Kerning is Caring

I’ve never considered myself a typographer. Honestly, in this day and age, I’m not entirely sure what that would mean other than an “aficionado of typefaces”—it’s not like anyone is placing, by hand, little metal sorts inside a wooden frame anymore—but as a grizzled, Jack-of-too-many-damn-trades, there’s no reason not to add that skill to my tool belt. A primary reason I’ve avoided the moniker, however, is because I’ve never really conquered hand-lettering. My grandmother had an old Speedball calligraphy set with a textbook and I managed to at least understand techniques and fundamentals, if not master them. Don’t get me wrong, as the non-musical, art school friend of many bands, I’ve done my fair share of “hand-scrawling” punk flyers (god bless Jamie Reid, Raymond Pettibon, and Gary Panter, to name but a few) so maybe it was this experience that gave me the self-confidence to go tactile on my most recent title design project.

The film is Michael Mongillo’s latest science fiction thriller The Changed, and we discussed a retro seventies/eighties feel to the aesthetic. Like most things that reference pop culture from my childhood, I went ahead and did the research although it was wholly unnecessary. That stuff remains in your bloodstream whether or not you desire it.

I started by cheating somewhat, I made myself some non-repro blue letterforms, but I’m so bad at staying within the lines that they were only semi-effective. I watered down some bright red acrylic and commenced slapping and slathering.

After each letter was completed, with several alternates, I began the painstaking process of scanning each one individually and then piecing them together in Photoshop. I also added some stray splatters… I mean, obviously, what else are you gonna do with them?

Once I was satisfied with the composed title, I hammered away at the pixels, applying filters and adjustments within Photoshop to produce several different variations of the finished product to show Mongillo.

A version was finally settled upon, which led to the vital stage of color and lighting, establishing my first proper collaboration on the project, with acclaimed poster artist Flavio Greco Paglia. We worked together to ensure that the title worked within the context of the one sheet, what was then the sole exemplification of the film as principal photography hadn’t even begun.

A few months passed after the completion of the teaser key art and the final step of making everything move finally arrived. Fortunately, having such a polished example to use as a template made this step surprisingly stress-free. Created using a relatively simple 3D lighting rig within After Effects, the final result managed to successfully capture that retro seventies/eighties feel with an eerie foreboding.