well I thought I'd kick it off by introducing one of the designers that have influenced me and in everything I do I have a tendency to refer to his work , Saul Bass. I guess it all started with a film directed by Hitchcock called North by Northwest and I kinda got carried away by the title sequence, if ever you have seen it it is an iconic piece of juxta-positioning and clever typography that gives you the essence of the movie on par with the directors own influence and thus Hitch having Bass do several other movies with him. But Bass was not a one trick pony he like Lowey influenced American graphics through the later part of the 20th century from type design through brand and into poster's and marketing. Me well I'm influenced by the illustrative nature of Bass's work and the clean lines of his brand work and I tend to favour a mix of the two disciplines when it comes to my own work. here are a couple of sites to get a feel for the great man http://www.artofthetitle.com/designer/saul-bass/ and http://saulbass.org/#portfolio so was he Spartacus ? who knows