Words and lettering played an enormous role in films of the silent era. Film titles made their appearance in the earliest silent films, along with letter cards (or inter-titles), which provided context. These cards were the responsibility of the lettering artist, who collaborated with the scriptwriter and director to create narrative continuity so that audiences could follow what they were seeing. Distinct from these inter-titles was the film’s main title, a vehicle of particular concern to film producers because of the legal, copyright and marketing information this footage had to bear.
This is a key part of title sequence history because this tells us that this part of the film is just information rather than to introduce any meaning about the film. They where also for he benefit of the film makes as they needed this to copyright there own work. What I find interesting is that this was birth of one of the most important parts of the film and we see nearly everyday.
As movies grew more popular, their titles evolved. Movie producers invested considerable sums in film production and sometimes resorted to fixing a dog of a film by rewriting the inter-titles. For a time, “film doctor” Ralph Spence (1890–1949) was the highest-paid title writer in the industry, earning $10,000 a picture for his one-liners. During the 1920s and ’30s, European cinema was deeply influenced by modernism, and aspects of this visual sensibility were brought to the US by filmmakers who were fleeing the Nazis. Meanwhile, the studio systems operating in Europe and Hollywood also delighted in creating titles that featured vernacular graphic novelties. As much as possible, they liked to convey the tone of a movie through the “dressage” of its main title. Thus, blackletter fonts in the opening credits were used to evoke horror, ribbons and flowery lettering suggested love, and typography that would have been used on “Wanted” posters connoted a western flick.
This is very interesting, this is where all the famous stereotypical typefaces of certain genres where presented to audience which help develop the typefaces we see today. These are all stilled used in today's modern film making which gives me background information when deciding on the font that I use for my title sequence.
The incorporation of audio into movies — making them “talkies” — didn’t revolutionize how film titles were handled, at least not immediately. However, we do see one avant-garde animator and painter of German origin, Oskar Fischinger, give serious thought to the relationship between visual effects and music. Fischinger’s practice of subordinating the visual rhythm to the audio was repeated often in motion graphics and title design.
The concept of score visualization first conceived by Oskar Fischinger in his film “Studies” anticipates the effects created by Saul Bass in “The Man With the Golden Arm” (1955) and later by Susan Bradley in “Monsters, Inc” (2001).
Oskar Fischinger looks to be the inventor of the modern-day title sequence. Almost all of the graphic designers who take on the task of creating a title sequence will always, in some way, use an aspect of in their sequences. What I find interesting is that the style that was made by Saul Bass are still being made and are still popular in the 21st Century and will carry on.
Every sphere of contemporary life — and especially the film business — has been affected by computers. For designers, creating film titles meant participating in the apprenticeship tradition — learning by doing, on the job; that continued unabated into the mid-1990s. At that time, dynamic openers by Kyle Cooper and others showed what the next generation of design-educated, film-literate, tech-savvy creatives could do. That apprenticeship tradition has largely been overshadowed by the rise of popular technology, the Internet-enabled archiving of everything and the plethora of schools that propagate countless design disciplines. Most significantly, we see designers working like filmmakers and filmmakers working like designers.
This is where titles and the typography used becomes the art form that it is today. From the mind of Kyle Cooper, many graphic and title designers are able to refer back to his work to get ideas of new ways to present the first five minutes of a film. This is what I personally find extremely interesting about this part of film history and shows that these first impression don't have to be boring but can be key to the film narrative.
The potential of digital graphics and typography has attracted some of the most creative minds to motion design. Pixar and Disney have reserved crucial parts in the branding of their films for the title sequences. Using animated characters to introduce viewers to the story became a popular trend. Such talented graphic designers as Susan Bradley (Toy Story, Monsters, Inc., WALL-E, Ratatouille), Jaimi Caliri (Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events), Dave Nalle (Corpse Bride), Michael Riley (The Back-Up Plan, Kung Fu Panda) and Michael Curtis (Brother Bear) use all manner of tools to test different approaches to designing titles. One thing these individuals have in common is a drive to find a strong metaphor and tell an exciting story with their sequences.
These are some of the many new designers that have contributed to the film title world which all have roots of Saul Bass or even Kyle Cooper in their work which help their great work shine in the industry that they work in. I really finds this interesting and will different show some reference to either Bass or Cooper when it comes to creating my own sequence.
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