Evaluation Task 4 - How did you use new Media technologies in the Construction and Research, Planning and Evaluation Tasks

 

Here I have added pictures of me holding the physical equipment we used. We used the Camera to film all of our footage on. We used the Microphone to pick up sound more thoroughly, even though we didn't actually use sound in our Teaser Trailer.

We used the Tripod to alter the difference between our camera shots, as some were a canted angle and some were straight on. We also used hand-held footage in our film as this gives a more eerie effect.

We also used Adobe Photoshop to manipulate the images used for our Poster and Film Magazine Front Cover.

Adobe Premier Elements is what we used to edit all of our footage together to create our Final Teaser trailer. We also used this to add the music onto our Teaser Trailer. Another thing we used Adobe Premier Elements for was to manipulate the colours of our footage, for example we made the footage of Milly and Hannah green, to make it look like it was a night vision setting on the camera.

This is a computer similar to the one we used to bring all of our Film Package together (Ancillary tasks and Teaser Trailer) 

Slide Share is what we used to put our PowerPoint presentations on. We used this to then publish them on our Blog.

Youtube is the Internet software we used to find our music for our film. We also used this to research other Horror Teaser trailers so that we could analyse them.

Blogger is what we used to keep a diary of our media work, it is also what we used to research and plan our teaser trailer and our ancilary tasks.

We used mediaconverter.org to convert our Production company, Legendary pictures, into an .avi file so we could add it into our Trailer.

This is the software we used to convert our music from youtube to make sure we could have it on our Teaser Trailer

Evaluation Task 3 - What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Some of the feedback that we got from our Teaser Trailer was that they didn't understand why the dog was in the film, we however justified this by saying that the Dog was to show the audience that the Victims were in their own house, which reinforces that it could happen to anyone in the own home. This is a reference to the film The Strangers, as the Victims in this film are in their own house when they are attacked.
Some feedback which we received from a Social Networking site was:
"Its really good guys well done :) just one thing is that the trailer doesn't really tell you anything about the film like any plot or anything its all very vague?"
My response to this is that the whole idea of our teaser trailer was to be ambiguous and to confuse the audience and this comment proves it!

Some more feedback we received was: 'I like the bit with the writing, where it looks like she is erasing it. I thought it was really effective as it could show the character is trying to erase her actions. I also liked the contrast between the Black and White colour scenes and the Coloured scenes.'
The only trailers that I know which are similar to ours are the Strangers, with it happening in their own house and Scream, because of the masks and the Black and white footage.

Some of the Strengths of our Trailer are:

• It confuses the audience, as it is a non-linear narrative. We start with the end of the trailer and end with the end too.
• It is very ambiguous
• The speed of the editing to make the shots quicker so the audience are left feeling a bit confused and also intrigued
• The intertitles are very effective. We have a few which very quickly flash on and off of the screen and then they fade on again in case the audience didn't read them the first time.

Some Weakness of our Trailer are:

• The Production company scene is really loud and cuts into the piano music of our Trailer. If I were to edit this I would make the Production company scene silent so you just heard the Piano music.

Evaluation Task 2 - How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

This is a video of us talking about how our media texts link together

Evaluation Task 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Shot One -
This is our title of our film. In this shot we chose to use a font which we thought fitted in with the theme of our Teaser Trailer. We used Birch STD font. We also used this font on our Ancillary tasks which lets the audience know that the Poster, Magazine front cover and the Teaser Trailer are linked together. We have used a White font in our Teaser Trailer. We looked at other horror films and their font usually is quite striking and spiky, we also wanted to use this in our font. I don't think this challenges conventions of Media texts as we took inspiration from other Media texts.

Shot Two -
This shot shows the Setting/Location of our Teaser Trailer. It also shows our Killer character, in this shot you cannot tell whether they are female or male. The effect this had was that the Killer moves around in the shot which is quite unnerving for the audience. I think this challenges real media products as the setting is in a garaged area, again showing that anyone can be effected by this sort of a film.

Shot Three -
This is a shot of our Killer again, however this time it is a close up shot. You can see a black space where the killers eyes should be, this could mean that they have no emotional link in doing what they are going to do as revenge. This is the only character in our Teaser Trailer who has a costume, with the completely black attire. The Killer is wearing a Black top and Black trousers. The Killer is also wearing a mask, this is one of their props, another of their props is the Knife used in Shot 7. We used similar shots of the Killers mask in our Ancillary tasks, a Film magazine front cover and a Poster. We wanted to make sure our audience made the link between the three tasks so that they remembered them, which is similar to the film Scream. I don't feel that this challenges real media products because many Horror genre films use masks to hide the identity of Killers.

Shot Four -
In this scene our victim, Amelia is being dragged through the woods by the Killer. In this shot we decided to use handheld footage as we thought it would give the audience a more immersive experience as the shot is quite unsteady, suggesting that the Killer could have an accomplice. We manipulated this shot to make Amelia look like she is scrambling forward, perhaps away from the killer. We used a function called Time Stretch, and then clicked on Reverse Time. To my knowledge this is not something i have seen in other Horror films, so I think this does challenge real media products.

Shot Five -
This shot is of an intertitle within our teaser trailer. It says another of our trailers we have produced. We chose to include this in our trailer because other trailers have previous films they have produced. It also draws in our audience, from our previous tasks. Throughout our main task this year we have decided to keep with the same font and font style. We used 'Minion Pro Black 89' style which creates a ghostly effect on our writing. We also used Birch std font for all of our intertitles and ancillary tasks. I don't think this challenges real media texts as every teaser trailer/trailer includes intertitles.

Shot Six -
Shot 6 shows a shot of Amelia writing on a piece of paper that she wishes to join the cult. This is an important shot in our film as it sets the story for the trailer, as well as being ambiguous as the audience do not know what she is asking to join. We also reversed this shot to make it look like Amelia was trying to undo what she had written, as if to say if she could go back in time and change things then she would. I believe this does challenge real media texts as I am unaware of other trailers doing this.

Shot Seven -
I believe that this shot sets up the genre of our film really well because you can see the Killer, with a knife in their hands. The Killer is striking the knife down towards what seems to be a pair of legs on the ground. I think from this shot you can definitely tell this is a horror theme, as the mis-en scene is very typical of that from a Horror/Thriller Theme.

Shot Eight -
This shot is of Amelia, hanging in the tree. We have introduced all of characters within our teaser trailer but we have not introduced them in detail. You see more of Amelia than you do any of the other characters in our Teaser Trailer. We thought this was a good shot to introduce her as she looks vulnerable, leaving the audience in suspense and on the edge of their seats. Amelia is also the typical Blonde character an audience would associate with a Horror film.

Shot Nine -
This is a shot which shows our special effects very well. The special effect we decided to use was the night vision effect on the scene of Amelia and Hannah. We thought this would be effective because the original idea of this scene was that the girls are having a sleepover and they are going to film it all. We thought that handheld footage was the best idea for this as it really captures the look on Hannah's face when she see the Killer walk into Amelia's room.

Final Teaser Trailer Magazine Front Cover

Here is our final Magazine front cover. Again we have taken a picture of Alana, The Killer and manipulated the image. I think this is a really creepy picture as everything is black yet you can still see the image of Alana underneath. We used the title Horror Review instead of Horror film as Horror Review sounds more like a Magazine name. We have also added blood splatters onto the image as this then ties in with the fact that our Teaser Trailer is a Horror. We've used the colours Red and White. Red connotes Blood and Fear and White connotes innocence and purity.

Final Teaser Trailer Poster

Here is our Final Poster for our Teaser Trailer. In this we have taken a shot of Alana, the Killer and manipulated the image to make it fit in with our film. We have also added some review at the top of the page, like you see in other posters. We have also added our 'Don't Cross The Line' catchphrase to go along with the Poster, and this is also in our Trailer aswell.

Final Teaser Trailer

Here is our Final Teaser Trailer.

Certificate Ratings

Above I have added a picture of different Certificate ratings given to films. I think that most horror films are either a 15 or an 18 certificate. I think that our Teaser Trailer should be a 15 because as it is a horror genre it includes some gore and is scary in some places, it is not as bad as some of the other Horror films which I have watched. However it would not be certified as a 12 or less than that as I don't think it is suitable for younger viewers.

Editing Footage - Finalising

Today we edited our footage again, however in this case we decided that as we have quite a lot of fast paced editing we should have something slower at the end to slow the pace down and then BAM there is the release date, so it slows the heart rate down a bit and then frightens the audience again. We have decided to have all of our footage played really quickly at the end of the film as it looks as if the film is undoing itself, as in the Victim wants to turn back time to ensure she never joined the Cult.
We did this by saving our footage as it was, then rendering it as an .avi file (Adobe Premier Elements, the software we are using). We then loaded the footage and put it in our film. At the end of the footage there is a scene where Milly writes on a piece of paper that she wants to join the clan, we reversed this so it looks as if she is rubbing out the writing, that she never wanted to join in the first place.
We then made the whole thing backwards so it starts with Milly writing that she wants to join the Cult and it ends with Milly being dragged through the Woods.

More Poster Ideas

Today we thought it would be a good idea to take some pictures for the Poster as the ones we have are not a very good quality. Here we have taken a few images of Alana, we are going to manipulate them to make them look scary.

Todays Media Lesson - Poster

Yesterday in our double media lesson we had a go at trying to put together our Poster. We thought this went well however as we print screened the image from our Teaser Trailer the quality wasn't the best. We thought it was harder to use Adobe Photoshop so at first we tried it on paint and then we got some help on how to use Adobe and the quality came out better. I think we might possibly take some photos of Alana, the Killer again on either mine or Alana's digital camera as then the files will be of a higher quality. I think this process will enable us to make a higher quality poster, and we can make it to a specific size as the print screens from our Teaser Trailer could only be a certain size.

Editing Footage

Today we again edited out footage, Mr Oswick saw this and said that Horror trailers usually have really quick editing and then a slow pace of editing, so he thought that we should add some more in. Hannah had the idea of Alana, the Killer, running down one of the corridors at school wielding a knife. She would run towards the Camera with the mask on so that she looked scary. I think this is a good idea as we can also flick the lights on and off to create more suspense and tension.

Production Choice

We, as a group have decided to use Legendary Pictures for our Production company. We have decided to use this because Legendary Pictures are most famous for the Saw franchise which is a well known set of Horror Films. Last year we used Working Title for the company which produces our film, but this year we decided against it as we couldn't think of any horror films in which Working title had produced or co-produced. Legendary pictures' introduction is very quick which is good as we are just going to flick it on between two of the scenes in our trailer to save on time as we would like to keep the Teaser Trailer under one minute.

Film Magazine Research - Positioning of the Magazine

Earlier I decided to compare the positioning of Total Film magazine and Empire Magazine. I uploaded the images onto Microsoft Word and then described the positioning of the the text and images on the front cover.

Film Magazine Front Cover Research - Possible Titles for our Magazine

Another possible name for our Film Magazine could be 'Horror Film'. As we are doing a horror film, both this name and the Horror Review idea are possibilities. and I like both of them. I have again used Microsoft word's Word Art to create this. I have stayed with the Red colour this time as in Horror films there is usually quite a lot of blood so I think this fits well. I have again used Calibri in size 150 for Horror and then size 36 for the Film bit. I am pleased with the final design of both of these ideas and I am not sure which name we will use for our magazine but both of these names are good.

Film Magazine Front Cover Research - Possible Titles for our Magazine

Here I have decided to play around on Microsoft word with the Word Art. I have used words which I think are good Magazine names. I have played around also with the colour of these words, I've also changed the size, and moved the 'review' word around to see where it fitted in the best. I used Calibri Font to create these words.

 I like on this one, how the Review is in the actual Horror word, I think this is similar to the Total Film title.

I like the Glow on the letters above. I think it really emphasises the red colour and looks really effective.

This is the idea I like the most, as I think it is informative and it is not similar to any of the Magazines in which I have researched.

Film Magazine Front Cover Research - Total Film

I am now going to research Total Film magazine, as this is another mainstream film magazine. I think the same as before as Horror films are not really advertised within Media magazines, so it is probably a good idea that we are doing our own Film Magazine.

Here is the Total Film Front cover for Inception. In the Total Film title you can see that the title has been edited to seem like it is part of a city, as it is an aerial shot of a city. I think they have done this because within the Inception film you are transported to many levels of dreams, and on many occasions you, as the audience, find yourself in a city setting. The nearly full length shot of Leonardo DiCaprio suggests that he is main character of this film and he has a shocked expression on his face which could tell us that he is worried or he is looking at something which has shocked him. At Leonardo DiCaprio shoulder the background changes, so that you can now see the side of a city building, at a human eye level, this could explain the different levels of dreams in which they enter. I think for our Front cover we should use the Total Film title idea to tie in with our Teaser trailer, as with the Empire Magazine as well.

This is the Front cover for the Social Network, which is about the finders of Social networking site Facebook. As on Facebook, you have a profile and you can upload a picture of yourself for your profile I think the front cover is a really good idea, as the main picture and even the Total Film title is made up of hundreds of Profile Pictures. As nearly everyone uses Facebook, I think this was an imaginative idea for a front cover as not really anyone knew the basis behind where Facebook came from. From this I think we could possibly use lots of little pictures, perhaps of the victims in the film to make a main picture of the killer, however we have quite a tight time restriction and I think this will take too long but it is a good idea nonetheless.

Film Magazine Front Cover Research - Empire Magazine

Here I have collected a few front covers of the Empire magazine. I think this would be a good magazine to analyse as it is one of the most well known media magazines. However, there are not many front covers in which there is a horror film on the front cover so I don't think it would be a good idea to use this as a basis for our Film Magazine front cover. We were told yesterday that we could produce our own film magazine so I think we are planning on something with the title Horror Film or Horror Review. I think we should keep the theme running throughout the Film Poster and the Film Magazine front cover, as this keeps the theme running of the Killer being the most important charater within our film, I think this is our Unique Selling point of our final products and hopefully if we keep this theme running then it will make our audience feel that they actually would like to see more than just the teaser trailer.

 

Here you can see the two different covers for The Dark Knight Film, these covers are based on the two main characters in the Dark Knight. I think this would be a good idea for our film magazine front cover as it draws the attention of the audience. Wherever you look it look as if the Joker and Batman are staring at you and it is quite unnerving. I think we should take this idea into consideration as we have a shot of the Killer where she is just staring at the into the camera, and her eyes look wild and she does look quite scary. If we don't think this shot suits the front cover of our Magazine then we can take a picture especially suited for the role. I like how the Empire title is also in the theme of the person on the cover, for example on the Jokers front cover there is an outline of Green which runs throughout the front cover, with the writing being in green and there being a green theme. As for the Batmans front cover there is a Blue theme running throughout and this shows the audience how different the two characters actually are.

  

Here are a few examples of some other films front covers on Empire. We have Hellboy 2, Kick Ass and The Hulk.I like the idea that Empire have changed the titles of thes of their magazine to fit in with the theme of the front cover, for what film is being advertised. As in one of these magazines it looks as if the Hulk is ripping through the magazine, as the P has been split into two. The Hellboys front cover is on fire thus enforcing the connotations of fear and hell into the title as this is what the film is about. Kick Ass is a fighting film. about an ordinary boy who decides that anyone can become a superhero, he however gets beaten up a lot on his way to accomplish his goal, this is why on the front cover he is bloody and Empire have changed their title to fit in with this, as it looks like someone has blood splattered the word 'Empire' onto the wall behind Dave. I think these are good ideas to consider when we are creating our own film poster. With the technology available to us I think we should be able to create a title which looks effective, as this is one of the things which is important when attracting an audience.

Possible Fonts and Colours for Film Poster

I am going to research on Microsoft word what fonts and colours we can use in our Film Poster, for the film title. Regarding my previous posts I think we should use a red coloured font, but this depends on whether we decide to do a coloured poster or a black and white poster.








Above is one of the fonts I tried with our title for our film, Trespasser. This font is BatangChe and I have decided to do the font in both Red and Black to see which would look more effective. I have also done each of the colours in Normal and Bold. In this case I think the Black bold is quite effective.

Here I have used the Conolas font again doing it in black and red, in this instance I think the bold red is more effective as it draws your attention towards it more than the bold black.

Here I have used Courier New font, again in black and red. I think this is the most effective of all the fonts as it looks like it has been typed by a typewriter, which pays homage to The Shining, which is a thriller. I think it looks effective and both red and black bold but again I prefer the red as it has more connotations than the black titles.

Film Poster Research - Faraway Shots

In this post I will analyse more film posters, the theme in these posters are that the shots are further away and they show more than just a face or a mask.

In this film poster, from the film the Unborn you can see the woman looking into the mirror and you can see her reflection, and also another reflection of a little boy, however he is not in the shot, looking into the mirror as well. It says on the left hand side that 'Evil will do anything to live' you can probably guess that the little boy in the mirror is evil and is there to cause her some discomfort. He doesn't look like a proper little boy, but he looks more like a ghostly image, which could say that the boy isn't actually alive, agreeing with the title 'The Unborn'. I think having the text at the bottom of the shot is quite effective as your eyes aren't drawn to the text immediately but you still look at the text. I think in our film poster we will probably have the text at the bottom so that the audience are not immediately attracted to the text but the actual shot of the poster.

I think that this poster is quite scary, as your attention is first drawn to the women standing in her kitchen area, and then your attention is drawn to the person behind her in the darkness of the corner of the room, with a mask on. It looks like he is staring at her, however, you can't see if he is carrying anything in his hand but he looks as if he is going to cause some harm to the lady. Again, as the poster before this the title of the film is at the bottom, which again draws the attention down. Underneath that it says it is based on true events, this would personally frighten me as when you watch a scary film you can tell yourself it's not real but with this film you cannot tell yourself that! What I like about this poster is that the woman looks as if she is just a normal woman and that she hasn't done anything wrong and there is someone after her.

In this film poster your eyes are drawn towards the figure in the middle of the poster, again you cannot see his eyes but you can see his hands and it looks like he is rubbing them together, either he is coming up with a plan or he is rubbing them in glee, as if he has accomplished something. This Film Poster is very dark and again the writing is red, this seems to be a very popular theme among the posters. The figure in the middle of the poster looks burnt, or has been burned previously, so I think this will play a big part in the film. A difference from this poster to the others is that this has the release date at the bottom whereas the others don't.

From these posters I think that having the Title of the film at the bottom of the poster is a good idea as the majority of all horror posters I have come across have the title at the bottom. And that we should incorporate Red and Black into our poster.

Poster Research - Close up Posters

Here I have decided to start researching posters, in reply to my previous blog post about the ideas we had. I have decided to find posters from films which are a similar genre to ours. These posters focus manly on the face, as this is a possible idea for our poster I have decided to make these separate from the others I have found.

This poster is from the film Scream, it focuses mainly on a girls face, her facial features imply that something she is looking at is scaring her, as she has a shocked look on her face. Her hand is over her mouth, which could mean that she is trying to hold her breath, or trying not to talk or even make any type of noise. The poster is in black and white, which is much like the mask in the actual film, they could be trying to get a link between the two. I think this poster is effective because it is simple, with the black and white yet it is informative and effective in the way it portrays the film, I think it makes you want to go and see the film.

This is one of many posters from the Saw Franchise. In this particular one you can see a mans face, but only the lower half, as we cannot see the eyes we cannot really tell if he is in pain or if he is scared etc. When you look closer you can see the brutality of the poster, you can see that the upper lip is held up by some sort of torture contraption and that in the upper jaw all of the teeth have been extracted. You can also see the Saw logo and it looks like it's the 3rd film as there are three teeth after the saw. I think this film poster is effective because as it is the 3rd film you know what the brutality and gore is like in Saw yet you cannot get enough of these films as they are quite addictive.

This is a film poster from the film Grudge, this focuses on the eye of a girl, we do not know if she is possessed or if she is just looking scared, I haven't seen this film so I am just going on what i think the film poster portrays, the poster, again is simple in black and white with red writing and red can connote blood and anger. This film looks quite scary and the fact the girls hair is covering her face says that it could be quite a mysterious film. I think it is an effective poster as you can just see her eye and some hair covering her eye, it is quite a simple design.

This is a film poster from the Friday the 13th films, which have been remade a lot of times. This again is in black and white, and there is a bit of red writing which again connotes blood. All you can see is the Mask which could tell you that someone or something in a mask is going to be a part of this film and something regarding that mask will happen to someone.

All of these film posters have the Black and White theme within them which I think is something we should consider when brainstorming ideas for our poster. They are all close up shots, which I think is again a good idea as we have a shot which would be perfect for this kind of poster.