How did they do graphics in old movies?

Question

I recently watched “Citizen Kane” from 1941. The whole thing has graphics (credits, flashbacks and flash forwards.) Did they use computers?

Edit: it also had those graphics fade in/out.

In: Technology

Answer 1

Not computers, for obvious reasons.

The two basic methods would be actually printing the words onto plastic sheets and rolling them through two drums, like unfurling a scroll. For example, this the classic Star Wars opening credit scroll. They’d just record the camera with a background (a sheet with holes poked into for stars) and slowly scroll the plastic film in front of the camera. Same thing for film credits.

For the graphics like, just words at the bottom of the screen saying a date or location, they could do the same thing but most likely did a double exposure. They’d film the scene normally, and then separately film just the words over a clear background and then create a composite after the fact. This was a very popular technique with regular photograph technology so readily reproduceable in the early film era as well.