teaser trailer final cut

My movie magazine cover

My poster

evaluation Q4

How did you use media technologies in the construction and search, planning and evaluation stage?

In every stage of my coursework I have used new technologies to communicate, create, edit and evaluate my work. To begin with my work is place on a blogger. I’ve used different sites such as www.scribd.com to upload notes on my research in a PowerPoint and Word format. This was very useful for when I had to pitch my project to people.

RESEARCH &PLANNING;
I found myself using www.Youtube.com most of the time to view appropriate horror trailers in order to analyse their conventions and base my ideas on them. I’ve watch about 30 different trailers to find out how many clips most of them had in average, I watch their narratives and most of them used a linear one, I’ve watch some makeup tutorials although we ended up not using that much makeup.

 I also used Google and Google images to find horror film posters and magazine front covers to find out the conventions of these ready to apply them to my media products. This was also used in my planning stage, I Googled a certain image I wanted, for example the dark sky for my poster background and the blue background for the magazine cover and added that to my draft posters and magazine covers in order to get an understanding of what sorts of images I wanted.

 I also used Wikipedia to research into the history of film magazines, and well known and particular film institutions. To plan and draft different copies of my media text products, (film poster and magazine)  I started by using PowerPoint to edit my drafts but then I had to switch Photoshop which was more appropriate. In the end I decided to edit some of my drafts on Photoshop as I found it had more tools, features and was more equipped for picture editing. There was also a ‘set transparent’ tool, and I found I needed this to edit the background of my pictures if a background was unwanted.

 

CONSTRUCTION
This process involved me taking and editing the pictures I had planned to use. This is where I started to use hands on technology, for example digital cameras setting the studio finding the right lightning and trying to work that camera. Then the Photoshop editing programmes, as I could finally put to practise my own initial ideas.

I adjusted the image, the levels, the balance etc. to edit my pictures. This was helpful to get the right lighting, colour and text. It was easier to add the main text such as the title of the magazine  LECINEPOLICE, and the text was easy to rearrange. I then print screened the other images on PowerPoint then copied and paced on Photoshop and edited the rest of the text on there. you could just grab and drag to the size you wanted
You could also change the text to have another colour in the middle of it like this example here...

The evaluation stage allowed me to look back at my work not only to see what I could have done better but also what did well.

As the editor of the trailer i've learn a a lot about how to build the tension in a trailer to attract the audience attention, whic transitions; blackouts, fades, blurs
Titles and writing... Music downloaded from free music websites.
 

To Conclude…
After looking over what I have evaluated and the use of new technologies, I believe my two ancillary texts and main product work together in challenging, using and developing real media products.

evaluation Q3

What have you learned from from audience feedback?

I made a questionnaire to get feed back from our target audience.

The majority of the audience understood the genre of film by looking at my poster, which is what I was aiming for by using conventions of real media posters. Some people say they were quite confused by the fact I only had the main character’s head showing, it looked like a movie about pirates they thought... This critic was quite good as it made sense to me and I thought I should have been more mindful when picking a picture and maybe take out  her eyes, although she was meant to look like an actual ghost.

The black background was the most appropriately used to represent a horror and I chose to follow that convention to make it a bit easier for the audience to identify the genre.

For my magazine, I have to say that I'm quite happy with the feedback I received as most people thought it was quite realistic. Although i was a bit anxious about the use the 3 pictures, people’s response were quite positive about that and they thought there was even space for more...they quite like the idea of have only one actress on the page since it attracted their attention quicker and they wanted to know who that girl was, that’s maybe what attracted them the most.

 I didn’t have an exact target audience for the magazine but I think that after showing it to 10 people between the age of 15-21, I might have to make them my target audience because they seemed to quite like it... 

The feedback I got for the trailer was I’d say 60% positive as people liked the linear narrative as it help them having an idea of what the movie was about.

People were quite satisfied by the writing to help them understand the plot.They say it didn’t give too much as they still didn’t get what the secret was, although they understood that something was after the girls, and they were not really sure who it was.They’re still puzzled and would like to watch the movie to understand it.

Things to improve:

- The music was very good however there should have been some more  creepy sound effects added, in one scene the words and the image weren’t quite synchronised.
- The plot  had to make to make more sense as they wouldn't have understood it without the writings.
- I think the first scene could have had different lighting as it was quite dark. But overall I think it got better when we filmed in side the church.
-We might have had built pace more by adding more short clips.

       -The clips needed to be connected better.

After studying the feedback, I think that overall, my products are fitting for the horror genre they are and follow the right conventions. The first happy scene was a convention we discovered in horror trailers to contrast with scenes later on especially the last one.  I think that the fact that the feedback showed me that people actually understood the message i tried to communicate is a good thing. However, the more negative comments the synchronisation of the words and the image in one scene must have ruined it for them but i need to be more careful when cutting sounds and make sure that they match with the actions. The fact that the secret is  not revealed in the trailer or mentioned it made it quite hard for the audience to understand it since it would only be revealed in the actual film, but thinking back now I believe we should have made it more obvious within the trailer so audiences make the connection between the title, tag-line and the footage. But again this is because we lost some footage... It’s another story!
Overall I have got some positive feedback and I am happy that the products had the effect I hope it would have had on the people.

evaluation Q2

How effective is the combinaition of your main product and ancilarry texts?

žOur two auxiliary texts and our main product all work together to construct something realistic. Horror convention can be found in every single one of our products and replicate those of real media products.

žWe chose to make one actor the principal character  on the magazine front cover and the poster so that her face can be memorable  to the audience.

žMost of the text is white and red on both the poster and the magazine. The trailer and the auxiliary text have for aim to promote the movie as we tried to include as many media conventions of the horror genre as could.

Evaluation Q1

In what ways does your media product use, develop and challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Poster

• žFor my poster, I used the movies The Grudge, house of wax and drag me to hell because they are quite simple and easy to realise. The main character is on the pig plan of the picture. The main actress' name is on the top of the page, the title is in red bold which co notates evil, danger, blood or anything sinister.
• žThe tag line is in white capital letters and is a hint for the degree of evilness that people can expect from the movie... and the background is quite effective in setting the mood in which the audience is expected to watch the movie.
• žThe film poster I have create ties in well with stereotypical conventions of a horror film. In order to get the effect I wanted, I researched other media posters of the genre I was aiming to achieve.  The colours were generally cold for example dark grey.  It connotes loneliness
•  žAll we see is a big white eyeball surrounded by dark eye Shadow in The Grudge, and the fact that her face is pale shows that it's not a normal person but rather a ghost or something malefic. I did the same with my poster however I took out my main characters eyeballs to challenge that convention. And her body is not pale but darker and colourful... 

•  Other horror poster conventions are:
  -A main picture
  -Ice blue
  -Dark background to represent the evilness of the character.
  
  
  My horror film poster conventions:
  -A dark sky as background and some light coming from the sky
  -A centred main picture
  -The subtitle in bold and red under the main characters head  

 

Movie Magazine

The film magazine front cover I have created mostly follows conventional patterns of real media products:

-The magazine name is clear and at the top. Usually going across and behind the main image.

-images on the front targeting a certain audience or reflecting a specific and easily recognisable film genre.

-Colour schemes are matching a maybe perhaps tie in with the main image.

-Font sizes vary on more important headings

-Several cover lines surrounding the main image to show what’s inside.

-the price and barcode are displayed somewhere in the bottom.
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Film trailer

The film trailer we produced followed many codes and conventions of the horror genre such as:

• žA happy equilibrate first scene... The 4 friends walking around busting jokes until they met a stranger.
• žBlackout throughout with words on them to help the narrative (4 friends lost...)
• žPace rapidly progressing
• žCreepy background music
• žScreams
• žFilm titles

 1. In the first scene of our trailer is similar to one of the movie House of Wax. A group of friends walking on a street and a bunch of friends camping and chilling  and some random car comes then disappears... It’s the same as our movie where 4 friends are stopped by a stranger. This is placed in the beginning to contrast with the rest of trailer. This  is very common in horror films.

 2. Throughout the trailer we have added writing in order to give the audience hints to understand the narrative. We have added impact sounds almost each time writing appears. It builds the tension and the atmosphere, this is stereotypical of horror trailer conventions. And our trailer also contain the movie’s title at the end.

3. In our trailer the lightning goes from being very bright to very light...  And this is very typical of horror trailers. The lightning changes as the tension gets higher and higher.