Wednesday 10 December 2008

Ideas for the title sequence

For our title sequence, after watching some of the title sequences, we decided to go with animation. We all quite liked having fancy text with swirly lines and patterns going around it, but we wernt to sure about what the story was going to be about or what genre it was going to be. So we sat down and discussed it and came to a decision that we would go for a childrens film. Like this we could have done any storyline whereas if we made it in to another genre we would have had to consider alot more things to link with the animation, and doing animation is already alot to think about. We thought we could recontruct a fairytale such as 'The Little red Riding Hood, Three Blind Mice' or a childrens programme such as, 'Phineas and Ferb or Hannah Montana'. Some of these are very common and have already been used in films like 'Shrek'. But then we came up with the idea of using childrens books which are not so common or well known. Thinking of this, Hannah thought of a book that she use to read when she was little called 'Laura's Star'. This book is a story about a little girl who captures a fallen star. She mends its breaking point and begins a new friendship with this star. Some time after, ths star starts fading and she realises that it must return back to the sky. So we thought this story would be realy good to work on becuase its not a realy common book and the 'star' would have been interesting to animate.






Tuesday 9 December 2008

'Bass' on titles...



This is a video of Saul bass speaking to us about some of his work.

(click below to see the 'Bass on titles' video clip)
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=9UU132IUU_o




Saul Bass was an American graphic desinger who was well known for his title opening sequences in films such as Alfred Hitchcocks 'North by Northewest' and 'Psycho'.

He started off by working in Hollywood doing print work for film ads and posters but thought that he should take a step higher and make a chnage in the way we see title sequences. He was the first to realise creative potential of the opening and closings of films. He said that 'the titles are the first interaction with films and this must draw the audiences attention in to the film making them want to carry on and watch the rest of the film which often mirros the film.


His first title seqeunce which was designed for Otto Premingers film 'the man with a golden arm'. This was publicised with a picture of a arm which mirrored part of the film. The storyline was about a Jazz musician who was addicted to herion, showing his struggles. When music is added to this it just makes it laot more dramatic to watch. The titles for this film were very simple. A plain black background was shown with thin white stips sliding in and out of the screen on to the black background and the small white font names which appeared around these stripes. It ends with the image of the white cutout of the arm which again is dramatised with the music. The title is very simple and does its jobs of drawing the audience in, making them want to watch more by not giving away too much information.
Another title sequence that I looked at was North by Northwest by Alfred Hitchcok.

Sunday 7 December 2008

Our title sequence...

It took us a whie to actualy decide what we wanted to do for our title sequence. We started watching openings of films like James Bond, Quantum Of Solace and Casino Royal. We also watched titles sequences of films like, Catch Me If You Can, North By Northwest, Westside Story and Juno. After watching some of these opening sequences, we were inspired alot by the different types of aimation that were used in them. We then sat and discussed some of these openings and thought about how we could use them in our own. So at this point we had a rough idea about what we wanted to do, which was to use animation. We carried on watching opening sequences of films that had animation in them, such as Juno and catch me if you can.



What is the importance of a Title seqeunce?



Continuety Peice

Unfortunately the Mac wont let me upload my continuety peice on to my blog. So, I have added a link from Hannah's blog which will take you to our continuety peice.

This is the link to the first cut that we have done. It leads on to hannahs blog.

http://hmoores.blogspot.com/2008/12/continuity-sequence-first-cut.html

This is the second and final-cut of our continuety peice. It leads on to Hannah's blog.

http://hmoores.blogspot.com/2008/12/continuity-second-and-final-cut.html