NEW YORK — Nice Shoes Creative Studio (www.niceshoes.com) created the opening and end titles for Pitch Perfect 2, Universal Pictures and Gold Circle Entertainment’s hit comedy. The film opened last weekend and has already taken in over $70M.
Creative director James Coulson and CG supervisor Steve Parish were selected by director/producer Elizabeth Banks thanks to their skills at beautifully illustrating humorous and risqué moments from the film. The pitch was inspired by thematic keywords provided by Banks: graffiti, flashlight and rebellion.
Nice Shoes explored and presented several ideas, tapping into local graffiti artists and using different approaches for the titles. The filmmakers ultimately gravitated toward one idea that used LED flashlights. It was then developed in full after the team saw an edit of the comedy.
“The original Pitch Perfect logo was done as graffiti,” notes Coulson. “In this film, the Bellas compete against the other teams — who sing covers — with an original song called ‘Flashlight.’ The current fascination with writing with LED flashlights over long camera exposures seemed to be a perfect, thematic match.”
With a preproduction schedule of two weeks and a production schedule of just three weeks, Creative Studio created a number of in-camera elements.
“We wanted to do as much as possible in-camera to make the light drawing more realistic than if it had been achieved digitally,” says Coulson. “We even created a font from scratch, shooting each letter individually and with multiple iterations, to make it feel handmade. We also captured the feathers for a pillow fight sequence in-camera.”
The team then applied the light concept to 35 technical and cast cards. One of the most complex scenes was the logo reveal in the end title sequence.
“We wanted to have a big sweeping camera move through the audience as they waved their flashlights. The audience was represented by illuminated dots, and we came up with a 3,000-light particle system that had to sway organically in time with the music. I had to program it so that it had a realistic sense and feel. There are actually hundreds of different animations, at different heights, randomly distributed throughout these particles.”
Bridging the main titles to the cast section is the Gold Circle Entertainment logo, which was crafted using the same long exposure technique. The cast section features each actor highlighted with a light drawing relating to their character. The Creative Studio worked to create interactions with the light motifs that would allow the audience to spend more time with the characters and their memorable moments, in addition to keeping the energy going.
“It was really important that the title sequences reflected the characters and the identity of the series while also helping this film stand out on its own,” says Banks. “The Nice Shoes team delivered an approach that hit the right tone with humor and originality. We wanted to give the audience a chance to spend more time with Beca, Fat Amy, and everyone they’ve come to love across these two films, and the end credits achieve that beautifully.”