As a first entry in this “Design of the Future” series, I chose to review Ridley Scott’s “Blade Runner”. This film was an early forerunner of the “dark future” setting explored so fully in science fiction and cyber-punk to come after.

While previous films had ventured into the exotic, and the bleak – Blade Runner melded the two successfully and brought the look and feel of this grim, cluttered future and planted it firmly into the subconscious of the film going public.

While the overall visual design of the film pulled heavily from both Noir films of the 40s, and from the Heavy Metal future aesthetic widespread at the time – most of the films graphic design successfully merged these with simple current design of the time in a way that said “what if we stopped really trying and just played things out as they are til they were worn thin”.

Neon signs and giant projection screens abound – and bits of more fanciful ‘futuristic’ design can be seen throughout. But by and large – the bits of new are anchored heavily by things old and familiar. For every logo designed in a futuristic style – there is at least one Coca Cola sign or TWA advertisment somewhere glowing into your subconscious. They may be projected large on a building, or rendered in flashing neon – but its the flashy overkill of pre-cleanup Times Square gone – nothing hopeful or new.

Another interesting element is the opening credits and intro scrawl. Film goers would know from the posters alone that they are watching a science fiction film. Yet the first thing we see is old school serifed type. Even the films name is rendered in the same font – called out in red.

And where often in science fiction films computer screens and visual interfaces are sort of a showcase of how nifty things can be – in this world they are basic, matter of fact.

Even at the end of the films climactic final stand – when Batty (the arguable main villain) gives his final monologue, its staged in front of a giant TDK sign.

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As an additional bonus – the “final cut” version of the film comes with a bonus film called “Darker Days – the making of Blade Runner”.  A segment of this focuses on the visual design of the film, and features a few glimpses of some of the design work in progress:

And one of the highlights of this feature is seeing the original style and production paintings by Syd Mead (visual futurist).

credits here: