FILM MAGAZINE COMPARISON

POSTER COMPARISON

FINAL DRAFT MAGAZINE COVER

• Similar effect used on this and the film poster but with this image I purposely made her face clearer and easier to distinguish, because this is about the person that played Mary and not the character herself.
• Previously removed background on the image, but it didn't have the desired effect. The outline was a bit jagged and didn't look good with a white background. Leaving the photo natural made it look more professional.
• The masthead 'VIEW' relates to film obviously, but could also be read as 'NEW' hinting to the new reviews etc in the magazine.
• Different pull quotes used to try and draw the reader in; 'Worlds First Look', 'First Time Interview'.

FINAL DRAFT FILM POSTER

• The darkness in the face, on the dress and in the background of the picture was achieved by using effects on Paintshop Pro. I blurred the image to start with and then used a darkening tool.
• Iconic image of the noose around the girls neck, also links to the title.
• Image doesn't give anything away about the plot, will leave the audience with many questions, e.g who is the girl on the front? 
• Tag line 'short drop, sudden stop'. A line used to describe someone's death in the gallows, back when death by hanging was legal. Relates to title of the film and is quite a chilling sentence to read.
• The girl appears to be looking straight at the reader - draws them in and makes it seem personal.

Focus group plan

Beforehand

·         Set up tables and camera

·         Put 8 questionnaires on table with pens

·         Put posters and magazines on memory stick

Structure

1.       Katie explains what is going to happen and what they need to do...

·         Watch trailer

·         Fill in questionnaire straight after viewing (not during trailer)

·         Answer open questions which they can answer as they wish openly

·         Have a look at each poster and magazine

·         Answer open questions on each one

2.       Play trailer

3.       They fill in questionnaire

4.       Ask them open questions about trailer

5.       Show each magazine

6.       Ask three open questions about each one

7.       Repeat with magazine covers

Focus Group Questionnaire

Circle your answer(s)

1.       What genre (type of film) do you think the trailer is?

Romantic

Romantic comedy

Sci-fi

Horror

Comedy

Western

Thriller

Psychological Thriller

Action

Action/ adventure

Fantasy

Drama

2.       Who do you think the trailer is aimed at?

10-15 years-old

15-25 years-old

25-40 years-old

40-50+ years-old

3.       What were your emotions during the trailer?

Beginning:

Middle:

End:

4.       What would you rate our film trailer out of 10 (10 being excellent)?

5.       Would you personally go to see this film after watching the trailer? And Why?

Evaluation


The genre my group chose to specifically focus on was 'psychological Thriller'. With our trailer we decided to stick as closely as we could to the conventional aspects of this genre. We drew upon conventions from existing psychological Thrillers such as the 'Blair Witch Project' and 'The Women In Black'. We particularly liked the dark minimal stylistic approach the trailers took with the low key lighting, shadows and the quiet, eerie soundtracks which we intended to replicate with our own. The Mise-en-scene of our trailer was based primarily on that of the 'Blair Witch Project'. With our location being also in a wood it allowed for shots to be easily distorted and darkened. It also made it easier to film our 'ghost' character Mary; the trees helped to only show glimpses of her and not her whole body, which is what we wanted.  An unconventional aspect of our trailer would be our female main character, which contradicts Mulvey's 'male gaze'  theory of film which claims that the use of females in film is too simply attract male viewers and in doing so portraying females as 'weak' and to rely on males for protection.  


An example of the type of the overall 'dark' mise-en-scene used in the Blair Witch of which we wanted to replicate - 



Example of our ghost 'Mary' -

Ideally we would want our audience to consume our trailer in cinema's, as the cinema is probably the best way to view a trailer. The internet and television would be the other way that we would want our trailer to be consumed.


  Cinema would ideally be the best place for our trailer to be consumed, the audience would be fully focused on the trailer and it would benefit from being on the big screen.


 Televised consumption would be good because it allows for our trailer to be exposed to a much wider audience, one that we could not fully reach if it was just confined to cinema


 The most popular form of media, and so it would obviously be a great place for our trailer to be consumed. The internet allows for media forms to be shared across the globe, which would be invaluable for our trailer.

Well preferably I would want the audience to be in suspense for the majority of our trailer. We tried hard to build up tension in our trailer, without giving to much away about the plot, the music we used builds up a few times during our trailer so the audience will be in suspense to when the climax of our trailer will occur. The order of our trailer also doesn't correspond with the order of the story, and many shots are distorted and accompanied by fast paced editing, so the audience will hopefully feel disorientated and scared at the same time.

The generic codes and conventions in our trailer could also relate to Todorov's theory of narrative structure. A 'state of equilibrium' is disrupted when 'Mrs Kynch' slams her hand on the diary accompanied by a diegetic boom. This scene signifies a change in the trailer, from the slow beginning where the audience is introduced to the characters in the trailer to the fast paced editing used when the mise-en-scene changes to the wood.

In Atkinson's study of suicide, he claims that to define suicide it is purely up to a coroners opinion. He claims that hanging is a stereotypical image associated with suicide, so when there is a death by hanging, people assume it would be suicide when really it could be murder, its all just a matter of opinion. This theory relates exactly with our trailer becuase the images of the noose will leave the question, suicide? or murder?

The main characters were not very clearly represented in our trailer. You could say that this is a point where we challenge the conventions used in most professionally made trailers because normally main roles are usually identified straight away.. We deliberately wanted to make our trailer mysterious and confusing and so we didn't want to completely fully represent each and every character clearly. At the begginning we give a brief introduction to them, as the camera focuses in close up on each character, but from then on they are only seen briefly as the editing process is sped up after our 'point of equilibrium'.

This is an example of how we tried to display our ghost character 'Mary', its very difficult to make out her features and she only appears in flashed, we didn't want to give much away in regards to her appearance. 

Images are constantly shown throughout the trailer that link back to death; images of a noose are dotted around in the trailer through different close ups, worms eye views and medium close ups; the legs of a person hanging outside the door of a tent is shown and a medium close of our character 'Mary' as she enters the wood with a knotted rope in her hand, so death would certainly be a key theme in our trailer. Other themes such as darkness definitely play a huge part. We wanted the audience to be as disorientated of the surroundings presented to them as much we could,so,a lot of shots in our trailer were darkened in the editing process so that we could give off a sense of isolation and fear; two other key themes. 

Example of the dark imagery used in our trailer 

A striking image that personifies the theme of death in our trailer. This image was used to shock and scare the audience 
but to also leave questions, such who is dead? was it suicide? or murder?




One of the many shots of a noose used in our trailer, the low angle worms eye view gives off the impression that its a point of view shot of someone about to be hung.

My poster helps promote my film because it is a striking and dark image. The distorted face of the girl on the front will hopefully attract my target audience because its leaves a lot of questions -1. Who is the girl? 2. What role does she play? and also the poster is quite obviously part of the horror genre, as the girl's appearance looks obviously evil. I darkened the image quite a bit so that her facial expressions were not obvious, giving her a sort of non-human kind of look, so that the audience may identify that she could possibly be a ghost or a demon of some sorts. The poster doesn't give anything away about the plot of the film either, so the audience will be drawn to watch the film so they can see what part this girl has to play. My poster also contains the 'iconic image' of my film, and that is of the noose.

My magazine on the other hand gave off a different side to 'The Hangings concept, on the magazine cover I used Katie who plays the character 'Mary' in my trailer. I chose to display her as herself in real life than as her character in the trailer.

All three texts woked well together becuase they each individually promote my trailer in their own way.They all represent different aspects of my film, the trailer obviously shows sections of the film and is created to entice the audience. The trailer would be my main source of promotion as it would be displayed to a wider audience through the cinema and television etc. My poster then accompanies my film by displaying the film in a dark and evil light. The dark image of the girl relates back to the character 'Mary' you see in the trailer, but presents her in a very much more sinister fashion. The trailer only shows glimpses of Mary whereas in the poster you see her fully, with a noose around her neck. Hopefully the poster will leave the audience with alot of questions that could only be half answered in the trailer, and then from that, they will go to watch the full length feature film. The magazine however shows 'Mary' in the form of an actress and not her in character. I wanted to show have her like this because I feel enough had been shown of the characters and the plot in my trailer and poster, and so the magazine would be a promotional tool for my film in the sense that it will show the audience the actors and actresses.


The technologies I used when creating my final promotional package included the internet, a digital camera, Adobe InDesign, Paintshop Pro, Photoshop, Video camera and Blogspot. I used the internet regularly in the early parts of the planning process for my trailer. I researched film posters and looked at how effective they were at promoting their film. I also looked at other film trailers so I could see different codes and conventions used in professional productions, and so the internet was an invaluable tool in the planning process. The digital camera was used during the development of my groups animatic. We storyboarded our film synopsis and then went on to replicate in photo form. The animatic allowed us to view the key shots we had storyboarded and helped us decide whether any shots needed changing. Following on from the animatic, the Video Camera was then used to bring the animatic photos to life and to capture all the additional shots needed for the trailer. Adobe InDesign, Paintshop Pro and Photoshop were all used during the creation of my film poster and film magazine. Adobe InDesign allowed us to layer images and words that helped to create a conventional, professional looking magazine and poster; Paintshop Pro and Photoshop were used when the images needed to be edited and cut to how I wanted them. This proved invaluable for my poster because my image I had required a lot of work to be done to it in order for it to look how I wanted it. I used many blurs and distortion effects on the face and darkened the image significantly. Finally Blogspot was used to keep track of all the work I have done over the year, and to display ideas and inspiration that directly influenced the final products in my A2 portfolio. 

All in all I feel the film trailer that me and my group have produced is extremely successful and I'm extremely proud of what I and everyone else involved has achieved. The film trailer itself I feel looks professional, due to the variation in camera shots (close ups, worms eye views, medium shots, pans, zooms, long shots, angled shots, tilted shots, point of view shots), the effects used in the trailer ( blurs, sharp cuts, flashes, ghosting effects) and the soundtracks; we used many different non diegetic sounds throughout the trailer, like soft eerie piano, or sharp build ups of strings and other instruments. We also had in the background the non diegetic sound of a nursery rhyme sung softly over the scenes, which I think adds a brilliant ghostly effect to the whole production.  We also used many different diegetic sounds like the rustling of trees or the sounds of birds and speech from characters throughout the trailer. 
During our focus group presentation of our film we had very positive feedback from the selected group that watched the trailer. We had two adults aged at twenty four and twenty five and then we had eight other teenagers aged from seventeen to eighteen, this roughly covered our target audience which was aged 15-25. They viewed our trailer and were then asked to fill in a questionnaire (a copy of which can be viewed later on in this blog) based on their first impressions. They made comments claiming that the trailer looked 'professional', 'genuinely scary' and that it was 'brilliant'. When asked to rate the trailer out of ten, scores varied from 8 to 10/10. When the group was asked to identify the genre of our film they all answered with psychological horror or horror, which was the genre of our film, so hopefully this means that our trailer would be able to attract audiences who are fans of those genres. It was interesting to see if the audience could work out the basic plot of our film because the trailer does not present the plot in chronological order. Suprisingly they could pretty much work out the basic plot, but they failed to pick up on key sub characters like 'Mrs Kynch' who was the best friend of our ghost 'Mary' when she was alive, everyone in the focus group thought that she was the mother. 
     The audience could establish the key characters in our trailer but couldn't identify what parts they played in the plot. The focus group liked our locations too and said that the wood really added to the overall dark ambience of the film, one person did say though that she would've preferred it if some shots that were filmed in the wood were a bit darker, as the light didn't seem as scary. 


Variations of shots used in the trailer:

Side on medium close-up

High angled shot with sepia effect

Hand-held panning long shot

Film Poster Examples

This image is key because it is supposed to make the audience jump as it is displayed. It will be accompanied by a sudden bang and is intended to make the audience question who this hand belongs to and whether it is the villain in the film. The hand itself also gives the shot a very creepy and eerie feel.

This shot I feel is a key shot because it establishes the four main characters in our film and will give the audience a brief chance to look at the characters before everything gets disrupted in the wood. It will hopefully create a false sense of security for the audience, almost like the calm before the storm.

This shot is my favourite out of the whole animatic. Its so shocking too look at and will hopefully give the audience chills. Its the first chance that the audience get to see that people do actually get hanged in the animatic and so it will have a strong effect on the mood change in the animatic.

This is the main shot of our character Mary. Its very creepy to look at and again like the hanging feet will hopefully shock and scare the audience. Striking images like this really help to bring our animatic to life.

Mary blurred running through the wood. A very eerie shot that is quite hard to see, the blurred effect will hopefully confuse the audience and make them wonder what it is that is running.

My groups final animatic

Critical analysis

An animatic is a series of photos that depict the key shots that appear in a piece of film (in my case my film trailer) possibly accompanied by diegetic and/or non diegetic sound. Its function is too give a rough outline on the order of a piece of film and to help view whether any parts need changing.

The process of developing an animatic starts with the drawing up of a storyboard, which is the pictures in the animatic only roughly drawn. The pictures are then replicated through photographs. The photos are then collected and put into the relevant order for the animatic and then sound is edited over the top.

In order to create and develop the narrative of my groups animatic we first put all our separate narrative ideas together and then combined elements of all of them to get our final plot. We then edited the storyline using the process explained above, and then picked key shots out of the storyboard that we wanted to be used in our
trailer.

In terms of organising a schedule from our storyboard we took our photos in order of location instead of the order in the storyboard; so for example we took all our shots in the wood location at once and then took all of our shots in the school at a separate time.

Overall we had around 55 shots and used three different locations; my friends house, some woods and my school. We used a variety of props that ranged from a dress for our ghost character to some rope for a noose to a tent for the four characters to sleep in. We chose to use as little props and extra equipment as possible because we didn't think it was necessary to use everything on our animatic which only really acts as an outline.
As we went along with the photo taking process we chose to add and take away certain shots as it was much easier to distinguish what would work in our animatic when we were actually on our actual set taking the photos. Most of our photos were relatively easy to capture, the only problem being was with the ones in the woods that required a birds eye view. We attempted to climb trees to do it but it turned out to be very difficult to capture well, also with the limited amount of people we had available it was hard to get all the shots  taken of everyone; it required much changing round of the person taking the photos.

We constructed our animatic by placing all our photos in order and then playing the animatic back, we could then distinguish which shot we wanted to have shorter than the other and where to place the diegetic and non diegetic sound. We decided on the length of shots by basically deciding on what we thought looked best, for example we didn't want shots that weren't that visually attractive to be on screen for too long.

The titles we used on the animatic we decided on before hand during the storyboarding process, the font we used was one that we thought looked scary enough and one that related to our animatic. The font had to stand out and add an eerie edge.

Our soundtrack to our animatic was kept as simple as possible. We used very strange sounding chimes on the wood scenes and the other scenes were accompanied by my friend singing this ghostly child's song. It sounded great I felt and really accompanied the shots on the animatic well.

I think our animatic would appeal to our target audience because our characters are of similar age, and so they could be related too, and our animatic in my opinion has the characteristics of a good horror film that would capture people's interest.

Personally I would change the soundtrack to our film slightly, I like the one we have currently but maybe some more clips of music to build up tension better would be useful. Also more realistic props would be needed to make the film trailer look more authentic, and maybe make the editing look a bit more smooth than it was in the animatic, but overall I'm very pleased with my groups animatic.