Typography & Title Ideas

I have been looking at typography of urban drama films to get an idea of what type of text is commonly seen in films of this genre. I looked at a series of film posters and paid attention to font, colour and style of the titles. This aids us in our opening as it we could hopefully make it fit its genre more and make it look like a genuine film opening. I noticed that bold fonts were common as well as the use of block colours, the overall title style is quite simplistic but stands out. Urban drama titles are often quite vibrant and clear, simple fonts are used.

Below I have chosen a few titles as examples of urban drama titles. They all demonstrate typical traits of the typography expected from urban dramas such as, bold vibrant use of colours, clear simplistic fonts, and overall they are block and bold in style.  

   

We started to think of titles for our film opening and we thought of things which relate to the context of the opening, therefore we thought of several ways to describe riots or violent action. As well as this we thought about where it is set which is London and possible titles surrounding this were abbreviations or relative words.
Here is the list of names we came up with before deciding our final title name:

• Insurgence - We liked this title idea as it represents the action of rebellion which we will be trying to convey in the opening.
• LDN - This title name was influenced by Lily Allen's album name as well as being a common abbreviation for London.
• Skyline
• Uprising
• Liots - This idea came from the idea of merging two words 'London' and 'riots' which is common in text language which would represent the youth angle our opening is showing.
• Capital
• Central - This clearly presents where in the country the violence happened most but also we have only one main protagonist that we follow in the opening so could be reflective of her as being central to the story.
• Disruption
• Moral decay
• Lawless - We often saw the violent acts of the riots not being stopped by surrounding police and so this title name hints towards as the authorities being helpless and lawless against rioters.
• Urban war
• Against the crowd
• Tagged - This title idea arose from thinking of young offenders being electronically tagged after committing offences.
• Rocks and Bottles - We thought that this was the best title name as it has a slightly abstract meaning just like urban dramas such as 'Fish Tank' and 'Albatross'. The idea of the impromptu weapons used in the riots involved in the title also helps us get across the violence behind our story line. I saw this as a sub heading in an online news article and it struck me as a good title to use for our film opening.

I created a poll from our short list of possible titles so we can see which title idea would be most successful and is popular with our audience. Rocks & Bottles was the most liked with 62% of the votes.

 

Amy F

Top Boy Opening Deconstruction

The clip begins with several establishing shots of the urban setting of London. This sets up the action by introducing the genre and placement of the story allowing the audience to familiarise themselves with the surroundings firstly before any character or the plot is introduced.


The opening scene switches between various different places and characters within this setting. A young boy figure in is shadows shown from behind creating enigma and raising questions. The next shot is over his shoulder looking out the window down on a couple by a car. The secretive angle shows that perhaps he's snooping and spying on his neighbours. The high angle of the shot suggests perhaps he is more superior and powerful. Because he is watching an incident that should be kept low-profile, he has knowledge - represented maybe by his school uniform.The fact he doesn't seem to react to the situation shows the type of lives the people in the area have. His silence greatly contrasts with the shouting and swearing of the gangs down below. This could perhaps be a microcosm of the silent Gods looking down watching the world but not doing anything while humans commit sins. Another similar idea looks at the fish in the market. These are being put on ice and cut up. This could suggest that once you're in the net (drugs and gangs scene), the violence can get you into trouble.


Most of the gang involved wear bright hoodies under dark clothes, suggesting perhaps they have a loving personality under their hard exterior. There is only one girl in this group of people, however she is treated as one of the boys (it is noted though that violence towards her is different as she is slapped rather than punched). Once all the gang meet together, the shots are shown as if the audience are part of the gang. This works in conjunction with how we as the audience know things about this group of people no-one else would. The editing throughout the opening scene is handy-cam and is portrayed rather shakily.


The sound throughout the scene is mainly percussion reflecting the hard-hitting content. The beat is repeated throughout but the tempo runs parallel to the pace of the scene, increasing as tension builds.


Daisy