When We Go to War: Multimodality and Film Title Design

Welby Ings

doi:10.1515/mc-2015-0012

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When We Go to War: Multimodality and Film Title Design

Welby Ings
Welby Ings is a Professor in Design at AUT University. He holds a Ph.D. in applied narratology and is an elected Fellow of the British Royal Society of Arts. He has published and spoken widely on issues of language, typography, and drawing, and has been a consultant to many international organisations on issues of creativity and learning. He is also a multi-award winning designer, filmmaker and playwright.

Published/Copyright: November 28, 2015

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From the journal Multimodal Communication Volume 4 Issue 2

Abstract

Film titles are distinctive paratextual artefacts that while supporting and normally prefiguring a film or television series, orchestrate unique modes of address into an expression of identity. These multimodal texts have a bifurcate function. First they establish the film’s title and list the primary creative and management team behind the production. In addition, they can also become unique expressions that interpret the ethos of a film. As such they increasingly stand as appreciable design works in their own right. This article considers the design process and eventual form of a 45-second title sequence developed for the six-part television drama series When We Go to War (2015). In so doing it discusses the work as a multimodal artefact and unpacks the creative relationships between elements and ideas that were interwoven into its fabric.

Keywords: design strategy; film title sequence; multimodal processing; multimodal text

About the author

Welby Ings

Welby Ings is a Professor in Design at AUT University. He holds a Ph.D. in applied narratology and is an elected Fellow of the British Royal Society of Arts. He has published and spoken widely on issues of language, typography, and drawing, and has been a consultant to many international organisations on issues of creativity and learning. He is also a multi-award winning designer, filmmaker and playwright.

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Published Online: 2015-11-28

Published in Print: 2015-12-1

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Articles in the same Issue

https://doi.org/10.1515/mc-2015-0012

Keywords for this article

design strategy; film title sequence; multimodal processing; multimodal text