Saul Bass Presentation Slides and Script

 Yesterday (6/02/14) we (Molly, Tom and I) conducted a presentation on the graphic designer Saul Bass. Here are our powerpoint slides along with a rough copy of our script.

SCRIPT

INTRO: VIDEO CLIP.- Saul Bass is globally known as a graphic designer and academy award winning film maker. His was born on 8th May 1920 in the Bronx, New York. He began his career in 1940’s Hollywood working with Otto Preminger helping him with print work for film adverts. Otto was so impressed by his work that he enlisted Bass’ help in creating title sequences for his film. Bass is most known for his film posters, particularly for The Shining, West Side Story and The Man with the Golden Arm - the film that made him known in the industry. His skills also include creating the logos for numerous brands such as Quaker Oats and United Airlines whilst also producing specific film title sequences for well-known directors - most notably Alfred Hitchcock.

POSTERS: When looking at Bass’ work in posters, it is clearly visible that his style uses lots of block colours and fonts. Bass’ film posters often featured either paintings or portray key scenes or main characters from the film, but instead of using just an image from the film Bass created the idea of film posters being made up of graphical design elements, that represents a moment from the film. He broke the traditional poster style with his “savage, jagged-print objects and use of broken type. He uses bold lines and text with simple images to echo the soviet commercial design of the 1920’s whilst also giving it an American twist to make it unique. It is Bass’ unique style that changed advertising completely, a film poster mainly consisted of key scenes and characters from the film, however Bass’ use of stylised figures and distorted shapes capture not only the titles of the films but also their themes and atmospheres.

Change slide….

Here is a slide to show several of Bass’s film poster. As you can see Saul Bass has created an awful lot of film posters and this is just some of them. Some of his best known posters - as seen here were made for Hollywood’s finest Otto Preminger, Alfred Hitchcock and also Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List however, his poster was never distributed in the end. His work with posters continued over 5 decades and went on to inspire many other graphic and poster designers and his work is most commonly known for its distinctive typography and minimalistic style.

TITLE SEQUENCES: Beginning with his title sequences, the video shown at the start of this presentation displayed a collection of the title sequences that Bass produced. His first title sequence was The Man with the Golden Arm and he linked the title to the controversial subject of the film. The film itself follows a Jazz Musicians struggle to overcome his heroin addiction - which was a huge taboo in the mid 1950’s. The title featured an animated black paper cut-out of an arm to symbolise heroin addicts. As Bass hoped, the title caused a to of controversy. Over the next 40 years, Bass continued to design and produce title sequences, employing diverse film-making techniques - from cut out animation to fully animated mini movies and live action sequences. His live action opening title sequences often served as prologues to the films and transitioned perfectly into their opening scenes. Overall, Bass has produced title sequences for over 50 different films - all involving various texts’ and transitions that reflect his overall style yet are still somewhat unique.

INFLUENCES: Over time, Bass has influenced several film-makers with his innovative title sequences. Examples of this are seen in Mad Men, X-men First Class and Catch Me If You Can. When looking at Bass’ work in Hitchcock’s Vertigo we see the image of the falling man, which is reflected in the opening sequence of AMC’s Mad Men where the entire sequence is cartoon shapes and a man again falling through the air.

CONCLUSION – In conclusion, Saul Bass has definitely put his mark on the film industry in terms of his posters and title sequences. His particular jagged edged font and block colours create a striking look to all his film posters and title sequences. So much so that on his 93^rd birthday, Google celebrated it with a trademark doodle.