Planning Opening Credits - Miss Georgiou

Planning Opening Credits

Opening credits are important in an opening thriller sequence because they inform the audience of the title of the film and also the starts that appear in it and directors and other important people that feature in the film.  It also introduces the style and genre of the film and gives the audience an idea of what they should expect when watching the film.

This is the opening credits used in the thriller film Se7en (1995) directed by David Fincher. We analysed the different conventional elements to a thriller film and also analysed what we as an audience found out from the opening credits.

Colour Scheme

The colour scheme used in the opening credits of Se7en is quite conventional. The black and white colour scheme represents good and evil theme but also the lack of colours presents a dark atmosphere. The colour black connotes darkness and also mystery which is conventional to an antagonist of a thriller film. Also the black connotes the evil antagonist whilst the white colour connotes a good protagonist.

The Style of Credits

The style of credits gives the atmosphere a jagged and hazed feel. This is because the font mirrors a child like style of handwriting and the credits appear on the screen all over the place and slightly blurred. This represents a mental and unstable character in the film. Also when the credits appear on screen there is short flashes of light on the words which makes them look as if they are being repeated and that they are not fully disappearing. This could relate to the antagonist in the film to give the audience the idea that the antagonist won't just disappear but will carry on killing victims. This helps add to the mental and unstable aura of the antagonist that the credits is trying to exemplify to the audience.

The Use of Thriller Conventions

A popular convention of thriller films is an unidentified or hidden killer/antagonist. This is ultimately to present an enigma and make it hard for the audience to build relationships with the antagonists. This convention is also portrayed in the opening credits of Se7en. The images used in the opening credits are extreme close up images which only ever show irrelevent parts of the body for example a finger or an eye. However these images create mystery and suspense as the audience feel there is a certain focus on these images and therefore this makes them think deeper into it. The images in the opening credits never show any characters or faces which makes the audience anticipate who the antagonist will be and this makes them more likely to want to watch the film. Another convention portrayed i the opening credits of Se7en that is conventional to the thriller genre is the iconography shown in the images. The iconography includes images of someone drawing in a book, a sharp blade and photos of the victims. These are conventional to the thriller genre because we usually expect the antagonist to plan his murder before the happening occurs.

The Order of Appearance

The order of appearance is important in the opening credits because it is what the audience take notice of. Therefore most films produce an order with the most popular names of actors near the front which will be appealing to the audience as a big actor they like may feature in the film and therefore this is the first thing they will see. The order of appearance in the opening credits to Se7en is production company, director, actor, title of film, actors continued, casting, music, costumes, editors, production, camera operator, co-producer, producer, writers and director. The reason for the repetition of the directors name at the end of the sequence is because the director is quite famous and recognisable. By having his name repeated twice it will be more obvious to the audience to notice it and recognise him. This may make the audience think that the film may be as good as other films he has produced in the past and therefore make them more likely to want to watch the film.

My Groups Opening Credit Design Ideas

 

Each member of my group including me created our own opening credits to our thriller sequence. We created these credits on the programme Final Cut Pro X. We interpreted all our ideas into these credits before showing them to our group members and analysing the strengths and weaknesses of each others work.

 

This is an example of the opening credits I created for my own thriller sequence. The title of our film is Devour so I tried to make this stand out the most. I done this by making the title font bigger in size than the rest of the subtitles and also by changing the colour to red. This is not only conventional to opening thriller credits due to the main focus of the title but also due to the title being in red. Having the title in the colour red is conventional because the colour red usually represents blood, pain, brutality and death.

The positioning of the title in the middle makes it clearly stand out well and also shows the audience that this is clearly an important part to the sequence and gives them an understanding of what out sequence may be about and gets them thinking about what they may expect to see. The different titles will come in from different directions of the scene. This kind of represents the chase scene in our sequence, this is because the antagonist is the big and powerful being who chases the victims into different directions. This could represent the antagonist being the title "DEVOUR" and the other pieces of information such as the subtitle and actors names will come in at different directions.

My Design Idea

 

These are my other group members opening credit design ideas:

Kane's Design Idea

This is Kane's design idea that he created to use as part of our thriller sequence. I find that there are both many strengths and weaknesses to Kane's opening credit design idea. A strength of Kane's idea is the faded red colour underneath the title. This resembles blood which is conventional to the thriller genre and would give the audience an immediate understanding that our own thriller production may include blood and weapons which is a key convention of thriller films. This would help to create suspense as it would intrigue the audience as they would want to know who's blood it is and also the cause of the blood whether it is a person, animal or other being which may persuade them to want to watch the film. I also think faded black colour in the four corners of Kane's design idea is also effective. Black can represent many things in the thriller genre such as pain, evil and mostly death. This could represent that death may be included in our film which will make them sense the blood and the death could be linked and this may cause suspense to make them want to watch the film. Some weaknesses of Kane's design idea could be that the title itself could stand out more which would possibly make his design look more effective. He could maybe put a white fill instead of an outline which would make the title more bold and make it more eye-catching for the audience. Another weakness in Kane's design idea is that the font style and appearance doesn't really resemble the setting of our thriller piece whereas if it did this could be more effective. For example the pale beige brown colour used in the background could be a darker brown or musky green to resemble our setting of a forest. This would help the audience to understand a little knowledge of our film or make their own conclusions of the film before watching it which could be effective and ultimately make the audience more eager to watch our film. Overall I think Kane's idea of using the blood surrounding the font worked really well in giving the audience an idea of our thriller film and its narrative and I think it would have fit in well. However I believe that using this style credit for each credit entering the screen may look to much and a bit messy to have over our film.

 

Malu's Design Idea

This is Malu's design idea that she created for the opening credits to our thriller piece. There is also strengths and weaknesses that I analysed of Malu's opening credits. A strength of Malu's design idea is the characterized font on a plain black background. This is conventional because the black background makes the font bold and eye-catching which instantly catch the audiences attention and makes them wonder about the film as it doesn't give too much away about what may be included in the film. She has also included a blur effect over the font which may resemble a unclear and mysterious character or idea which may be part of the sequence. There has also been a yellow green colour inserted over the top of the font to resemble or setting of a forest however as this isn't entirely clear the audience could make there own interpretations of the colour scheme and what it may resemble as this also builds the intensity and keeps the audience anticipating. Due to the colours representing the forest being in the middle of the black background this could interpret danger being surrounded by the forest and also the people in the middle of the forest such like the font may be in danger. This would make the audience paranoid as they wonder who in the forest may be in danger and why. A weakness of Malu's design idea is that the font may be a bit small and unclear and it could be improved to make it more bold and to immediately stand out to the audience. I think that she could maybe do this by making the font a bit bigger and maybe adding a white or bright coloured outline around the font to ensure that it would stand out against a harsh black background. Overall I think that Malu's design worked really well and she thoroughly thought out her methods in interpreting the setting and danger of the characters into her font and credits and I think that he credit would fit in with the genre and narrative of our opening thriller sequence.
 

In our opening sequence we are planning to have our opening credits give information on the title, actors names, director, director of photography, editor and also the producer. All the different opening credits will come in order of importance. We will have the actors names first and we will also make sure our title isn't the last credit to appear as this resembles a trailer. The opening credits will all come onto the screen in a different direction that the one before . This is to resemble the chase scene in our sequence and the unstableness and vulnerability of the victims. Just like Se7ens opening credits where the credits appears jagged and looked as if they was all over the place on the screen to resemble the unstable and mentality of the antagonist.