alanis viera designs - The Grateful Crane

The brief required creating a photography series based around a fantasy, myth or legend, which will then be used as a base to design for an event. The deliverables of the brief were to create a magazine, posters, merchandise and a promotional video for an event.

The designs are based on the ancient Japanese folktale ‘Tsuru No Ongaeshi’, which translates to The Grateful Crane. The story depicts a poor farmer who receives good fortune after he rescues a wounded crane.

The final design resulted in a ballet production based on The Grateful Crane story in collaboration with The Australian Ballet Company. The primary elements are sophisticated, flowy, simplistic and elegant. The colour palette is minimal, but it portrays vital aspects of the story, such as describing characteristics of the environment, characters and certain events in the storyline. The photography and the applied effects of motion give movement to the photographs. The brief required experimentation of cameraless photography as well. I experimented with scanography, which involves scanning objects to make unique and distorted imagery. Many of the photographs and designs are inspired by ancient Japanese art, particularly the delicate and quaint paintings of Nihonga paintings.

The Grateful Crane

Year// 2023

Category// Photography, Publication, Branding: Packaging, signage, Brand assets

Client// Swinburne University of Technology

Magazine Cover