Opening Sequence Research

We watched a few different title sequences from various different production companies in order to identify some of the conventions and similar techniques used in title sequences.

This will then be useful to us because it means we can use these sort of things in our opening sequence/title sequence

We chose to look primarily at the opening of Juno created by Shadowplay Productions and Rock 'n' Rolla created by Prologuefilms. These would be particularly interesting to see if they have any similarities in their conventions because they're such different films.


Conventions:

-Both opening sequences use songs, which set the tone for the film. Rock 'n' Rolla having a loud brash rock song, and Juno having a acoustic love song.
-They both also used animation in their opening sequences, animation is a clever media to use in opening sequence because it can be done alot cheaper and is often useful because you can be quite stylistic. It is also very eyecatching. Often title sequences will use animation for this reason, however this is not always the case. They are more often used in title sequences, perhaps as part of a larger opening sequence. In both these cases as a lot of opening sequences have they have live action sequences which then goes into an animated sequence for the titles. This is something we might possibly be able to do, depending on the practicality of this with our final idea.
- They also both had titles/credits and production company logo (or 2 in the case of Rock 'n' Rolla), this is something ALL opening sequences have, for obvious reasons.
- They also both introduced the main protagonist or one/or more of the main protagonists, something which most opening sequences do.
-Opening sequences also generally set up the tone of the film and you can often tell what sort of film it's going to be from the opening sequence.


-The Rock 'n' Rolla opening also had a voice over which is sometimes used in opening sequences (again often for introducing protagonists), although not always as in the case of the Juno opening sequence.

-Opening sequences also almost always include the title of the film, however this is not always the case. The best example of this I can think of is The Dark Knight in which 'The Dark Knight' comes up at the end of the film.

All these sort of things often crop up in the opening sequences of films, and we might be able to some or all of them in our own opening sequence