36

Titles/Openers- TV

1899

Famestore

framestore.com

From the creators of DARK, this thrilling series revolves around mysterious events that change the course of an immigrant ship headed for New York in 1899, where a mind-bending riddle unfolds for bewildered passengers. Our team used CGI to devise a beautifully designed opening title sequence that is a disorientating and dark exploration of the show’s themes and key elements. The brief was really open as the creators didn’t want to use footage from the film.

They were after something unique, dynamic, dark, and mesmerising. The team quickly came up with visuals around the cruise vessel, surreal representations of the sea playing with a stylised language to evoke reality against a dream simulation. Once the right look and feel was found, character scenes illustrating key moments of the show were developed. These scenes then became the main beats of the title sequence structure, alongside the more abstract design-led elements.

The fully CGI sequence was created using Maya, Houdini and Nuke. Working on a creative piece of this scale was a long journey, with design and storytelling always at the heart of it. The key thing to bear in mind was to tease, without showing too much. To be entertaining, but not too obvious. Be visually different from the show, but still be part of it.

CREW

Concept & Design: Jules Janaud
VFX Supervisor: Johannes Sambs
Concept Artist: Nikola Yordanov
FX Artist: Tobias Andersen
Previs Artist: Quentin Sur
CG Lead Artist: Caspian Graca Da Silva & Ed Mykolaitis
CG Artist: Adam Burnett, Erik Weaver-Pronk, Tim Jenkinson & Victoria Stuart
Modelling Artist: Billy Butler, Bruno Reis Coimbra, Davide Sasselli & Eleonora D'Onofrio
Rigging Artist: Jack Beynon & Nathan Clark
Lighting Artist: Kristoffer Andersson & Phil Robinson
Lead Compositing Artist: Lionel Heath, Michael Baker & Owen Braekke-Carroll
Compositing Artist: Daniel Ravanelli & Miriam Pavese
Editorial Lead: Stephen Goalby
Editorial Support: Humberto Reynaga
Pipeline Support: Nicolas Darques
Executive Producer: Luke Youngman
Line Producer: Lisa Mundt
Production Coordinator: Olivia Unwin
Production Assistant: Emma Simpson