Hollywood Movie Titles

When I was first approached about this article on Hollywood type effects, my eyes lit up as did my imagination. Being one of the biggest movie fans in the office, it made sense. I’m the one who is always going to midnight shows and still showing up for work the next day. It’s a passion that has played a major role in my creative process. I get so much more than two hours of entertainment; I also get a treasure trove of creative ideas.

Much of the peripheral visual media for a movie is also rich with inspiration. Has your attention ever been captured by a really well-designed movie poster, even if you weren’t interested in the movie? Before you know it you’re examining the logo, the overall image, the colors and you suddenly find yourself a little inspired. This happens to me all the time and it motivates me to try and re-create the effect.

One of the most visually stunning aspects of these posters is the overwhelmingly creative use of type. For some movies, the logo becomes one of the stars of the movie, and it gets its own star treatment in a way. For instance, let’s consider Steven Spielberg’s film, Jurassic Park. (I assume we’ve all seen it.) The posters for this movie were nothing more than the actual Jurassic Park logo on a black background. The logo had a certain theme park feel to it and that was all that was needed. It became an easily recognizable icon. Hence the name became one of the stars. You often see this with big-budget epic films—because these movies are promoted so heavily, they need eye-catching imagery. Another Spielberg classic that has a recognizable typeface is Raiders of the Lost Ark.

This type style has been typecast (pardon the pun) as a standard look for conveying action and adventure, and it’s been mimicked many times. Then there are those films’ titles that are a bit understated, but the appearance of the text still plays a critical role.

Take The Matrix, for example. The text treatment on this film used a standard typeface that was broken up and slightly offset in various places for a sort of convoluted effect. The result is a very simple graphic look, yet powerful enough to carry the theme of the movie. Other movies use simple customized fonts with mild type adjustments for a subtle effect. One example would be Spider-Man. This text effect is a line of text in a specially designed typeface with some careful character spacing, which is very effective.