Saul and Elaine Bass

Thursday 17th March 2022

Saul Bass

Saul Bass was a graphic designer and an Oscar winning filmmaker from America. His job was a best
known for his motion picture title sequences and film posters. He worked with many famous film directors and produces such as Hitchcock, alley Kubrick and Billy Wilder. His first very good piece of graphic design work was the 1954 film of Carmen Jones. The makers of this film liked his work so much that they asked him to return and design their title credits as well. He became famous for turning old techniques of making traditional title sequences into exciting moving titles. He is also credited as pictorial consultant for his input on the horror film 'psyco'. He also was the person that designed the opening title sequence for the film. He was famous for creating sequences with distinctive shapes which were unique to the films. He wanted to show a message in all of his work. For instance in Casino Royal he incorporated a coin to show that money was going to be talked a lot in the film. As you can see in the Requiem of Dream it shows an eye and a skull. The themes of the film are going to incorporate death or solving a case of some kind.

Elaine Bass

Elaine Bass was also a opening title sequence designer who worked with her husband Saul. She is known for her design of the titles in Goodfellers, the title designer in Casino and being the title design consultant in Physco (as well as her husband). She also directed a few short films such as a film named Quest. Even though both her husband and her worked along side each other to produce the work that they were famous for, her husband was credited for many more projects than her. Both Elaine and Saul worked on the title sequence  of West Side Story and Grand Prix. I really liked the way that they both contributed to the opening title sequence of West Side Story. It was very effective how that added the themes of the film into the title. The prominante red colour of the cover was used as it was the colour of the jets in the film. Once Elaine had her children she stopped working for a few years and Saul took over making the titles. She was 're-discovered' by James L Brooks in the 80s as she was asked to create the titles for The War of The Roses and The Age of Innocent.

Awards and jobs 

Elaine is praised for her diverse style to work with a verity of styles. Saul Bass won awards for his design of legos, title sequences and commercials. He won an Oscar for the academy award winning "Why man creates" in 1968. He won another academy award for best documentary in 1969 and a "Lion Of San Marco" for best film in 1965. Around 1969 he started creating logos for companies such as A T&T,  Continental airlines and United airlines in 1974. 

Saul Bass opening title sequences:

Here is a video that I watch when researching Saul and Elaine Bass's opening title sequences. It includes some of their most famous ones such as Casino, Goodfellas, Psycho and Vertigo.