Have you seen any of the following movies: "Psycho", "Carmen Jones", "North by Northwest", "Vertigo", "West Side Story" or "Goodfellas?" They all have one thing in common. The designer of the posters and opening film credits was Saul Bass. (1920-1996)Bass was born in the Bronx, New York and studied art at the Arts Student League in Manhattan. After years of working in printing, he designed a film poster for Otto Preminger's "Carmen Jones." Preminger was so impressed that he asked Bass to also design the film credits.
Later, Preminger asked Bass to design the film credit for "Man with the Golden Arm" (1955). Those designs led to Bass' fame as a title/font designer. He would design for such famous directors as Hitchcock, Kubrik, Wilder, Scorsese and Jim Brooks. Bass became known as "The Godfather of the Font."
That's not all of the story... ...In a career that spanned forty years, Bass designed many of the iconic company logos in use today. Do you recognize these?
He really accomplished a lot in his profession. I read somewhere that he has inspired a lot of younger film credit designers. I can see why! Tony
ReplyDeleteTrue! If you look at the movies "Catch Me If You Can" and "X-Men:First Class" you can see his influence.
Deletethat is very interesting Dee
ReplyDeleteFascinating! MAR
ReplyDeleteVery interesting, Fran.
ReplyDeleteI didn't think about this as a career--thanks R. That was very interesting.
ReplyDeleteElaine