How effective is the combination of my main product and ancillary texts?

This is my audio answer for the above question...

How our trailer uses forms and conventions of real horror teaser trailers

(click images to read annotations)

CONVENTIONS I ADHERED TO:

 

1. use of a natural/everyday setting - we began with an opening shot of Sean at the bus stop to show a natural setting and to set the equilibrium which as it is a horror, will be broken through the inevitable murder

2. use of bright light - the use of motivated artificial lighting is commonly used in horror as typically locations are dark so lighting is used to create shadows and highlight the characters to we are able to see them. Often torches and matches are used within the scene for this and become part of the mis-en-scene.
3. use of torture - we used shots of torture in our trailer to show what to expect in the film which most horror teaser traielers do also, as well as this it also shows the characters and part of the narrative

4. use of close up of body parts - These shots are similar as they both use a CU of feet instead of the face or injuries. A horror convention is to have a great deal of close ups to show the gore and interesting shots, we followed this convention as it created interesting shots however we also used a range of other shots as we wanted to have a diverse range also.

5. use of hidden identity - Most horror films hide the identity of the killer, usually as that comes at the end of the film, we followed this convention as it makes the narrative more mysterious and then the audience have to see the film to know who the killer is. We also followed a common convention which is to hide the killers face with a mask. This idea is used in 'Scream' 'Friday the 13th' and 'Halloween', and I think is very effective.

6. CU of victim - although audience feedback said they felt as though they didn't relate to the victim however we did use close ups of Sean in an attempt to allow the audience to identify with him. This shot from 'The Sixth Sense' shows a young male victim, similar to ours and shows a close up of him sleeping.

7. interesting shots using reflections - This shot from Hostel shows a man killing another in the reflection of a mirror. We did a similar shot where you can see a victim hanging but only see him in a mirror which is propped up on a rusty wall. We followed this convention as it makes shots stand out and by showing them in a reflection you don't see everything so makes the audience pay attention as well as creating a unique shot. I don't think the shot would have worked as well if it wasn't in a reflection, and also if it wasn't canted.

8. use of violence - obviously in horror violence and gore and important and we had to incorporate them into our trailer. This shot from 'Stakeland' shows an overtly violent act with blood splattered, while it was difficult to create realistic gore we did attempt it with this shot were we acted the victim getting stabbed. We increased the speed of the knife stabbing to make it look more real and brutal which worked well and looked realistic. If these shots were easier to create, we would have attempted more as we had a lot of ideas and it was a shame they didn't all come to life.

9. use of distribution company - All trailers show the production companies at the beginning and so we used this so our trailer looked as professional as possible

10. intertitles - most trailers use either intertitles or a voice over, but we used both. Intertitles are usually used to either explain the narrative or to give information, we felt we should use both as we wanted our audience to understand the narrative through the voice over and we used an intertitle to keep the audience engaged with our trailer as they would have to read it.

Other conventions which I adhered to are:

music - not all trailers use music, however in horror it is a common convention as the music sets the tone as well as the pace. We used bangs to emphasise the voilence on screen and a slow paced quiet music which worked well with the on screen shots, the music quietened nearing the end unlike most horror trailers which tend to get faster and louder to build up tension and suspence.

title and release date at the end - A common convention not just in horror is the title and release date at the end which we used so that the last thing the audience would see would be the title and release date, the most important components of a trailer.

male killer - as we used a male victim we felt that we had to adhere to the male killer convention however I think that the male killer is the most effective as sometimes a female killer (unless in supernatural horror) often isn't as scary. While you don't ever see the killer's real face you see his body and clothing to show that he is obviously male. I think this is one of the most important conventions as men stereotypically connote strength, power, and intelligence which are characteristics needed in a horror killer for the audience to be scared and the narrative to work.

weapons - we used scissors and a chair leg as our main weapons as we obviously weren't able to source real weapons and also as we wanted to make it more interesting that the common guns and knives. We took our inspiration from Hostel, and originally we had shown a pan of tools on the wall to show a more imaginative and cruel killer. However this didn't make it into the final cut as it didn't flow with the rest of the trailer, unfortunately.

canted angles - while I wasn't able to find any stills of canted angles in horror trailers it is one of the main conventions within the horror genre. We used a few canted angles to give the idea of being watched and show a more interesting shot rather than just the usual straight on camera angle. We also used a moving canted angle with the shot of the victim hanging in the mirror which proved very effective and popular with our target audience.

illusion of being watched - many horror films give this illusion by showing part of another object in the line of view. The opening shot was Sean at the bus stop with half of the shot being a tree to give the illusion of the camera being POV. This is a convention in horror as it makes the audience feel uneasy and creates mystery as they want to know who is watching them.

voice over - many trailers, especially horror trailers use a voice over to explain the narrative as a lot of the time horrors are much more complicated. We decided to use two different voice overs from two different perspectives. This isn't a common convention however having a voice over is and from my research I found them very effective so wanted to incorporate it into our group trailer. The main inspiration for our voice over came from the 'Friday the 13th' trailer which uses Jason's mother's voice narrating, it was very unnerving and effective and we wanted to do a male version of this.

Setting - most horror films use a isolated setting or a creepy setting to create fear at the beginning. Films like Hostel and Frontiers also use foreign countries to show the cultural isolation and lack of understanding, and supernatural films usually use the home like 'Sixth Sence' 'Poltergeist' and 'The Exorcist'. Most gore films like 'Saw', 'Hostel', 'Untraceable' all use isolated settings and places which are hard to find, mostly abandoned factories, cellars and basements. We adhered to this convention and set our trailer in the college boiler room as it is dark, dingy and looks as though it is isolated and abandoned. If we had used just a dark room the mise-en-scene wouldn't have been as effective as it was with the rusty walls, dirty floor and lack of natural lighting. If we hadn't have followed this convention I don't think our trailer would have worked and wouldn't have looked like a horror film, rather a spoof.
Age restrictive - I gave my horror film a 18 certificate as most horror films are so full of violence, gore, bad language and sex that they must. Personally if a horror film is only a 15 I wouldn't go to see it as I would assume that it wouldn't be as scary and a bit 'watered down' to appeal to a greater and younger audience. While I may have lost a percentage of my audience, if this were a real film I doubt it would make much difference to its profit and box office takings, as many people who are underage still manage to see 18's and if not at the cinema they do when they are released for rentals, released on DVD and especially when they premiere on television.
Narrative elements - I only included enough of the plot so that the audience would understand, but not enough as I wanted them to real 'unsatisfied'. I did this as I wanted to follow the convention which all good teasers adhere to, to 'tease'. We only told the audience that the killer could see his victims all the time through the voiceover at the beginning, a brief bit of him being captured, and the rest him being tortured. We purposely didn't show any more as if this were a real film and gave too much away there would be no need to see the actual film and you would lose your audience's attention and the film would 'flop'. We never included the killer's face as in most horrors not knowing who the killer is is much scarier, we used this further at the end as his identity is concealed by a mask and the screen blurs and distorts so that you never find out who it is. Hopefully this means that you have to see the film to understand and feel satisfied. Also we never explored how the killer picked that particular victim, or how many others there were nor why, because of this the audience want to know more about both the killer and the victim.

I adhered to most of the conventions of the horror genre and for teaser trailers so that it looked professional and was of a clear genre

CONVENTIONS I CHALLENGED:

 

non-conventions for blog final Originally uploaded by Sophie Temple

1.Lots of gore - The usual convention for horror teaser trailers are to have a lot of gore to show the high production values as well as the genre. However we didn't use a great deal of gore for many reasons. Firstly as if it was a real teaser you wouldn't want to give away too much of the narrative or too much of the memorable scenes as when you would go to see the film you would have already seen a lot of the good parts.

2. CU of violence - We didn't use many close ups of violence, this is because a lot of our trailer was stunt work and it seemed more effective to show long shots and CU of the blood instead, this also worked I think as then if you did go to see it at the cinema you wouldn't have seen some of the important and memorable scenes.

3. Use of shadows/ natural lighting - While we did shoot some good shots using shadows and lighting effects unfortunately they didn't make it into the final cut as we needed faster paced more interesting shots, and while they were good shots for the film, they didn't work well in the teaser trailer. The shots that we created made the killer look huge connoting his power and dominance over the victim, and we did argue as a group as to whether we should have put them in the final draft as lighting and shows are a common element in horror.

4. Special effects - We weren't able to create any special effects as we didn't have the software, this shot of the sixth sense where it shows some handprints coming up on the table surface and then disappearing is unusual and works well in the supernatural thriller, however such shots aren't common in gore horror which is the genre of our trailer. While special effects could have given our trailer an edge using memorable action sequences we couldn't think of a way to do it as we preferred shorter shots and faster editing which this wouldn't have complimented.

5. Final girl - The main convention of horror is to have a 'final girl' which I have mentioned previously. While we did challenge this convention I think that it did work as many modern horrors have used male victims. We wanted to challenge this convention mainly to make our trailer stand out so that it wasn't the typical and ordinary narrative which most to conform to.


As you can see I followed more conventions than I challenged and the few that I did challenge were to make our work stand out and as some of these conventions were unobtainable on a small budget and with limited resources.

How I used new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages

Web 2.0 is associated with interactive information sharing websites like Facebook, Blogger, and Youtube and rather than being a term for new technologies, it is more about how we use the current technologies in new ways.  Because of web 2.0 I was able to incorporate photos videos and links to my blog and everyone was able to participate in this by viewing or adding comments.  It made thing much easier as when it came to research and planning I was able to incorporate lots of different media into my work making it a more visual experience than the norm of just plain text.  Also it made it easier for my teacher and classmates to see my inspirations quickly rather than having to research or find out themselves, however web 2.0 does have it's setbacks.  You do lose some of the simplicities of usual communications and it can be complex and technological issues also come into play, for example if my computer crashes I could lose any unsaved work, similarly if the internet doesn't work then you are unable to do your work.  Other issues can include copyright as there is little privacy, however this in some ways helps as you can gain inspiration and ideas of other peoples work, although obviously not copying. Here are some examples of the technologies which I have used some including web 2.0 sites:

These are all the technologies which I have used in the process of making and researching my media product.  Flicker, Youtube and Facebook helped me mainly with the research stages as they helped me to see similar work and gave me new ideas.  They also allowed me to broadcast my work to a worldwide audience rather than just a local one, this helped a great deal when it came to audience feedback.  Facebook allowed me to talk to my target audience and get quick feedback and post my ideas as well as my finished product.  Flickr allowed me to annotate images and post them quickly on my blog.  Blogger was a quick and easy way to organise my work and share ideas with the rest of our group, it also made it easier for our teacher to keep track of our work so to make sure we were up-to-date.

Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, Dafont, Garage Band, and Creative Commons helped me with the making of my product and as they are the most up-to-date software it meant that I was able to get the very best final products possible.  I used 'Dafont' to use original fonts which I then downloaded into Photoshop to give my products a unique touch, and made my products look professional.  We used Creative Commons to look for music for the soundtrack and used Garage Band to make our own sound effects and voice overs.  Creative Commons is a non profit organisation where the creators are able to legally share their work with people and are able to waive certain rights so that the public are able to obtain their work for free by creating a more flexible licence agreement.  Because of this we were able to preview and download a range of different music to fit with our trailer and didn't have to make our own from scratch or have to buy it.  This was very useful and helpful during the production of our work and was easy to use and benefits both the creator and the consumer as it was simple, usually free and allowed the work to be available worldwide.

The digital camera and video camera along with my Iphone all helped to shoot the material for our final product and ancillary texts, also as they are all digital it helped us to quicker upload them to the computer without any hassle.

Because of media convergence, where technology evolves to perform many tasks in one product, for example, my Iphone.  I was able to take photo's and upload them straight to flickr on my mobile, annotate them and upload them to my blog, I was also able to upload and download videos off youtube and add them to my blog just using my phone.  Also, while I didn't use it, there is an app on my Iphone for film editing so I could have shot our trailer on my phone and used the Iphone's software to edit the trailer and upload it straight to Youtube. Because of how much technology has developed in the last few years it is much easier to share ideas and work on the internet than it was previously, now there are sites and programs which allow you to upload and comment on them, rather than having to create your own website or server, which obviously is very complex.  Media convergence has made technology and information more accessible to everyone and has made it simpler to do, particularly during this product as all of the technology I used made things simpler on average and quicker.

I would use a lot of the technology which I have been introduced to during this coursework particularly flickr and garage band.  Because of the knowledge and skills which I have gained during this project I have been able to extend my mum's business by creating her own CD's for retail using Garage Band and also I have began setting her up a blog and helped further on the design and production of her website where I have added links to videos, to websites and songs showing how my skills have been developed and extended and impacted other areas of my study and free time.

All in all, the technology which I have used while completing this coursework has helped me to be more organised and has helped me to get the best final product as well as being less time consuming that other medium and much more interesting visually.

What I have learnt from my audience feedback

Most of my feedback came from my classmates, my peers, however I managed to get a lot of feedback from Facebook as my friends are in my target audience and are more diverse than my class.  The feedback I received from these people I feel was most beneficial as they took it on face value, like a real audience would.  I targeted mostly males as they are the most likely to see a film like mine on the whole they felt it was very well produced and the story was very interesting.  I asked them to comment on three main areas:

1) How it works as a teaser trailer, e.g were they 'teased' would they want to see it, did it look professional, was it constructed well, did it make sense etc

2) Did it follow the conventions of horror teaser trailer? (However many struggled to answer this as they were unsure what the conventions were, so this area of feedback was mainly from my media class)

and 3) How it could be improved

Here is what I found...

How it works as a teaser trailer

The main points which my target audience pointed out were that all in all, they were 'teased', which means that overall our main product was effective as they wanted to know more. They also thought the trailer was easy to understand and the plot was clear, liking how they were able to see the plot from two sides, the killer and the detective and how it said enough, yet kept the mystery as the killer's identity was never revealed. Overall the majority felt that it was a good mix of gore, plot and mystery although some of it could have been improved.

The overall construction of the trailer worked. They found it was in a logical order beginning with context and showing how the victim was captured, although they noticed a minor issue at the end with the victim appearing dead and then sitting on the chair again. Our feedback shows that the majority of our audience liked the voice over as we edited it to sound deeper and have a rougher resonance, and they especially liked the 'evil laugh' mid-way through as it stood out and was memorable. As well as the tone and nature of the voice itself working well, the dialogue of the voice-over from two opposing perspectives helped the audience to understand the trailer by hinting more about the plot. Teaser trailers usually have either a voice over or inter-titles, however we used both as we wanted to make sure the audience would be engaged with the plot as well as the action. However feedback about the inter-title wasn't positive during our first screening so we changed it for our final cut to engage our audience further.  Also many felt that the production companies title didn't look professional and it was a boring font, many suggested that these could have improved this by using 'dafont' or by using effects like some of the other groups did.

Other feedback which we gained about how our product works as a teaser shows that the grammatical devices used at the opening of our trailer were memorable and they found engaged them by addressing them with "you". They particularly liked the repetition of "I see you" and the rhetorical device of addressing "I" why raises questions of identity and "you" as it made them feel uneasy by addressing them. They noted that it was the right length but could have built up the tension better through the use of our soundtrack, which we agreed with also.

How it uses conventions of the horror genre

Character - The main idea which our target audience noticed was that our teaser challenged the 'final girl' convention of horror which we did on purpose to make it stand out by developing the typical conventions. While not all of our audience agreed that this was the right choice, I think that it made it more relevant and modern by showing a male as a victim and as powerless. While the idea of the 'final girl' being androgynous shows a modern equal view of women we decided instead to use a ‘final boy’ we did this for a few reasons:

• To make ours stand out and challenge the established character conventions

• To show a modern take

• It was easier to use a boy with all the stunts and effects we wanted to do (dragging down the stairs)

• We believed it followed some of the more modern conventions like Hostel and Saw which uses mainly male victims

Although it challenged the usual conventions I think that it worked, although not all of our audience agreed, and some felt because of having a male victim and detective it made our trailer appear to look more like a thriller showing the genre issues.

The ‘Male Gaze’ is a convention in horror and in a great deal of the media overall, however while we didn’t use it in the same ways, I think that while it doesn’t objectify the characters, it does show them from a powerful and dominant view, although not at a woman. Showing the victim as weak, although not in a sexual way still objectifies the main character, so while we weren’t able to incorporate the male gaze the effect of showing the character as weak was still accomplished.

Another part which most of our audience like was that the killer was kept hidden. Although in some horrors we see them, we don’t know who they are, or vice versa like in ‘Halloween’. For our trailer we used subjective POV shots  - which is a commonly used in 'classical horror' - and purposely didn’t show the killer, although we did use his voice on the voice over which our feedback was very positive about. They said the laugh in particular was very effective as it made them feel uneasy and made the killer appear mysterious as you could hear him but not see him. Our audience also liked that we only showed him at the end, and edited it so that it appeared that the camera was crackling so that you couldn’t see him in his entirety which most of our audience thought was a good ending, although again made it appear more of a thriller.

Camerawork - Feedback pointed out that there were some edgy shots which stood out, particularly the shot of the victim being dragged down the stairs, the reflection in the puddle, and the legs hanging.  Audience feedback was also positive about the camerawork, particularly like the canted angles which we used, a member of our class went of to say that it made her feel "uneasy and dizzy" when the camera canted in the shot of the victim hanging in the mirror showing how it affected our audience and our teacher commented that it was one of his favourite shots in our trailer as well as the shot where you can see the reflection of the killer coming down the stairs in the puddle.  A lot of my feedback off Facebook showed that the audience really liked the POV shots which we used (in the eyes of the killer), and strangely they felt as though they related to the killer, which is what we wanted as he is the main character, which is unlike most horror films. While this does challenge the main convention of the male gaze and identifying with the female I think it made our trailer more intense and stand out against the others. Also as the main audience of horror is male, it means that they are able to identify with a main protagonist more than an androgynous female.

Music/ voice-over - Music in horror trailers are known to build up tension which we attempted to replicate however our audience felt that it didn't work very well as it didn't build up enough tension and many weren't sure whether they liked how the music changed at the end near.  However some disagreed and felt it worked well with what was on screen and felt that the change to almost classical calm and unnerving music which was juxtaposed against the torture scene. Someone commented that it was reminiscent of 'Seven' which worked, although they also pointed out that this could make our trailer appear more like a thriller than a horror, which could be a genre issue.  Other aspects of the music which they liked was the synchronicity between the music and the shots.  They noticed the bangs which we created on 'Garage Band' worked well with the violence especially the shot of Sean hitting the bathroom wall at the beginning, the shot in black and white with Sean being stabbed and the shot of the killer hitting sean with the chair leg, feedback showed that it actually made some of them jump, which was the desired effect.  The voice over was received well, although some of my feedback from Facebook showed that not everyone agreed as some felt it was 'cheesy' however the 'evil laugh' they felt was unnerving and a good technique as it reinforced the sinister tone throughout. I was happy as it was a last minute idea during the editing process to make it more eery and to fill an empty space.

Mise-en-scene - Many commented on the good use of mise-en-scene mainly due to our choice of location, which all believed to work well as a horror, specifically they liked the 'grungy' texture on the walls and the good use of lighting.  Jody in our class especially liked our use of lighting especially before the victim was dragged down the stairs as she thought that it could be symbolic of freedom which I really liked the idea of.

Editing - It appears that the short and quick editing at the beginning worked well (bang scene) and with the slow tempo music at the start complimented what was on the screen, however many felt that it a faster editing pace would have worked better nearer the end to create more impact.

Gore and torture - Many liked our use of stunts (dragged down the stairs,  hitting the wall, hit with table leg) as not many groups used stunts, but felt that we should have shown more gore.

How could it be improved

The first shots were quite weak which we did agree with however we didn't have time to re-shoot it which was a shame. Using a male victim wasn't as popular as we had hoped, a lot of our audience felt that it could have been more effective overall if we had used a female victim which perhaps if we could redo it we may have tried, or added in another victim.  However Saw uses male victims and many modern horrors are beginning to use male victims also which we pointed out, and many felt that we should have taken out the detective as it complicated the narrative and gave a lot away, as well as making it more like a thriller than a horror.

Also many commented on how we could have showed more CU and POV of the victim so that the audience can relate to them better as they usually identify with the main protagonist.


While the music received a lot of positive feedback they didn't like it at the end as they  felt that it didn't build up tension as well as it should have as it was too slow paced, and felt that there wasn't much of a climax at the end which would have worked better.

While overall most of the feedback was positive and flattering of our final product many felt that it should have had quicker shots and faster paced editing to build up the tension more which some of the other trailers used with brilliant effect. Whilst we did intend to have a faster paced sequence at the end, we didn’t have enough shots and felt that it didn’t flow as well as the ending which made it into the final cut, but agreed with this feedback.  Our issues with editing which I have mentioned previously is that the structure issues with the victim appearing dead and then alive at the end.  As well as this our audience felt that we should have made our narrative easier to understand as we attempted to show two sides of the narrative with the two different voice overs and different camerawork, however our audience didn't think that this was clear enough as they didn't realise that the use of night vision was symbolic of the killers view, so they felt we should have either clarified this from the beginning or left it out as it was confusing.

Other suggestions were that we should take our the intertitle “coming to a basement near you” which we had had disagreements on between our group throughout the editing process, our feedback was that it was too 'gimmicky' and the movement wasn’t to everyone’s taste.  They also felt that we showed the killer for too long at the end, which I agree with as it took away from the intrigue as the audience felt satisfied, it would have worked better if we had just had a quick flash of his face and then cut to black as it is scarier not knowing.

The main feedback for improvement which we received was that we should have used more of the classical horror techniques specifically a final girl, more close ups and extreme close ups, more gore and a faster pace to create tension.   Audience feedback really helped, however I wish that we could have done it earlier on so that we could have used their suggestions for our final edit as they made some very good points, although we did edit the main parts they suggested.




How real distributors gain feedback


Film distributors gain feedback on there products in a similar way to this.  Before the campaign begins they research (like I did) similar products like posters and concepts and test these on a target audience.  They do this to make sure that there would be an audience for the film and so that they could direct this audience with the rest of the campaign and will meet their expectations.  During the campaign, they usually they hold a test screening before the final edit of the film and invite it's target audience to see it free of charge.  After watching the film the audience are usually given a questionnaire or interviewed in a 'focus group' to gain qualitative and quantitative data feedback.  From this feedback mainly, the film is then re-edited to appeal further to it's audience.  While it wasn't a movie, a well known example of this was the music video for Britney Spears 'Everytime' where the end was her dying, assumably from suicide, her fans and audience who first saw this were so distressed with the ending that it had to be reshot and changed.

My horror teaser trailer - 'UNTOUCHABLE'

This is the first edit of our trailer 'Untouchable' however after our audience feedback we made some minor changes.



This is my groups final cut trailer.  Our concept for the project was 'Seven' meets 'Hostel' as both were very successful films in the past decade.  I hope you enjoy it..

Location

Here are some shots of the boiler room which we shot most of our trailer in.  We attempted to make it appear more like a cellar which 1/3 of our target audience wanted to see in a horror movie, thus attracting our target audience through location and mise-en-scene.  The main reason we used the boiler room was also because of the natural sounds which are created from the pipes, which although didn't make it into our final cut were very effective within the mise-en-scene and added a more realistic and eery tone to our trailer, however didn't work well with our soundtrack.  The boiler room also allowed us to have a space with minimal natural lighting which meant we could use motivated lighting to create shadows and interesting shots, which are key in horror.  The overall location, we felt resembled 'Hostel' and gave the sense of isolation which adds a lot to the narrative.  We also used the stairs for a stunt where we pulled Sean (the victim) down the stairs and we liked the idea of the killer being heard coming down the stairs before he would have been seen.  Overall I think the location was perfect for our trailer as it made it appear more realistic through a run-down, dark, and rotting room and showed how attentive we were to the mise-en-scene.

Story board for our trailer

Lesson on horror make-up and gore

In class we were given some lessons in gore to help us while filming our trailer so that it looked as realistic as possible.  We were taught how to create action fight sequences and hide the punches, how to use weapons and props with match on action editing to make them look more realistic and mainly, how to use make up to create wounds and gore.  

We used latex, black paint and grenadine to create the wounds, I made a long cut on my forearm which you can see above.  We used latex to create the main wound, the size and depth, we then used the black paint for the inside and to define the wound and to make it appear deeper, and then grenadine as it looks like blood.

We also were shown how to fake being sick, however we didn't need that for the trailer which we did, although was fun to find out.

While filming our trailer we did use grenadine as it does look like blood and it is easy and cheap to use.  We used it in the only sequence when the victim hit his head on the wall.  Sean put the grenadine in his mouth and spat it on the wall when he hit, we could do this as grenadine is a syrup which is often used in cocktails, we couldn't have used it so effectively if we had used paint or other substances as blood.

Annotations of final ancillary texts

(click to read annotations on Flicker)

Ancillary Texts

This is my second draft of my film poster, and I think the most effective of the two.  I agree with the feedback which I received and I believe that this works better.  I used a landscape poster as I felt that it fit the image better as I wanted to use the empty space to make the image more mysterious.  I followed many conventions with my poster, I used the actors names at the tops and created a selling point - as it would be a new film - of the director who many would know.  I used a simple tagline and release date as well.  Overall I am happy with my poster as I think it is effective as it is simple but eery.  The main parts which I am happy with are the title, and the eye in the image.  The title I edited the transparency and gradient so that you could see through to the texture of the wall behing it and so that the colour changed at the bottom.  I liked this as I think it looks like green smoke and makes the title more interesting however it could make it harder to read the title which could be an issue.  The eye I think is very effective as in the original image his eye was black and the poster lacked focus overall, I decided to put the killer's mask as the eye ball as it makes it much more interesting as from first glance it looks like the eye but on closer inspection you can see what it is.  Overall I am very pleased with my film poster as I think it looks professional and from my audience feedback it is clear that they agree.

This is my final draft of my magazine although I have had many different drafts trying out different compositions and ideas.  Overall I think that I have followed most of the usual conventions used for a film magazine so that it appears professional and effective.  I used an already established film magazine of 'Total Film' and then used many of the other conventions which I found in my research.

 

 

This was my first draft of my film poster, however after I got some audience feedback my target audience felt the composition wasn't effective. To appeal further to my audience and to take into account their feedback I changed the composition moving the image to the left and using the dark space which was created for the billing block and the release date.

 

Analysis of film posters

(click to read annotations on each of the posters on Flickr)

What I have noticed about the common conventions of film posters:

Mise-en-scene From researching other horror film posters I can see that the mise-en-scene is usually quite simple with little going on.  Make-up and props appear to be the most overt parts of the mise-en-scene to draw attention on them.  And few use a location unless it is instrumental to the plot.

Image It appears that close-ups are the most popular shots perhaps to allow the audience to relate to the character and to make the shot appear more interesting and detailed.

Lighting most of the posters use low key lighting to make the images appear more natural.  There is limited lighting obviously to create a dark and sinister tone meaning that there is a lot of            

   shadows and dark space which are key to show the horror genre.

   Composition The composition is quite simple and the classical            

   conventions are clear.  Usually the title is in the centre of the 

   poster in a large bold font, the billing block is the bottom centre in        

   a contrasting colour to the background with the release date 

   underneath along side the company logos, actors names are 

   usually at the top centre, and a tag line on top of the image.

   Billing Block is usually centred in the middle in a small, long thin 

   font contrasting against the background colour.  It usually   

   mentions the main companies first, then the cast and then the 

   crew.

  Colour Scheme the colour schemes are relatively simple 

  mainly using either black or white as the main colour and 

  having a contrasting colour to draw the audience in.  Usually 

  this colour is a red colour, mainly as this is iconography of the   

  horror genre as a whole and also as it connotes danger, 

  death, blood and passion which are themes in most horrors.

  Tag line is usually used.  It is a memorable phrase which is 

  attributed to the plot of the film to give a clue about the 

  narrative and can be very effective.

  Quotes sometimes on the poster is a short review of the film usually from a newspaper or magazine which occasionally has a rating in stars (***** 5 stars) to show their audience what others opinions have been of the film.

 Overall this has helped me to design my film poster as I can see what works well.  For my poster I will use a close up of the victim or killer with simple mise-en-scene (but enough to make it clear it is a horror).  I will use high key lighting to contrast with the darkness and create interesting shadows, use a simple and balanced composition  using the usual conventions and have the billing box at the bottom.  The colour scheme will be simple and use a lot of empty black space to make it more mysterious and I will use a memorable tag line.