Dear Moderator,

Welcome to my blog, I hope you enjoy reading through it.

I have completed a trailer, magazine cover and poster for the trailer which has been created. I have posted all my research and planning for my trailer, magazine cover and poster and then the process of making them.

My research and planning starts in September 2012, and my evaluation in March 2013. My completed trailer, magazine cover and poster is just below this note.

From
Sophie O'Donnell

Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Evalutaion: Ouestion Three

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

I have created a short movie on imovie to show what audience feedback I was given and I also talk about how the audience feedback which I recieved has helped me throughout creating my film poster, magazine and trailer.
To get audience feedback I have gathered it in various ways, using various technologies. I used
  • Social Networking Websites
  • Interviews
  • Questionnaires 

    The social networking websites which I used to gather my audience feedback were facebook and twitter as these gave me a range of audiences to ask and get better feedback. 

    Interviews and the questionnaires gave me more detailed answers so would help me more when creating my products.

    From my audience feedback I changed parts of my trailer, poster and magazine. At the beginning my poster had a picture on one side of the poster and the text on the other side from audience feedback I made the picture more of a vocal point of the poster making it as big as the whole page and the characters eyes as the main point by adding brightness to the face of the actress.

    I changed my magazine by making the picture on the cover of my character with a gradient around it making the face of the character making it a big vocal point by making the picture bigger and taking the blue tint off of it. as well as making the name of the film bigger so the audience knows that it is promoting the film which was a point on my audience feedback.

    From interviews which took place before creating the trailer they helped us shaped the narrative of the trailer. As at the beginning before we creating the trailer and before the interviews we was going to have a completely different idea than what we did, we was going to film a group of friends going camping like blair witch but changed this idea due to the audience feedback.


Evaluation: Question Two

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary tasks?


I made a podcast and on IMovie edited it together to show what I am speaking about in the podcast.  As I did editing I have taked about how we used jump cuts inbetween each clip starting off slow and gradually building up getting faster to build serpense like in the possession trailer. I have also spoke about how my poster and magazine link together and how they show the genre. I have spoke about how the production company logo and the distribution linked to the horror genre. 

The magazine and poster link as they both has a similar colour scheme of red, white and black. Both of them have the same girl in similar positions making the link bigger between them, although my poster has a blue tint to the photo and the magazine has a dark tint with a black gradient around her to show the genre more. 

I tried to make the magazine and poster simple but effective and if both of the products show this it shows that they are both promoting the same film and help the audience make the link. I tried to make the pictures the vocal point of the products as out target audience will be drawn more to a good picture than they would text. 

During the trailer there is many different affects used on the footage which I have done during the editing process of the trailer on imovie as I was the editor of the group. I put shadow effects on the video to make the horror genre show through, I tired to carry this through on to my poster and magazine to help show a link between them and make the link effective to the audience so they can make this link. I did this by using a gradient on the magazine around the face of the possessed girl and then on the poster I used a blue tint to show a shadow, cold affect.

Representation of Characters: Throughout the trailer the girls are shown as typical teenagers, getting drunks and having fun with friends. The clothes they are wearing and the make up which they have on through the party scene shows that they are young. The girl which gets possessed is shown to be quiet and shy through her actions as she doesn't take part in the party and doesn't drink. The news reader is shown as a professional through the clothes she is wearing as she is wearing smart clothing with her hair pulled back.

Good Vs Bad: In the trailer there is a clear binary opposite as it is clear to the audience who the villain is and who the victims are. It is clear to them through the acting of the villain, the make up which she wears and the way she carries herself when she is possessed.

Colours: On the poster and magazine I used dark colours and reds as these colours are linked to the horror theme, so the audience knows straight away that the film is horror. On the trailer when the girl is possessed I also tried to use the dark colour effects on her to show she is possessed, these scenes are also taken at night so make the theme of horror more clear.

Lighting: In the trailer I used dark lighting when the girl was possessed, this was filmed in dark lighting to help show the theme of horror because it seems more dark and dingy when she is possessed with a slight glow on her to show clearly to the audience that she is possessed. It was also filmed so the possessed girls face was the vocal point of the shots because her face had a bright light on it and everything else was darker. This shows the audience the girls possessed eyes which she has making the trailer more scary.

Location: The location of the trailer was in a house, which we tried to make it look like a student house. The location was kept the same throughout the trailer to make the trailer look more consistent and help show the audience that it is something about the house which is causing the possession of the girl. 

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Vox Pop's 
 

Evaluation: Question One

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

 When creating my film magazine, poster and trailer I used, developed and challenged different   aspects conventions of real media text.

The Storyline which we used in our trailer is similar to other films which contain possession in them. This type of film is very popular at the moment so we had to make a few changes to help it stand out from all the others. Our storyline contains a group of students having a party when they move into their new house and strange things begin to happen when one of the girls who is more shy and quite gets possessed and kills off her friends apart from one.
Changing it to a group of friends who are students gives the storyline a change to other similar films, it also makes the film more appealing to the target audience as they are around the same age range.

Trailer
Conventions used from real media text 

Conventions which I have taken from real media texts to help show the genre of my film as there are certain conventions which are always used in horror films to help show the genre to the audience. 
I have used titles throughout my trailer like the trailer of the possession uses to help show the narrative of the trailer to the audience so they know from the trailer what the film is about to see if they would want to watch it.
I have also used a montage affect at the end of the trailer so when the music of the trailer builds up to the title of the film. The montage effect (kuleshov method) this is very common in horror trailers and films to build up tension through the trailer and film for the audience. 
I used the 'final girl' theory in my trailer by carol clover which is when a character gets haunted throughout the film but at the end survives.
I have also included the distribution logo of the company and the production logo on the trailer as this is the most common convention in trailers as every trailer made has these features. 
I have also used music which builds up throughout the trailer, this is a common convention when it comes to horror film trailers as when the music builds up in the trailer the jump cuts and editing of the trailer becomes faster and builds up more tension for the audience.
I have also copied the mise-en-scene of how possessed people are shown in a film, I got ideas off the way the girl in 'The possession' which helped me create my character in the trailer.


Conventions developed from real media text 
A conventions which I have developed from real media text is flicking from a hand held cameras and camera which are on a tripod. This is a developed conventions as films usually only use one or the other but in our trailer we thought adding hand held camera footage it in would help show the party scene and how drunk the characters are. I believed this worked well in our trailer because it changes and does stay the same throughout making it more interesting for the audience to watch.

Conventions which I have challenged from real media text
A challenged convention in the trailer is that the person who is possessed and killing the characters off is somebody they know where as when in most horror films the characters are killed by an outsider.We thought this would be a good change to the film as these types of films are very popular at the moments so it gives it a bit of a change to the normal storylines which you see a lot in these type of films.

Also throughout the trailer its gives more of an insight to watch actually happens in the film audience, it give more information then a normal trailer would which is a difference to normal horror film trailers.