Director's first credit examples

Our establishing shot

The establishing shot of our opening is a pill bottle, which we have decided to add a title into. We wanted the title 'a ____ film' or 'a film by ____' on the bottle, because we think it works well in the shot to introduce the name of our director. Here are some other examples of this being done in films:

The Dead Zone (1983)

The Breakfast Club (1985)

Beetlejuice (1988)

Donnie Brasco (1997)

Hollowman (2000)

Dreamcatcher (2003)

Fight Club (1999)

Se7en (1995)

Various Tarantino films

Film title ideas

Mac 5 were in our lesson editing, when we realized that we haven't really blogged about ideas for the title of our film! We wanted to incorporate the clinical aspects of the film, and following in this thought chain came the name 'Double Blind' which we were introduced to in GCSE biology.

Here is the Google definition of our title:

Here is some further wiki research:



We have chosen this title because we would like it to reflect our character's duplicate personality. The concept of the researcher and the patient being unaware of the effects of a treatment fits in with both the medical nature of our film, and the idea that our psychiatrist is a qualified woman in a position of power, abusing these drugs, yet her patients are unaware that she is potentially dangerous to them.
We are yet to decide on a creative way to present this title, though we have started exploring 'shutter' effects, to make our title appear in quick flashes, as though a blind has been opened.

Title sequence inspiration

After much contemplation, our group has decided to add our titles in post-editing. We figured it would suit the film genre slightly more than filming the titles in the real world, which is more typically associated with comedy or indie films such as Napoleon Dynamite shown below:

However, rather than just having our titles roll across, or fade in and out of the screen, we would like to use elements in our setting to make the sequence a little more interesting.

We have looked at a few examples of this which we really like, such as the opening sequence of Six Feet Under:



The opening sequence for Dexter really inspired our group in producing our own sequence too. We plan to use close ups to create intimacy, and an uncomfortable viewing experience for our audience - Dexter is a great example of how our close ups could be shot incorporating the titles:

Although both of these sequences are for TV series', we think adding our titles in, in a similar way would be much more appealing for our audience while maintaining a sequence reflective of our film genre.

Title sequence ideas

Our group has been doing some research on the order of our title sequence, and after reading online and watching several examples, we have a list of common titles and the relative order they go in:

• Name of studio
• Name of production company
• A film by
• Starring
• Film title
• Featuring
• Casting
• Music
• Production design
• Editor(s)
• Director of photography
• Producer(s)
• Based on the book/ characters/ story by
• Screenplay by
• Written by
• Director

We don't plan on using all of these in our opening, so we have narrowed down the list. The potential titles we may use are highlighted in blue.

A great deal of our research was done using artofthetitle, which provided us with inspiration for potential fonts and for the position of our titles. Here are a few examples:

                                                             Grand Prix (Film)

                                                             The conjuring (Film)

                                                             Black sails (TV)

                                                             United States of Tara (TV)
                                                             (Sorry, I had to)

Se7en

In our last few lessons, we have been watching se7en, directed by David Fincher, as a class.

This opening sequence was ranked by IFC as the third greatest title sequence of all time, and is one of the most memorable:

The sequence is a montage of unnerving close ups, giving the viewers an insight into the killers mind, and an intimate view of his artistic expressions. The use of extreme close ups and jump cuts in the sequence creates an unsettling atmosphere, in conjunction with the sharp music in which a few short screams and disturbingly high pitched sounds can be distinctly heard. The editing done by Angus Wall, incorporated techniques such as fading, dissolving and superimposition to add to the abrupt, distorted and almost violent composition of the sequence. Here is the storyboard of the sequence, drawn by Wayne Coe:

The actual titles of the film looked almost hand drawn to reflect the idea of the audience seeing through the killers perspective, and they appear in roughly 4 second long flashes then are quickly wiped off the screen to reinforce the distressing atmosphere. Here are stills of the titles, designed and executed by Kyle Cooper:

The opening sequence for se7en is extremely effective in creating a thrilling atmosphere and mood for the rest of the film, and the techniques used help place a visual emphasis on significant details, which are revealed and explained later on in the movie. As a viewer, I was compelled by the sequence and in creating our two minute opening, my group hopes to use similar techniques to engage our audience. We have also taken away some ideas about how to present our titles more dexterously, to reflect the atmosphere we hope to create.