With World Cup fever breaking out, you would have thought my company was located in the middle of Europe yesterday. Aside from early coverage on the FIFA 2006 posters, I haven't really commented on the World Cup. I'm trying ot resist getting pulled in to the fervor. But resistance is futile since I work with so many Europeans. To touch on the subject again, I noticed AllPosters.com (not trying to sell anything here, but I couldn't find anything on the official site) has available, a number of additional posters not covered in the previous post. Guess the posters for the individual cities weren't released until after the earlier post.

Anyhow, I noticed an over use of the 'heart' theme. It's central to the theme of this Munich poster, but could have easily been left out of this otherwise cool Cologne poster. They could have used a soccer ball pattern or even the outline of the city or country. I just think the use of the heart/seed pod shape is a bit cliché.

But touching on the ones I favor, this Stuttgart poster makes interesting use of the architectural icons in what could have been another cheesy rainbow streak behind a ball. The Leipzig poster gives a nod to its history, the city is famous for book printing and trading in the later middle ages. While the player kicking the ball in the background is nothing new, but the ball itself, it's well executed though it seems a bit heavy. They could have maybe dispersed the letters more in the white patches, this would have also aided them in getting a gradient going to enhance the 'spherical-ness' of the ball. Using colors in the different patches would have also made it seem lighter. I somewhat appreciate the simple Berlin poster, but if I knew what the poster represented that could sway me either way.

And my favorite of the bunch, the Nuremburg poster. The focus of it is Albrecht Dürer's Ein junger Feldhase (A Young Hare), a a work of art dating back to 1502. I'm not fond of the designer using the actual piece in the background, but the outline of it used for the field piece is eye catching, capturing all the speed, tenacity and energy of the World Cup.

Lastly, the Germany poster itself. It seems a bit retro doesn't it? I'm thinking of the 80's, possibly the 70's as I stare into space. Those extra bright shimmering stars, do the represent the approximate location of the cities hosting the games or am I just reading too much into it?

Given the importance of the automotive industry to Germany, I would have expected to see some posters dedicated to the idea of an engine, the closest thing I saw related to tech was this Kaiserslautern poster, looks like a circuit board, could have done without the soccer ball, or they could have at least made the soccerball fit in with the overall theme. Anyway, I would have liked to see a engine powered soccer player dribbling or kicking a soccer ball in one of the posters, but oh well. Coupled with the previous 'artsy posters' overall, this isn't a bad collection.

Come back tomorrow when we take a close look at this year's logo.