Teasing with titles
I know I’m getting ahead of myself here, but I want a cool title sequence for “The Dead Can’t Dance,” not just opening credits.
I love title sequences. I think they are an art form unto themselves. It’s something I want to get more experience doing, and so as I move ahead on everything else, I hope to play with the main title design periodically.
The new Final Cut Pro suite comes bundled with an upgrade of its LiveType software. I’ve used LiveType for some brief title treatments in “Sleepdancer” and our last short, “A Momentary Lapse of Brilliance.” But neither were full-fledged title sequence designs.
Since I am a graphic designer, I’d like to think to think I have a pretty good typographic sense. I’ve already started doing some research on the title design I want to create, and I imagine spending quite a good deal of time on it. It will be an evolving thing of its own.
Anyway, I started vaguely messing around with some type treatments for “The Dead Can’t Dance” last night, my first real sitting with the new LiveType upgrade. And I have to say it’s much better than the previous version. There are some new filters and motion effects, and i was able to browse fonts and effects simply, and manipulate a few into something I actually liked, and can envision using.
If course, this is just the first step. But it’s nice to have started it, and I completely got caught up in it. I finally looked at the clock and it was 5 a.m. Wow. I needed to get to bed. Of course, when I did, I couldn’t sleep.
But while I was laying there thinking, I suddenly wondered how I would design my titles in the correct aspect ratio. So far, I’ve only used 4:3 (the standard size of TVs). And I knew that that was what I was working in already. That’s not going to work, since I’ll be editing in Final Cut Pro with a 16×9 aspect ration (widescreen).
I’m sure this is boring as hell to most everyone, but I found an answer to my problem on Apple’s site today:
“Final Cut Pro supports anamorphic media for use in 16:9 sequences. When
creating titles in LiveType for use in such sequences, it is necessary
to make correct project settings. Otherwise, content may not fit the
frame or may not maintain geometric proportions. Making these settings
also ensures that graphics and movies imported into LiveType have the
correct proportions in the 16:9 sequence in Final Cut Pro.
For DV NTSC:
1. Open LiveType and open your project.
2. Choose Edit > Project Properties.
3. In the Project Properties window, choose “NTSC DV 3:2″ from the
Presets menu.
4. Change Pixel Aspect to 1.19.
5. Click OK.”
So…. there you go. Problem solved. At least, I hope. I’ll try to play around with it tonight, maybe.
Or get some sleep.
-r.
