What's Your Type?

Bored to Death opening title sequence
This title sequence uses typography for it's illustration. Text off the pages—in the title sequence, form shapes and moving imagery to create a creative introduction to the show.

Tom Barham, Curious Pictures, Opening title sequence for Bored to Death, 2009

Bored to Death is a show about a writer who wants to be/pretends to be a private investigator. The title sequence takes the concept of the writer and mixes that with the Crime Noir comics the protagonist bases his investigational practice off of. One can see that the font forms shadows—But, when one looks closely, they realize that the words do more. After each character's introduced, words drift away from their text-bodies. These words reflect the character's feelings/actions and character traits in the show.


The font used in the title sequence is a basic serif font. This font is typically used for newspapers, books and other printed material. Using a serif font for this title sequence creates a "writer/reader" feel to it, which adds believability that this is a real book being used in the sequence. Serif, rather then sans-serif, is also easier to read and presents a more professional/sophisticated look.


The typography used in this title sequence reflects the themes & ideas for the show. With it's black and white layout, the target demographic is clearly one who likes both comic books & mystery. Although, with it's 'sophisticated' feeling and song, it implies an older [comic book/newspaper reading] audience.


To learn more about how the title sequence was created click here.

DEXTER

As many people know, my favourite television show is Dexter.  I think the overall show is simply amazing. However, I’ve always been iffy about the shows advertisements.  I can never decide if the typography and overall design is doing too little, or just the right amount. So, it is now time to decide. Firstly, here is a Dexter advertisement:

I started by figuring out which typeface is used in the Dexter adverts. I have recently discovered that I am awful at simply looking at a text and knowing what it is. For example, I thought Dexter’s font was maybe Helvetica bolded and even italicized. But after staring at the advertisement, I realized that this was not the case. Whereas in the initial picture posted above, the T’s little top flicker looks like part of the blood splatter, in this advert (posted below) I realized it was part of the text. So I went to google to learn more.  After typing something really silly, along the lines of ‘Dexter font theme title’ into google, I found a few forums where hardcore Dex fans discovered that the Dexter typeface is called Soda Pop.  

Now that I knew the font, I looked more closely at the advertising and decided it was really well done. The sans serif font starts off very simply. It’s just clear font. And as the title continues, blood sprouts out of it. This simple idea tells Dexter’s story—He is a simple man by day, but at night he kills. The plain text represents Dexter’s “real” life & the blood splatter represents his dark passenger.  Its simplicity also suggests an older targey audience. One who doesn’t need separate colours or a fancy typeface to understand what Dexter is all about.


Toys R Us

The Toys R Us logo has always made me feel happy! It’s big and colourful and loud. I think that the company has done an amazing job at capturing their entire essence and target audience. The letters are bright and happy much like little children. Little children are drawn to the store because of their branding. Children like big playful letters similar to the ones used in this logo. If instead they had used a typeface such as Ariel or Helvetica, it would not have the same effect. 

The font used for this logo is called Toy Box—With the manually reversed R.

The pastel colours of the logo work extremely well too. When one thinks of children, or even toys, their mind—or at least my mind automatically goes to two things: pastels & the rainbow. I think that Toys R Us has used colours that reflect their target audience and products. Note that the colours are not either pink and girlie or blue and boy-like as people usually associate with babies, but rather pastel, darker, truer colours that toddlers & older children are associated with.

In conclusion, Toys R Us really knows who their target audience is for the products they are selling & their logo proves this.

If like me, you did not realize that their logo changed—from having a reversed R in quotation marks to instead a reversed R with a star in the middle, don’t fret. Read this article I found online to learn more about the change!
*Please note that none of the above images are mine. I do not claim the rights to any of them. They are simply images  I found online and believed worked well as examples