TB: I don’t. I think it’s healthy to have no illusions about this. Credits are there to tell you who worked on a movie. They’re a contractual obligation. Basically, they’re not that important. I know this because there are a lot of great movies with bad titles, and bad movies with good titles. They simply don’t take up enough screen time to impact a film’s quality in the way that production design, editing, lighting or sound do. That said, really well-designed titles can do a few cool things. They can signal genre. They can kick off, deepen or alter a mood. They can create a fl eeting moment of surprise or beauty. They can be funny. They don’t need to accomplish any of this, but it’s a magical thing when they do. I’m not one of those people who thinks you have to stay in the theatre for the credits. I’ll only stay if they’re good – to find out who made them.

SN: You’ve worked on a number of instantly recognisable titles in recent years – Barbie, Wicked, Nosferatu, Babygirl, Severance. How do you typically come onto a project now? Are you pitching alongside other designers, or are directors seeking you out?

TB: What’s funny is that all of the projects you mentioned were with directors I’d worked with before. When a director with a clear vision finds a collaborator who can make work that fits into that vision, they tend to bring that person along to the next project. So some of my work comes from being part of an artist’s ongoing team, some is directors seeking me out. But the single biggest boon to CHIPS’ film title work has been the New York State Film Tax Credit Program. When I first started pursuing title work, it felt a bit stupid not to be in LA, where most title houses are. But staying in New York turned out to be a lucky break. Over the past decade, more and more films have been doing post here, and there’s a strong community of NYC post people who jump from project to project together. I’ve built long relationships with a few post-production supervisors here who’ve given me countless opportunities. I’m sometimes asked to put together a pitch; most times I decline. I’m always happy to meet with a director who’s choosing between me and a few other designers, but I don’t like to audition by doing sample work. It’s bad for the process. My best work comes when I know I have the director’s trust. I don’t always nail it on the first round, but I usually get there.

SN: After winning an Emmy for Severance, did you notice any shift in your career – whether in the projects coming your way or how people approached you?

TB: Not especially. I do feel a subtle change over the past five years in that my opinions about the design work are taken a little more into consideration, but I think that’s more a result of experience than any single award.

SN: Once you’re involved, how do you approach creating a title sequence that both honours the director’s vision and meaningfully contributes to the world-building of the film or series? When you start a new title design, what does your research process typically involve?

TB: I start by watching a cut of the film and taking note of anything about the setting, time period, characters, dialogue, themes or visuals that might give me something to latch onto. Then I have a conversation with the director to find out what they have in mind, if anything. Research usually means digging through book covers, artwork, printed material or other film titles that relate in some way. Sometimes I’m looking at what titles in the same genre have done in the past – either to borrow from film history or to make sure I steer clear of the expected. As often as I can, I go to bookstores, libraries or museums. It’s important to get off the computer and make sure you’re not just looking at the same design inspiration as everyone else. It’s always easiest to research a period film. I can dive into the typographic look of a specific era. Even if the titles end up feeling modern, they can still call back to something older.

SN: You created the distinctive title design for Wuthering Heights, which was recently released. Where are some of the cool or unexpected places you found inspiration and applied it?

TB: The marketing title treatment I drew for Wuthering Heights is adapted directly from the poster for a 1920 film adaptation of the book. The film itself is lost to time, but I didn’t have to look far for the poster – it’s right there on the Wikipedia page for the novel. I did other research and explored other ideas, but this one stood out. I redrew the title, streamlining and standardising the letter shapes and setting them very close together, until the whole thing looked sort of like an ’80s romance novel. My final bit of research was in my wife’s underwear drawer. The lace inside the title comes from a high-resolution scan I made of one of her bras.

SN: You’ve spoken about the depth of consideration behind details most viewers won’t consciously register, like the bespoke almost-Helvetica typeface in Severance. How do you think about that invisible labour when so much of it is intentionally subtle?

TB: My hope is that it registers with the audience subconsciously; that the invisible labour contributes, in some small way, to a feeling they get when they watch the show. Maybe that’s magical thinking. There was definitely a much easier way to design those Severance titles, but where’s the fun in that?

SN: Even though you’re well known as an individual designer, much of your work is collaborative: CHIPS, Young Blanks, Spielbergs, even long-term creative relationships like the one you have with Lena Dunham. How has collaboration shaped your practice, and what do you look for in creative partners?

TB: Design is inherently collaborative. It’s a collaboration with the client, or in my case, the filmmaker. Writing and directing with Alex [for Spielbergs] is fun because it comes out of a shared sense of humour. More than anything, I want to work with people I actually like to hang out with.

SN: How do you balance individual creative voices with the collective identity of CHIPS? Is it primarily three people doing their own work, or a team collaborating towards a unified vision?

TB: My partners Adam and Dan collaborate closely on websites and interactive projects for museums, artists, bands and cultural institutions – Adam designs them and Dan develops them. Adam has also designed a huge number of brand identities, books, exhibition graphics and album art over the years. He’s done film titles, too – a short film he worked on was nominated for an Oscar this year. There’s usually a project or two each year that all three of us work on together. Adam and Dan have both jumped onto movie projects with me, and sometimes I’ll do animation work for their projects. We also give each other constant feedback. There are no two people whose opinions I value more. What really unites us is that we’re all drawn to design for the arts and artists. If you look at our portfolio, very little falls outside that category. The labour can be siloed at times, but the body of work belongs together.

SN: You collaborate with your wife, Molly, on smaller, one-off projects like zines, sweatshirts and objects. How does working with someone who knows you so intimately change the creative dynamic?

TB: Making things with Molly has been part of our relationship from the very beginning. It’s completely baked into who we are together. She’s my favourite writer and idea-thinker-upper, and has a terrific sense of design herself. Whenever we go a long stretch without a shared creative project and finally come back to it, it’s always like, “Why aren’t we doing this all the time?” I think the smaller scale has more to do with how busy we both are with our individual pursuits – and raising our daughter – than anything else. We do have larger-scale projects in the works, we just haven’t finished any of them yet.

SN: How has being a parent affected your creative practice?

TB: Molly and I talk about this a lot. Both of us are at our best as parents and as partners when we have that creative space in our lives, so we really try to protect it for each other. We try to say, what can I take off your plate so you can go and think about this thing you want to think about? But being a parent has expanded my mind in ways I couldn’t have imagined. I’m watching this totally new person who I love more than anything learn about the world and become more herself every day. What could be more inspiring?

SN: Your new album is coming out this year – congratulations. Why return to music now, and what inspired the sound? How did Maya Hawke and Eleanor Friedberger get involved, and is there anything else about the project you want to share?

TB: Thank you! I think I quit writing songs in the first place because they weren’t as successful as I’d hoped. One day I realised that was a bad reason to stop doing something I loved. This time around, I came at it with a better understanding, from my experience as a designer, of how much work it takes to make something actually good. I put more thought into the lyrics, gave myself a real budget to hire great musicians and asked my old friend James Wallace (aka Skyway Man) to produce it, because I love how all of his records sound.

I designed a lyric book in the form of a calendar for Eleanor’s album Personal Record, and did the cover art for Maya’s Chaos Angel. They were both clients I’d stayed friendly with, and I’m a genuine fan of their records. The fact that they both agreed to sing with me was one of the things that gave me confidence the songs were actually good.

The record was inspired by Devo, Dire Straits and Traveling Wilburys. It’s me trying to shove together a few very different flavours of ’80s music. It was written in the six months before my daughter was born, and it’s about preparing to enter a new phase of life. It’s called Mood Board for Graceful Ageing.