Concept and creative process
Titles for a series of stand-up comedy shows. Ken Dodd, the sage of Knotty Ash, offers his observations on this, that and t'other, interspersed with jokes and songs. The title sequence demonstrated the versatility of the use of the rostrum camera as a production tool for producing animated back-lit sequences, directly in-camera under the control of the designer and cameraman. The titles were produced from one piece of artwork, a large Kodalith negative of black on white lettering, shapes and lines, resulting in a clear image on a black cinemoid. This was placed on the back-lit area of the rostrum camera tabletop and lit by white light, with translucent coloured gels placed over different areas of the Kodalith as required. By careful planning to a frame count derived from the music track, the different permutations of shape, line and colour could be orchestrated to create the animation by the use of mattes or pieces of card to cover and uncover parts of the artwork.