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A Division of UnderConsideration

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Unlike previous years, 2012 didn’t bring FPO as many posters in terms of quantity. But we can always count on the quality of our submissions and despite having a small pool of posters to celebrate the best, these twelve selections are a handsome dozen.

See also:
Part 1: Jan - Jun
Part 2: Jul - Dec

12 — A Studio Life

You gotta love visual puns, metaphors, allegories, allusions, and plain random connections that both poke fun and illuminate the aspects of our dear design profession. A simple offset print in black on a grid with small type goes a long way.

11 — ARTCRANK Free Range Poster

I wish more posters had chickens in them. If, in 2013, we showcase 12 posters with chickens on them, all of them would be included in this list at the end of the year. That this chicken is built of out of Portland’s streets and is printed on chocolate-colored paper only adds to the appeal.

10 — Don’t Tread on Me Poster

I love me a good overlay and this blue and orange silkscreen poster with all its hard edges and punchy graphics sparks some great third-color magic.

9 — Northern Sky Poster

Anyone willing to typeset and vectorize a constellation gets my vote and not only is the design on this gorgeously obsessive but the print is like staring out in the sky while camping in a national park with a little fire burning by your side. Or not. Maybe it’s just an awesome print.

8 — Dill Pickle Club Fundraising Poster

This poster had me at “Pickle”. But also at the letterpress pounding that that paper must have endured under all that ink coverage. Plus, I think there is not enough posters with eagles holding foodstuffs in their beaks.

7 — “A Ride Through Town” Poster

What’s not to love in this poster? The roughish textures? The vest-wearing dog? The dapper men on the bicycle? The perfectly stacked clouds? Nope, there is nothing not to love.

6 — Typographic Matchmaking Poster

Pairing two different typefaces together is almost an art and this letterpress poster of popular, real-life and fictitious pairs makes an artful case for it.

5 — Holmberg Wooden Poster Series

A lot of DIY went into these very limited edition posters, including pressing, manually, some metal type and rubber stamping and stenciling and vinyling and… yeah, just all kinds of loving.

4 — Glow-In-The-Dark Poster Surprise

The phosphorescent ink in this poster turns an innocent Main Street into a seedy underworld in the dark.

3 — Chartis Graphein

Dude! That is some serious typesetting hours that went into this and the white/silver printing on black stock elevates this world map to Must-Have status.

2 — Wee Alphas Limited Edition Screen Print

Dude! (Sorry). This is a 13-color silkscreen print. This is, like, Registration X-Factor. Adding to the printing feat are the clever, cheerful animal-letters created by Office.

1 — Sigils of the Houses of Westeros Poster

If I had a penny for every e-mail we received asking if this sold-out poster was going into a reprint I would have, um, 50 cents. Which doesn’t sound like much, but we’ve never had this kind of feverish interest in any project we’ve published. And it deserves all the attention and lusting it’s gotten. Expertly designed and handsomely produced this Game of Thrones homage is not just the best of the posters but I would most likely take it as my favorite FPO project of all 2012.

The Best of 2012 on FPO, Part 2: Jul - Dec

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