Title cards/Doctor Who
Title cards for Doctor Who have either the episode title, writer's name or episode number superimposed over the opening title sequence or initial sequences of the episode.
The following sub-sections have galleries illustrating the changes in font and format that the Doctor Who title card has gone through from the earliest title cards where each episode had an individual title to the 1980s-2011 where each title card became more uniform as post-production methods became far more controlled.
First Doctor
For Seasons 1, 2 and most of 3 each episode had its own title, so each episode title card is shown. For most William Hartnell episodes the title card was superimposed over the action instead of the opening titles.
Font: Grotesque from Stephenson Blake (or variant).[note 1]
Animation: Fade in, Fade out.
Beginning with TV: The Savages each story had an overall title followed by an episode number.
For TV: The War Machines a special computer-style font was used, with each letter appearing one at a time, while flashing in and out of negative.
While TV: The Tenth Planet had the title card appear and disappear amongst numerous letters.
Font: Grotesque One Three (TV: The Savages, The Smugglers)/Eurostile (TV: The Tenth Planet onwards)
Animation: Fade in, Fade out.
Second Doctor
While having the title card superimposed over the action was still the norm, starting from TV: The Macra Terror it started being superimposed over the opening titles for some episodes.
During the Patrick Troughton era several stories had special film sequences made for the title cards to be superimposed on to.
In TV: The Ice Warriors where the title cards would appear burley, zoom out, become clear then disappear, over shots of glaciers and ice.
In TV: The Wheel in Space they were superimposed over a mixture of the opening titles and shots of The Wheel.
In TV: The Seeds of Death they were superimposed over shots of the Earth & Moon in space.
And in TV: The War Games the were superimposed between shots of explosions & gunfire, flashing in and out.
Font: Eurostile (except TV: The Ice Warriors, The War Games)
Animation: Fade in, Fade out.
Third Doctor
Starting with TV: Spearhead from Space the title card is superimposed over the opening titles, with TV: Inferno the only exception where the title card was superimposed over shots of a volcano erupting, with it appearing burly, zooming out, become clear then disappearing.
Font: Futura Bold (until TV: The Green Death)/Futura Extra Bold (TV: The Time Warrior onwards)
Animation: Fade in, Disappear. (Exceptions: TV: Spearhead from Space started small and zoomed in towards the camera. Appeared and Disappeared. TV: The Ambassadors of Death which used a unique format: hard cut to the words "The Ambassadors", zoom towards camera, then "of Death" appearing with a "sting" sound effect.)
Episode 1 of Invasion of the Dinosaurs
Episodes 2-6 of Invasion of the Dinosaurs
Fourth Doctor
Font: Futura Extra Bold (until TV: The Seeds of Doom)/Della Robbia Bold (TV: The Masque of Mandragora - TV: The Horns of Nimon)/Helvetica Rounded Bold with Upper Case "G" & Lower Case "t", from VAG (TV: The Leisure Hive onwards)
Animation: Appear, Disappear (TV: Robot – TV: The Horns of Nimon)/Fade in, Fade Out ((TV: The Leisure Hive onwards)
Episode 1 of The Ark in Space
Episodes 2-4 of The Ark in Space
Fifth Doctor
Font: Helvetica Rounded Bold with Upper Case "G" & Lower Case "t", from VAG
Animation: Fade in, Fade Out.
Sixth Doctor
Font: Helvetica Rounded Bold with Upper Case "G" & Lower Case "t", from VAG
Animation: Fade in, Fade Out.
Seventh Doctor
For the first time in the show's history the episode title and writer's credit appear on the same title card, this has now become the norm.
Font: Univers Light Ultra Condensed (story/writers credit) & Eurostile Extended Bold ("by" credit).
Animation: Fade in, Fade Out.
Ninth Doctor
Font: Futura Book Animation: Fades in/Fades out
Tenth Doctor
Title Card fades in and out from 2005-2009. During 2009 the title fades in, slightly zooms in and fades out. Font: Futura Book
Doctor Who website title card
For the fourth series of Doctor Who, the BBC published title cards for each episode, on the official Doctor Who website. Later on in 2008 they published ones for the previous three series.
Miscellaneous
- Attack of the Graske.png
- The Infinite Quest.png
- Time Crash.png
- Music of the Spheres.png
Eleventh Doctor
From The Eleventh Hour to The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe, the title caption appears at the bottom for the first time since Season 24. The font is SF Movie Poster and the text blurs in, grows slightly, blurs out.
From Asylum of the Daleks onwards, the title and writer centred again with greater spacing, and with a filamentous animation. The font used is Contax Bold Small Caps, and has a mottled effect.
TV: The Night of the Doctor is an Eighth Doctor story, borrowing the series 7b title card format used by the Eleventh Doctor in a darker vortex effect.
Twelfth Doctor
Font: Heroic Condensed Medium
Style: Series 8: Typeface fluctuates between lowercase (Episodes 1-4) and uppercase episode titles (Episodes 5-12) and writing credits. Series 9: Typeface standardised to lowercase lettering for both episode title and writing credit, the latter now being preceded by a 'Written by...' credit. Series 10: Typeface for episode title and writer's credit has become entirely capitalised, with the spacing between each letter being expanded. The writing credit has once again lost its preceding 'Written by...' writing credit, now abbreviated to 'by...' presented on a separate line to the writing credit.
Animation: Series 8-9 (Deep Breath - The Return of Doctor Mysterio) - the title card appears behind the TARDIS as it shuffles off screen. Series 10 (The Pilot - The Doctor Falls) - the title card fades in using a blurred fade effect - with the episode title appearing first, followed shortly by the writer's credit. Twice Upon a Time used the same animation from Series 8-9.
Thirteenth Doctor
Font: Axiforma
The Woman Who Fell to Earth has no opening sequence; instead, the episode, writer, series producer and director's names appear in the beginning of the end credits sequence. From The Ghost Monument onwards, these names appear in the opening titles; the series producer and director's names appear after the logo, and the episode title and writer's name appear after a light flash on the title sequence, with a golden texture, slowly scaling down while the theme music ends.
Notes
- ↑ The foundry Stephenson Blake closed in the 1990s. Their designs included a grotesque from the 19th century similar to the one used in the first Doctor title cards and credits. Today equivalents include:
- Bureau Grot (formerly Grotesque) by Font Bureau (1989)
- Weight Comp Book (formerly One Three).
- Grotesque No 9 by URW++ (2000)
- Available weight is bolder.
- Grotesque 6 by Émilie Rigaud (2010)
- Available variants are not compressed.
- Brezel by MilieuGrotesque (2011)
- Available variants are not compressed.
- Bureau Grot (formerly Grotesque) by Font Bureau (1989)
