ABOUT HIM…

• Lived between 1920- 1996

• American motion picture designer

• Made imaginative animated, titles, prologues, and epilogues

• Studied at the Arts Students League in New York city

• Attended Brooklyn college

• Apprenticeships with Manhattans design firms

• Freelance graphic designer

• Moved to Los Angeles in 1946

• Successful director

• produced short animated films, television openings and commercials,

live documentaries and features

• Creative art direction lead him to producing: Around The World In

Eighty Days (1956), Vertigo (1958), Psycho (1960), Spartacus (1960), etc.

• Best known for use of simple, geometric shapes and their symbolism

• A single dominant image stands alone to create a powerful message

• His posters capture the mood of the films using simple shapes and

images

• He preferred this way than a photograph of a film star

• The shapes were often hand drawn by him to create a casual

appearance with a sophisticated message

• Bass has collaborated with famous directors like Alfred Hitchcock,

Stanley Kubrick and Martin Scorses

• He designed the posters, animated and directed opening titles, credit

sequences to over sixty motion pictures

Bass revolutionized the way people viewed title and credit sequences by

using the time not just to display the information but give a short visual

metaphor or story that intrigued the viewer.

Often it was a synopsis or reference to the movie itself.

ANALYSIS OF SAUL BASS’S TITLE SEQUENCES…

http://www.artofthetitle.com/title/the-man-with-the-golden-arm/

THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN ARM

• Spiny, cut-out projectiles

• Veins and syringes that are disconcerting

• Elmer Bernstein's jazz soundtrack

• Lines proliferate and jab at awkward and unsettling angles

• Arm appears bent and tortured appendage

• Reaching out for redemption or a fix

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VG-

VPZ1AyOc&safe=active

WEST SIDE STORY

• Vertical bars create abstract effect

• Strangely representative

• As the mood changes the colours follow

• Arial shot of Manhattan and the vertical pattern confirmed.

• Simplistic sequence

• Dependent exercise

• The abstract bars resemble a perforated music roll

http://www.artofthetitle.com/title/vertigo/

http://www.artofthetitle.com/title/psycho/

• His work influences generations of graphic designers

• To transform movie tile sequences into art itself

• Examples of movies inspired by his work are ‘Monsters, Inc’ and ‘Catch

Me If You Can’

• In 1958 he worked with Otto Preminger again for ‘Anatomy of a Murder’

• Deconstructive technique works well with the dead body and adds

humour with the clever play on the word ‘anatomy’ as part of the films

title

• This influenced the poster ‘Clockers’ by Spike Lee in 1995

• A homage to Saul Bass was made by for ‘Precious’ by Lee Daniels in

2009