Closing credit guidelines

[sn-films]

Does anyone know if there is a set of published guidelines for creating closing credits? For example, there are guidelines for writing "Hollywood" scripts that include rules for fonts, margins, indents, etc. Watching the closing credits for movies, most movies appear to follow the same set of rules. Similar fonts. Similar scroll/crawl speeds. Content appears to be laid out in the same order. I'm just curious if SAG, or maybe one of the other entertainment industry unions, came up with a set of rules for studios to follow ("The actor's name must appear on the screen for 10 seconds, and no more than 30 names should be shown at a time... and Llama wranglers always appear after Grips."), or if the credits are left solely to the discretion of the studio? The only specific information I've been able to track down relates to the required elements for crediting songs that were used in the movie.

Anyway, I was just curious if anyone's actually seen any of these guidelines spelled out. Its too much of a coincidence for me to believe that there isn't some higher power dictating the use of white sans-serif text on a black background. I've been Google-ing a while and I haven't found ANYTHING.

[Kev Owens]

Judging by the amount of different ways closing credits are shown I don't think there are any strict guidelines to adhere to- even if there are you could easily alter them if needed.

Still not convinced? Watch the end credits on Se7en...

[k_wor]

I'd say play it by ear, but make sure that everyone gets there due credit. I'd say that if you in the order of Cast/Crew/camera/sound/then everyone else you cant wrong. In the Guerilla Filmmakers Handbook it give the hint that you can pad it out with made up creits to make the production look bigger than it is. I would recommend using silly names like. "Seating Co-ordinator Hugh Jass." ut that just me being silly....

[cash]

i am just putting credits on the Jumper and we were talking about this the other day. We have put Cast 1st Camera crew, Sound Dept, Thanks, Production then direction Credit. We havent done the norm of Credits on black, but had the credits crawl along the bottom off the screen left to right on a froozen image of the last image in the film, if that makes sense.

[Vertino]

I read somewhere that when you have "standard" scrolling closing credits (ie. from bottom to top)...

the time it takes from appearing at the bottom should take exactly 7 seconds to disappear at the top...

next few movies I watched after reading that... guess what? the screen time for each name was 7 seconds... geekish or what!!!

but I agree with Kev... watch the credits of Se7en... on first viewing, it makes you double-guess about which way the credits should scroll?!

[belovedmonster]

there most probably are strict rules... at least there would of been (they are probably more lax these days). I hear alot of stories about how ana1 the different unions and guilds are over moie stuff like this. Eg. Lucas was fined a bunch of money by the directors guild becos he refused to put any names at the start of Star Wars.

[Vertino]

not sure if its a "standard", but another thing I've noticed is that all the job titles are in mixed case, then the names are in uppercase.

for example...

Make-Up Artist JAKE GARBER

and so forth...

[windowslaws]

the 7 second thing is true!

thats amazing but also very ordinary

[untamed_aggression]

While were on the subject of ?nally retentive unions, the WGA wanted Kevin Smith to credit the writer before the director, even though he was both. That was the WGA West, the WGA East came through and said "Pipe the f?ck down, Westside."

Probably.

Anyway, unions can be a b?tch.

[sn-films]

Everyone... thanks for the responses! Given that it doesn't appear that there are any specific guidelines written anywhere, I guess I can modify the timing of the credits to match the music I'll be using. Again, thanks for the feedback.