Even though I wasn't involved in the filming of the title sequence used for the rough cut, I still made my own title sequence to demonstrate that I could and to gain experience if I ever make one again. Check out the finished product below:
When planning my title sequence, I wanted it to be fast-paced and place a heavy emphasis on digital technology. I wanted to create something that would feel like an information overload as the audience is bombarded from all sides visually and aurally.
I first started out with my production company logo and the flashing images warning. I know that flashing images on screen like the ones in the title sequence can affect photosensitive people in serious ways, so I took that into account and made the warning long. I also used the warning as a way to pad out the opening few seconds of the music so that I could place my logo in a place where it wouldn't drag on for too long or be too short. The logo alone establishes a lot of science-fiction and thriller vibes, what with how dark it is and the television screen effect.
For my font, I used Bahnschrift Semi-Condensed - It gave off a good, sleek, sans-serif look, and the semi-condensed version was just right as it was the mid-point between normal Bahnscrift, which looks like any other font you would see, and the condensed version, which looks much weirder and more, well, condensed. The font, primarily used for German road signs, has a distinctly modern look to it.
I also considered using Dismedia, a science-fiction font intended for use in cyberpunk media. It's a good font for sci-fi and/or thriller, with its squared-out edges and modern, sans-serif look. However, I thought it to be too retro-futuristic for my taste, as it evokes somewhat of a more 1980s feeling.
One other font I considered using was good old Calibri. As a font many people see everyday, I felt that it would be apt to include it in a title sequence for a film criticizing media consumption in everyday life. As a sans-serif font made in the 2000s, I almost included it except for one thing - it's Calibri. The font is just too generic and uninteresting, and probably wouldn't make for a good eye-catching font.
When text was on the screen, it was white, with a black background. I have been inspired to do this by the opening to Neon Genesis Evangelion (1996), which includes flashing images and big white words upon black standalone boards. The text pops out from the black background, instantly drawing attention to it. I did consider using red font, but it looks almost unnatural with the Bahnschrift font. Red letters do draw the eyes, but they clash too much with the blue and green colors of the rest of the title sequence. The short duration the text is on screen for is probably ample time for any reader to read at a normal speed, too, so I didn't worry much about people not being able to see the names. I chose not to use moving text or text on footage or images, as I think it wouldn't really fit with the fast-paced music. I also thought it would destroy the contrast made between the boards of text and the rest of the title sequence.
I credited everyone who was there on the day of filming, and added a few frames to thank to the person who lent us his house for the day to film. I started from the beat drop of the music because I wanted to establish a sufficient tone before I started to put the titles in. I also intended (as I have said) for the titles to be very short, so I put them towards the latter part of the title sequence due to the much faster beat.
For music, I used a breakcore mix that I'd listened to before on YouTube, made by Reizoko Cj. The breakcore is frantic and fast-paced, using multiple samples from wildly different places, and thus signifies a sensory overload from the sheer amount of information one receives through media. The cluttered and fast sound reflects the cluttered and fast life of the modern person. The sound used is all non-diegetic, as I don't think the sound would have been very effective had I put diegetic sound over the music, which was used very deliberately. The music doesn't reflect the genre of thriller very well, which I intended to show more through the visual part of the title sequence, but it does reflect the genre of science fiction through its deliberate usage discussed above. The song used for most of the music was Reizoko Cj's CirnoRHTL, which uses the tune of Cirno's Perfect Math Class by IOSYS.
Visually, I used a lot of cuts in tune with the music, the hopeful effect of which I have talked about above. For the section right before the beat drop, I got the faces of people from This Person Does Not Exist, a website that uses AI to construct human faces. The amount of human faces signifies the transparency of people on the Internet as well as the interconnectivity of the world through modern technology.
I used a lot of FX - one such effect is the TV effect in Vegas Pro, which I used for the images. I also added green color grading to the shots I had filmed, and darkened a lot of the footage. I added a reverse fish-eye effect for the second shot that I filmed, and added a .PNG for a bloody screen, distorting and blurring it heavily. A lot of the FX was used to generate a techno-thriller vibe, combining a dark frame with the TV screen effect.
Overall, I enjoyed the process of making my title sequence a lot, especially with the creative liberty I had over the editing. It wasn't very difficult, but I did have problems finding out exactly what I wanted to film by myself.
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