Imagine winning an Emmy for 60 seconds of television that begins inside a single atom and zooms out all the way to the nearest star. That's the opening title animation for the Netflix series 3 Body Problem designed by Australian firm Antibody, run by Patrick Clair and Raoul Marks. Their mother of all zoom-outs has been nominated for Outstanding Main Title Design, one of three nominations for Antibody at the awards in September.
"It doesn't show the whole universe," explains Clair. "It just shows the journey from down at an atomic level to the nearest star but that's actually an extraordinarily long way." Antibody's recent work actually makes up half the field of nominees in the Title Design category, with nods also for Amazon Prime Video series Fallout, and Silo from Apple TV+.
"We feel very lucky, it's a great time for television, everything has kind of come roaring back after the strike, and lots of great shows are being made," Clair told AAP. It's actually the second round of Emmys for 2024, with last year's awards delayed by the writers' and actors' strikes and held in January. Back in the heyday of linear television, the opening credits were a chance to grab the popcorn, find the best spot on the couch and remember what happened in last week's episode.
In the era of streaming, they have become a showcase for computer-generated imagery or CGI, films-within-films that can even be more memorable than the programs they introduce. Antibody has quietly collected 15 Emmy nomina.