Title Design in Bollywood Movie Posters: Design Features, Trends, and the Role of Technology

Abstract

India has a diverse visual culture and languages. Cinema art, especially the publicity materials used in Bollywood, is one of the significant parts of this visual culture. Publicity in print media is evident since the beginning. It started with text-based newspaper advertisements, shortly followed by posters and banners full of visuals. Film posters act as a form of visual language through which the gist of the film can be perceived. It is a composition of static image and text that gives the firsthand visual experience of the movie to the viewers. Along with the visuals, title design is another key element of a movie poster. It has been used as a logotype. Unlike the conventional typography, title design has been explored in many ways such as exploration with the shape, size, color, position, orientation, visual texture, and letterform structure to convey meaning and theme of the movie more effectively. There is significant literature on the visual content of the poster art; however, the title design has been neglected throughout the timeline. This study is intended to examine the unique design features used in the title design, their trends, and the role of technology. The finding reveals key design features and their trend across the timeline. These features also show a significant change from pre-digital to the digital era, revealing the role of technology and other factors in the development.