The Art Of Film Title Design Throughout Cinema History

"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."


I have chose to post this because I found this interesting, this is completely down to it showing the history of title sequences. This shows that when films originated they were underprivileged and couldn’t' use sound in there production. The film producer’s didn’t have the chance to use diegetic sound, non diegetic sound and dialogue. This shows how society and the film/media industry has changed, it provides the idea that technology has evolved the way in which the audience can relate to a film.


"The main title from the American release of “The Cabinet of Dr. Calligari” (1920) is much less expressive than the title from the influential original German film (restored original version):"

I find his interesting because it again shows hoe the film/media industry has changed. One the right is an original main title from the film 'The Cabinet Of Dr. Caligari' and one the right is a new version that has been restored. The use of typography in the restored version is effective; this is because it hints at a possible genre. The typography that is used is horror like typography so this could indicate that the genre is horror. The original version has plain typography this is less effective as it doesn’t inform the genre unless the audience watch the whole film. The restored version uses the colour green as the background he colour green could symbolises jealousy or poison. The original is black and white so this don’t indicate on symbolise anything, this doesn’t allow the audience to gather any meaning from it.

"As movies grew more popular, their titles evolved."


This is true and interesting; this is down to the more money that the film/media industry produce means they can spend more on upgrading thing. For example they can use higher profiled celebrities or upgrade equipment. The more money used could encourage better equipment meaning the designer is provided with software which supplies the designer with more features. The more features used could be used to reach a wider target audience. Also the higher a celebrity profile means the more people might want to see it, this can lead to an increase in profit and again more equipment will be used. This is what has happen over the past century, the designers have been given better equipment this has made there title better and more presentable.
"Breakthrough ideas in titling, such as timing the typography to interact with metaphorical imagery or to create its own world, were largely innovations that came from outsiders to the Hollywood studio system. Figures such as Saul Bass, Pablo Ferro, Maurice Binder and Richard Williams arrived on the scene in the 1950s, at a time when the studios were starting to flounder in their fight with TV. At that time, independent filmmakers made commercial headway by doing things differently, spreading utterly fresh ideas about the possibilities of title sequences. This is the era in which the discipline of film title sequence design was actually born."


I find this interesting as it informs be about how titles were getting predictable and the way in which people changed this. This provides me with information that the film titles were becoming second best compared with TV as they were loosing there fight of becoming better. It shows me that the new ideas that were thought of came from people outside Hollywood. It informs me that the likes of Saul Bass, Pablo Ferro, Maurice Binder and Richard Williams prevented Hollywood from going out of business as they added a different dimension and came up with ideas that amazed the audience.
"Every sphere of contemporary life — and especially the film business — has been affected by computers."


This point is true and this is interesting as it shows how technology has changed the way in which title sequences are displayed to the audience. When the films originated everything including dialogue, credits and sound were presented using letter cards, now everything is created and edited via a computer or some sort of technology. This has affected the film/media industry because these changes have generated more funds and money for that industry. Also the advance in other types of technologies has aided the way in which films are show. The new technology gives the designers more freedom to experiment new things whereas when they were originated the designer’s didn’t have that privilege.