Biography of Saul Bass 1920-1996:
A graphic designer, Saul is best known for his design on motion picture title sequences, which is thought of as the best such work ever seen. During his 40-year career he worked for some of Hollywood's greatest filmmakers, including most notably Alfred Hitchcock, plus Otto Preminger, Stanley Kubrick and Martin Scorsese. Bass became notorious in the industry after creating the title sequence for Otto Preminger's The Man with the Golden Arm (1955). The subject of the film was a jazz musician's struggle to overcome his heroin addiction, a taboo subject in the mid 50's. Bass decided to create a controversial title sequence. He chose the arm as the central image, as the arm is a strong image relating to drug addiction. The titles featured an animated, black paper cut-out arm of a heroin addict. As he expected, it caused quite a sensation. For Alfred Hitchcock, Bass provided very effective, yet memorable title sequences for North by Northwest, Vertigo, and Psycho. Bass famously claimed that he directed the highlight of Psycho, the tightly edited shower-murder sequence, though many on set at the time (including star Janet Leigh) dispute this contention. It was this kind of innovative, revolutionary work that made Bass a revered graphic designer. His later work with Martin Scorsese saw him move away from the optical techniques that he had pioneered and move into computerised titles, from which he produced the title sequence for Casino. Source: Wikipedia
Why did I choose Saul Bass?
When first receiving this assignment, I did a quick google image search for the name Saul Bass and found some of the movie poster designs that he had done. With seeing titles like "Psycho," "Vertigo," and my personal favorite "North by Northwest," I then ran up to the front of the class to pick him before someone else could. I really liked the way that all of his designs almost seemed like they were cut out and placed on top of the poster. It made them seem very simple, yet you could still get a feel of the movie from them.
What I liked about doing this project?
I definitely think I got a lot out of it because I never would have heard of Saul Bass otherwise. Most of my knowledge of design comes from my job doing web design, so I'm just starting out in print design. This project allowed me to look at the work of a designer and design a poster to reflect on his life's work. Though Saul Bass is probably best known for his title sequences for movies, his movie posters were equally amazing, so I decided to make it sort of a montage of some of his more famous pieces, including "Anatomy of a Murder," "The Man with the Golden Arm," and "Bonjour Tristesse." The layout of the poster was also designed with Saul Bass in mind, it was modeled after the poster for "West Side Story."
Sean is a first semester GAIT Major, but should graduate with his degree as soon as May of 2008. He is a recent graduate of the Walker College of Business with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration and minor in Music. Sean designed this poster during GRA 2102-101 ELECTRONIC PREPRESS (Spring 2007). His interests vary from playing trumpet to playing his xbox 360.Contact Sean
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