One Cut, Two Lights

One Cut, Two Lights

Produce ONE image: a macro photograph split by one diagonal light edge. Follow every line below. Replace only the FIELDS block; everything after it is fixed.

First — do you have the fields?

If any field below still has braces around it, stop and ask. Put all the questions in one short message, and show the example under each one so they can see the shape of a useful answer. Wait for the replies, then draw. Never fill a brace yourself: a value you invented is a value nobody asked for, and it will look exactly as considered as the ones they did give you.

Ask in whatever language they are writing to you in. Translate the questions and the examples; do not make someone read English to tell you what they want.

The examples are only examples. If someone answers a question, use their answer; never fall back to the example because you prefer it.

If the fields are already filled in, ignore this and carry on.

Fields — replace these seven lines only

• The subject: {what this is for} e.g. Vibary's summer build week
• The lit material: {what the light passes through} e.g. a single translucent leaf-green glass panel held to the light, its edge catching a bright rim, small dust motes visible inside it
• The dark material: {what sits unlit} e.g. deep indigo felt with a fine dense nap, unlit and matte
• The creature on the cut: {a small living thing} e.g. a small pale moth resting with its wings half open
• The small texts, for the lit side: {two or three short texts} e.g. VIBARY · a vibe library / Build Week / 18–24 July
• The display text, for the dark side: {one line} e.g. MAKE IT SLOWLY
• The two colour families: {lit side · dark side · display type} e.g. warm gold and pale green on the lit side · deep indigo and near-black on the dark side · the display type in bright gold

The assignment law

This style always gets its photograph right and its type wrong. Templates say "light text on dark ground, dark text on light" — true, and useless, because it describes a consequence rather than a decision. The type then lands wherever the composition looks balanced, which is how three small texts end up crowded onto the brightest quarter of the frame in a colour that nearly matches it.

Sides are assigned before anything is placed:

• The lit side carries the small structural texts — the name, the category, the date, a stamp. Set in the darkest tone on the page. They are readable because the ground behind them is at its brightest, and they are small enough not to interrupt the light.
• The dark side carries the display line — the largest type on the poster, in the brightest tone, alone. Nothing else goes there. A shadow is the only place a big bright word has no competition.

Nothing crosses the cut. No text spans both sides, and no text sits on the seam.

The test is squinting: any text that disappears is on the wrong side. That is not a size problem and enlarging it will not fix it.

The cut

• One straight edge at roughly 45 degrees, running corner to corner. Not a curve, not a soft gradient blend, not a vignette.
• It is a light boundary, not a collage seam: the two materials meet plausibly, as two things resting against each other under one light, rather than two photographs pasted together.
• The creature rests exactly on the cut, small, in focus, its body on one side and no more than a wing over the other. It is what makes the two halves one photograph.

The lit side

• Light passes through the material, not onto it. Its internal structure — veins, seeds, fibres, grain, bubbles — is visible because it is being transmitted, and the edge facing the light carries a bright rim.
• Soft bokeh appears only where light comes through, never on the dark side.
• Fine surface detail is welcome: droplets, frost, sugar, dust.

The dark side

• Deep, matte, saturated. Its texture is legible but unlit — nap, weave, grain, stone.
• No highlight, no rim light, no second source. The only light in the photograph is the one coming through the other half.

The type

• Two families at most: one serif for the small texts, one brush or display face for the single large line.
• No outlines, no shadows, no glows on any text. Contrast comes from which side the text was put on, which is the entire point of the assignment law.
• The small texts stack in one corner with a hairline rule between groups. The display line sits low on the dark side with generous space around it.

Never

• ✕ a text on the side that cannot carry its tone
• ✕ any text crossing or sitting on the cut
• ✕ outlines, drop shadows or glows used to rescue contrast
• ✕ a second light source, or a highlight on the dark material
• ✕ bokeh on the unlit side
• ✕ an opaque material on the lit side — the effect is transmission
• ✕ a creature large enough to straddle both halves

The result

A poster that reads at a glance and holds up close: one light coming through one material, one shadow holding one word, and every text placed where the photograph can actually carry it.