How to Create a Billing Block for Your Movie Poster

Nobody has ever looked at a movie poster and wondered how the tiny text at the bottom gets made. Nobody except you, right now, because you need one by Friday.

That block of credits follows a standard format, set by a mix of industry practice, guild rules and individual contracts. Getting the wording and order right matters, both for how the poster reads to the industry and out of respect for the people named on it.

The quickest method: BillingBlox

BillingBlox is our free billing block generator. Enter your credits and it builds the block with the right condensed type, caps and small caps, and spacing. If your credits are already compiled, you can go from spreadsheet to finished block in minutes.

Start from a spreadsheet. Download the Excel template, put titles in column A and names in column B, then upload it with the Import button. Re-importing replaces what's on the canvas.

Or build it by hand. Type a title (Directed by) and a name (Jane Smith) and click Add to Block. Not sure where to start? Load the starter block and edit it.

Write it the way billing blocks are written:

• The opening line sits above the credits, for "A JANE SMITH FILM" or a studio presentation. Capital letters render full height; lowercase letters render as small caps.
• Small caps in names: wrap part of a name in asterisks. Sofia *de la* Cruz sets the name in full caps with "de la" in small caps, the way it reads on real posters: SOFIA de la CRUZ. The same works for the linking words in a cast list: *with* Jane Doe and *and* John Smith.
• Certifications: add p.g.a. after a producer's name and BillingBlox sets it in lowercase, as it should be.
• Several names in one credit: separate them with semicolons (Jane Doe; John Smith) and you get the wide gap you see on real posters.
• Line breaks: use | to push the rest of a credit onto the next line.

Arrange it. Drag credits in the list, or drag them right on the poster preview and drop them into any gap. The Rows buttons spread your credits across two to five lines in one click.

Finish it. In the Logos & Style panel you can add studio and festival logos (single-colour PNG with alpha, or SVG). Logos are still in beta, and for now they aren't kept when you save your block, so add them in the same sitting as your final export. Turn on Equalize Sizes to give a wide logo and a square one a similar visual weight, and Colorize to tint every logo to your text colour. Add a copyright line under the block, set alignment, letter, credit and line spacing, and pick text and background colours.

Export it. Download an 8000 px transparent PNG, or an SVG with all type converted to outlines, so it opens and prints without fonts installed. Save generates a link to your layout, and can email it to you, so you can come back to it later.

Prefer to build it yourself in your design app? The rest of this post covers how a billing block is put together.

The design

Traditionally, billing blocks are set in Univers® 39 Thin Ultra Condensed. In practice, plenty of posters use variations or other very narrow fonts. Our free BillingBlox typeface was drawn for exactly this job.

The first line of the block is usually all caps with small-caps segments, covering the production companies, the title and the cast. After that come the crew. Each name is set in full-height caps, with its job title just to the left in smaller caps, stacked on two lines, so the title sits roughly within the height of the name.

The order of credits

The billing block follows a fairly standard order across the industry, though it can vary by production and by contract:

1. Presentation credit
2. Distributor credit
3. Production company
4. Cast
5. Key crew
6. Producer credits
7. Writing credits
8. Directed by

The breakdown, section by section

Cast

Cast billing order is usually contractual, so you should know it by the time you're making a poster. With no contractual obligations, the two most common orders are:

• By importance or size of the role
• Alphabetical

You'll also see a few callouts in the cast listing:

• "With [Name]" and "And [Name]" highlight cast whose roles are smaller but who may be better known.
• "And [Name] as [Character]" signals a featured cameo.
• "Introducing" is used for a genuine screen debut.

Key crew

These roles usually appear in the crew credits, in this order:

• Casting
• Music
• Costumes
• Editing
• Production Design
• Director of Photography

Directors of photography who are members of the American Society of Cinematographers can add A.S.C. after their name.

Writing credits

There are three general forms:

• Story By: for contributions to the story other than the final script
• Screenplay By: for the final shooting script
• Written By: only when the same person wrote both the story and the screenplay

Producing credits

The standard hierarchy runs Associate Producer, Executive Producer, Co-Producer, Produced By. Each title means different things depending on the production and the deal. If you're not sure how to assign them, talk to the producers and your legal team. It's not something a tool or a blog post can settle.

Directed By

Always the last credit, no questions asked. If the director also wrote the film, use "Written and Directed By," and it's still the final item on the block.

A final word on credit agreements

The order and wording here are standard industry practice, but your actual obligations come from your cast and crew contracts. If you have a question about a credit entitlement or its placement, ask your entertainment lawyer. BillingBlox is a tool for formatting, not legal advice.

When you're ready, open BillingBlox and build your block. And if you'd like the rest of the poster designed too, talk to us.