Typography

TYPOGRAPHY RESEARCH 

 

We used the website DaFont to download the perfect font that we wanted we all chose certain fonts as a group and came to a conclusion that we wanted a font that have a sophisticated feel as well as a stand out violent approach to it with a bit of class which our films all about. A good example of what we was looking for was the Goodfellas font which is shown below. 

 

As a group we then came to the conclusion that it would be one of the following fonts: 

We went for the second font simply due to the fact that we believed that the first one was to thin and didnt have that stand out approach. the second one was very bold and stood out which was needed. It also gave of the impression as if it where on newspaper and very much a city like feel, which was crucial for our film.

Mean Streets (1973) — Art of the Title

Mean Streets (1973) — Art of the Title




The film Mean Streets fits into the genre of crime and drama. This title sequence starts with the main character Charlie (Harvey Keitel) who wakes up and looks in the mirror. This could signify that this character feels bad about things he is doing as he looks in the mirror with regret.  We already know this character is religious this is due to the cross on the wall and the dialogue at the start of the scene so it could give the impression that this man is stuck between his religious life and some sort of crime life he is living. The music then starts, which sounds like it is from the 1950's with an Italian like feel. This gives the impression that this film is set in little Italy which is evident further on in the title sequence.

We are then shown super 8 videos of Charlie socializing with his friends around  little Italy and they are all very well dressed in suits. This immediately gives the impression to the audience that they are gangsters in little Italy. This shows a transition between when we first see him he looks as if he is upset or concerned about something but when we see him through the super 8 camera he looks as if he is happy and enjoying being with his friends. We then see a baby which we assume is Charlies and that he is married. He also gives off a distant feel as his wife kisses him due to the fact that she kisses him on the cheek and he barely gives affection. This could show that he does not love his wife as much as she loves him or that he is more focused on his life outside of his family.

A shot of a character called Johnny Boy ( Robert De Niro) is then shown who we have not yet been introduced too his shown in to different shots without the main character charlie. This could infer that Johnny boy is going to be another key character in the movie and have some sort of relation with Charlie. The camera also starts to scratch even more during the last shot we see of Johnny Boy this could show that there is something not quite right with this man and maybe he is an antagonist to the story or Charlie. The next shot is of Charlie with a priest this again brings up the two lives that Charlie lives one a religious man another a gangster.

The cards we made

The Cards we made 

The images that are below are of the cards we made for our sequence. We found out the right dimensions of a average playing card and we then used Photoshop to create the cards and give the cards a realistic feel after this we stuck it on real playing cards with a glue stick.

Map scene

                                                       

We shot the map scene for our  title sequence with the original idea being that we would have a birds eye view of the map whilst it pans across. However it did not go smoothly with the shot not coming out at all how we expected. We could not hold the camera still enough for it to look the way we wanted it to look for example the camera kept shaking making the road names not visible through the camera.

Burning the book

The buring book idea was not the original idea, it was first going to be blood dripping out of the book. We felt as if the orginal idea did not make that much sense to the scene and the thematic's of our film it also came across as if it was a horror movie which was the impression we did not want to give. 

We then came up with the idea of burning the books. We felt as if this was relevant towards the film as it is all based around the idea of Luther Lewis cooking the books. We felt as if this would add a nice touch to our title sequence as it foreshadows and explains the story if someone was to analyse the our sequence.

Re-shoot of hospital scene

We re-shot the hospital scene due to the fact that Thabo rubbed his head too much during the scene we shot before. This didn't feel right once we started editing and didn't fell as if he was mourning over his fathers death. It also was very difficult to try and edit because every time we tried to cut it and put another part in it broke continuity because of the amount of time his head was rubbed. Therefore the second time we shot this scene we made Thabo cut down on the rubbing of his head. We also wanted to add more intensity into the scene with Anton starting to get irritant and walk around whilst he worries for his fathers life. We felt as if this would give more drama to the scene and put the audience into the mind frame of the character.

                                              
                                              

Script

Son - "Take it easy dad" 

Dad - "The Books" 

Son - "The books are done dad, There okay, I took care of it. 

Dad - "Im sorry..."

Son - "You dont need to be!" 

Dad - "The book... Im... im sorry..." 

Son - "NURSE!" 

This was the script that we wrote for the end scene of our title sequence where Anton Lewis ( Thabo) is talking to his father Luther Lewis and discussing the situation that they are in whilst Luther feels bad for what he has left behind for his son.

Shooting of title sequence

Shooting of Title Sequence

These are some shots of the preparation and filming of our title sequence. In this scene we was trying to make a underground gambling like feel with dark lighting and poker chips. These pictures also show our first idea which was writing the names on the card which is evident through the picture below. We shot this round Harry's house, in his cellar because it was easier to control the lighting and had a lot of free space.

Voice recording

In today's lesson we voice recorded the scene where Anton lewis and his father Luther lewis are discussing the situation they are in, whilst Luther is on his death bed. This was difficult as we were trying to find someone who had the right type of voice and could act as if they are dying. We eventually found the right person and after a few takes we had the recording perfected and ready for editing.

StoryBoarding

We used storyboards to know exactly what to do when we was shooting our title sequence. It helped us to plan out the precise camera angles and movements so that when it came to the making of the scene we could start straight away without the any problems of discussing what type of shot we wanted on the day. This storyboard also includes the specific sound used in that shot. This helped us get a vision in our head of what the sequence would look like. Our storyboard also had the specific time length of how long our shot should last for which was extremley helpful when it came down to shooting. This all however could be changed and modified to help fit in when editing it is only used as a rough guideline.

New card idea

We shot our first card sequence with normal playing cards with only the actors names written in pen. This looked to standard, however, we believed we could achieve higher and give it more of a realist feel. We decided we should create playing cards using photoshop with each card to represent the characters position or personality within the card. For example the ace was tom hardy as he is ray winstons second in command and ray winstons is the king because he is the leader behind the crimes.