The initial concept for the opening logos of our film included the name appearing in the colours blue, green and red entangled in a twisted vine of wildlife with cracks and blood decorated around.
Also, the initial design for BMF was to have the head of a bull appearing behind it, in a homage to the city of Birmingham, where the production was filmed. The idea on screen with this concept was to have an animation of the front facing bull smash its horns through the emboldened writing BMF, with pieces flying towards the screen in a 3D effect. When it later emerged that it would take too long to design such a logo it was deemed counter productive. However the idea of a bull was still alive.
Essentially, BMF Studios needed an image to associate it with Birmingham, similarly as 20th Century Fox’s opening logos feature the city of Hollywood, Columbia has Lady Liberty and Walt Disney features Cinderella’s Castle. Almost all movie studios have homage to their origins in their logos; therefore it became paramount that we needed the same.
I began to focus on the BMF Studios logo, believing that along the way an idea for the production company logo would come naturally. Now that I knew it was necessary to pay homage to Birmingham in the logo, I had my heart set on the image of a Bull, Birmingham’s most famous landmark appearing somewhere as the most featured image.
With the film itself being of the horror genre, it was necessary to have elements of darkness and horror within the logo. So I had to find a balance between a Columbia/Disney style logo and those used by Hammer Films and New Line Cinema’s red hued horror features.
After days of scouring the internet, I came across an image of the bull that one of my colleagues had already placed as a stand in for the rough cut of the film. It was by far the clearest image of the Bronze Bull, located in the Bullring, Birmingham available on the internet. I knew that this was the image that I had to use for the logo, not only because the bull could clearly be seen, but the angle in which it was taken clearly showed the Bull’s strength and power, which I wanted to mirror in the logo just as 20th Century Fox do with their structure being the biggest in Hollywood in their logos.
Naturally, the initial image of the Bull didn’t look very terrifying. It was taken at mid day with shoppers walking idly by in the background. The image had no horror impact whatsoever. I took it upon myself to bring out the true potential this image had.
Firstly, I removed the entire background leaving just the bull, and experimented with several hues, ending up with a reddish grey one. This image was to be the one with BMF Studios name on it, appearing as BMF Studios Birmingham Metropolitan Films MMXI.
By this point, I decided that for the sake of continuity and to signify the unity between BMF Studios and S.O.S Productions, that they would both feature the very same image of the bull.
However, before I began the SOS logo, I decided to create a simple black and white image of the Bull, to fade between the logos, giving it a concise and professional feel.
I then began work on the S.O.S logo. Here, the image of the bull is much darker with a deeper red colour, signifying blood, gore and horror. I decided that this image of the bull should be darker as the production studio solely focuses on the horror genre. Whereas BMF Studios, even with its red hue, can still range from a broad spectrum of genres. I also included an image of my own eye, coloured a deep red in the O of the S.O.S giving a creepy and inhuman effect to the logo.
The name of S.O.S comes from the initials of my groups last names. Sheasby, Owen, Slater. I did this to connect us on a personal level with the opening logos.
The final product, on screen looks amazing and the logos blend flawlessly into one another, before fading into a panning shot of the dark, grey cloudy sky, to the earthy ground.
