I was, and still am, pretty obsessed with Bob Dylan.
The footage for ‘Subterranean Homesick Blues’ from D.A Pennebaker’s film ‘Don’t Look Back’ could arguably be described as one of the the first ‘motion type’ videos, couldn’t it? With that in mind, back in college, when we were doing a motion typography course, I thought I’d use his incredibly lyrical song for my project. Here’s what I had made:
Here’s the original clip of Dylan dropping ‘word cards’ along with Pennebaker’s commentary in the background. Apparently the alley still has construction work going on. 🙂
Here’s another one I did to the words from ‘Tambourine Man’ using completely analog means. I dropped hand written ‘word cards’ just like Dylan, only I dropped them from under a light table (a back lit table we used to use to trace stuff). I kept the unedited sound because it sounded nice and dark and spooky, and seemed to add value to the video. It was a happy accident, in keeping with my theory of how randomness helps me in design.
I was inspired to do this post by Blockader’s post ‘Now for something completely different’ in which he digs out a college comic project he did in the 1980s. Thanks Blockader.
It’s also interesting, when you dig into college work, to see what typefaces you used back then. Typeface preferences change so drastically. I’d probably never use Palace Script ever again, though it’s renegade ‘god save the queen’ sort of attitude’ mirrored my own approach to life back then. The cynicism I felt for the outdated flourishes in the script (using them as a parody almost) mirrored my own disparaging opinion of institutions.
Also It makes me miss the creative licence of the world of academia, and the truly ‘open’ approach to design, far from the conundrum of commercial art I mentioned in this post.
virajrohancircar 