Film Titling Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon

Project Type: Motion Graphics, Film Titling
Duration: 5 Weeks
Role: Conceptualization and Compositing

Results

Context

In Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon, the audience is put in the seat of a magistrate listening to the statements of each witness and is left to decide who to believe and who was responsible for the crime. Our team of 3 was tasked with designing, filming, creating motion graphics and compositing a tilting sequence that matched the mood, context, and style of this classic film.

Process

In our first week we conducted a detailed critical analysis of the movie's themes, plot, and characters. We looked at the historical context of the film, the messages and the general mood. There was analysis done on the camera angles, transitions and framing as well.

This film is heavily centred around its characters. What was interesting about many of the characters in this film was that they had two sides to them. We described this as their facade and internal selves.

We mapped out the connections between all the characters in the movie to see how they were related in the story.

The story was also non-linear. Each of the characters would tell a certain part of the murder story. Some of them overlapped and were often inconsistent with statments made by another character. We mapped out who told which parts of the story and how they overlapped.

Lateral Processing: 3 Storyboarded ideas

The second week, we conceptualized and storyboarded our titling ideas with three lateral processes.

We indicated transitions and some general motion graphics. The last two weeks was full on production where we filmed, animated and composited the film.