Concept art showing the detailing of the Astrolabe blades.
Each episode of Game of Thrones begins with the Emmy Award–winning title sequence, which has become such an instantly recognizable signature of the show. The brainchild of the creative team at Elastic in Los Angeles, the title sequence contains so many details that it is easy to miss them on first viewing—from the individual coats of arms alongside the producer credits to the sigils emblazoned on the Da Vinci–inspired models that unfurl from the map. Ultimately, the title sequence tells a story of its own that evolves along with the series.
ANGUS WALL (CREATIVE DIRECTOR): After the pilot was filmed, some people were confused by the geography, so we started playing with the idea of maps. Initially, the visuals were cut into the show between scenes, which was effective but really broke up the narrative. We were struggling with what the concept was to be and then we decided to create what you might find inside a fantasy book cover with maps and a key. Dan and David had written the title sequence as a crow’s flight from King’s Landing to Winterfell, but it seemed quite flat. We wanted to create a version of the world that was really easy to understand using 3-D models, and very quickly we realized that it made the most sense to put these models within a sphere, a closed environment, because you would be able to see what was coming. If you were on the outside of a sphere, these elements would be hidden behind the horizon. It was a huge leap forward to invert the world.
One of the early type studies was titled Mad Monk, as we were using Ralph Steadman’s gestural type as a general inspiration. Somehow, the idea stuck and became this concept of these mad monks, somewhere in the world of the series, watching the events unfolding and perhaps even influencing them in some way.
HAMEED SHAUKAT (PRODUCER): As the world changes, they update the map. For instance, Harrenhal was once a mighty fortress that was then destroyed. In our map, Harrenhal is inert. It remains the only site that doesn’t animate, as it’s “broken.”
KIRK SHINTANI (CG SUPERVISOR): The map is supposed to be a living version of the world, so when Winterfell burns, it is also laid waste on the map and appears destroyed.
ANGUS WALL (CREATIVE DIRECTOR): Bringing in new cities definitely keeps it interesting. The title sequence is actually different depending on the episode, telling you each of the locations you will travel within the episode. Obviously, some episodes mimic the same path, but generally you have about three or four different sequences per season. By the end of season four, we will have completed fourteen different versions of the titles.
ANGUS WALL (CREATIVE DIRECTOR): Our job is basically to play the part of the monks maintaining the map.
Close up of the mechanical towers that grow into King’s Landing, designed by Elastic.
HAMEED SHAUKAT (PRODUCER): There are no real hidden elements, but there is a lot of detail. When you pull back to bands on the astrolabe, you see these intricate motifs. If you know what you are looking for, you will see that they tell the story of the fall of the Targaryen Dynasty, starting in Valyria and ending with the rise of Robert Baratheon. Some people have found this, of course, but they aren’t spelled out for you. We have also tried to incorporate the sigils of the reigning families at each location, so the Baratheon sigil is in King’s Landing, the Starks were at Winterfell, and this season we have included the flayed man at the Dreadfort for the Boltons. We even had the Horse Gates at Vaes Dothrak. The only element that no one seems to have seen yet is that the Fist of the First Men is labeled and just barely visible on the map above the Wall.
KIRK SHINTANI (CG SUPERVISOR): We went into season one with the idea that the gears and cogs would function together, to move up and down, to make the models behave correctly. This also goes back to an earlier idea that everything could be made with a hammer, saw, and chisel.
ANGUS WALL (CREATIVE DIRECTOR): We start with the descriptions in the books, but we also bring in the concept art from the show. We have an incredibly talented artist, Rustam Hasanov, who spends a good deal of time looking at all the references in the books when he is putting together the concepts—is it a rich city, a poor one? Is it a trade city or a slave one?
HAMEED SHAUKAT (PRODUCER): Sometimes the CG team takes creative license, but this can be necessary. Take Dragonstone: On the show you only ever see it from the beach. We needed a whole city with an aerial view, so knowing things like it needs to be in the shape of a dragon and that it was the Targaryen seat allows the CG team to take the creative licence it needs to make things wholly recognizable, yet allow for interpretation. In our sequence, the first angle you see of Dragonstone mimics what you see from the beach, so it doesn’t seem out of place to the viewer.
HAMEED SHAUKAT (PRODUCER): When it came to the music, composer Ramin Djawadi came to see the sequence. He walked around the studio and saw all the concepts and the different elements, and then he went away to work on it. He came back around three days later with the finished theme. It was genuinely one of the most impressive turnarounds that I have experienced.
HAMEED SHAUKAT (PRODUCER): All credit has to go to the team we worked with in season one, in addition to us and [Art Director] Rob Feng we had a team of twenty-seven people working on this title sequence. That includes everyone from compositors to the CG team and if we have a streamlined process now, it’s only because of the foundations that were created then.
