Evaluation

 Our trailer is featured on Mr Earls blog.

The main part of our trailer is the visual part obviously but another important part which is not often considered significant is genre; which in our project was horror. The main features of a horror trailers are: fast pace, music (usually creepy), snappy shots – which complement the fast pace of a classic horror trailer, it is also significant to stay within the ‘typical’ colour schemes of a horror film – which very much can vary from in colour – red, white and black (connoting blood, gore and general horror) - to black and white (connoting fear, the unknown and old fashioned). This is why me and Steph decided to create an ‘up to date’ horror film which is focused around colour and will be liked by our main target audience. We decided we wanted to target a teenage age group, very much 15 –20, we decided this because in statistics it’s stated that the age group who attends the cinema the most are in fact 14 – 24. Compared to our AS project, we focused mainly on having female actors apart from the detective at the beginning but due to his age, he is considerable less appealing towards the younger male audience as to a teenage male within the film. This is particularly why we wanted to include a young male actor within our project as we will not be excluding half of our potential audience. We have stuck to the main convention of a horror film which is considered the location – it has to be ‘creepy’, isolated but open at the same time. Like many other horror films in the past we have stuck to a favourite location – the woods, many famous horror films have used the woods as the main location and we particularly liked the idea of doing this as many of our potential audience would often go camping with friends or hang around the woods for other reasons such as: drinking, using them for BMX jumps, creeping each other out. I also found very important when thinking about why I used to go to the woods and that was because me and my friends were often told about stories of that particular place and which quite often featured some form of death from murder to suicide etc. However we were more interested in creeping ourselves out as to actually seeing the nature side. This is one of the factors that influenced our project and the location within it. Another is all the trailers we watched as our research and preparation for the practical work, Steph and I watched all different trailers from the horror genre and watched our for the location within it
Insidious – Mainly based within a house
Paranormal activity – Again house
Hatchet – Woods / cabin within the woods
Urban Legend – set within a university however scenes within the woods
The Blair witch project – set within the woods

With those trailers we stuck with the main idea that we wanted to set out film within the woods therefore focused a lot on Hatchet, Urban Legend and The Blair Witch Project. We dissected them into the elements that we liked and made sure we placed them within our trailer.
Hatchet – we used the form of narration they used within their trailer, which was a little girl telling the story that their film is going to be based heavily on. In their case it was a little boy who was in a log cabin within the woods that was on fire – we are unsure if he died until she says ‘poor Victor Crawley died’ therefore it gives us a taste of what is going to be included within this film, we know by that, that we are dealing with a ‘supernatural’ being, and they are feared from the dead/ unknown. And another feature we choose to include is the fact that they base it on a folk lore, which in the narration they set it out as a children’s story. Which we particularly liked the most, which is what lead up to watching Urban Legend and The Blair Witch Project – both have woods based scenes (some more than others) but they both also focus a lot around the idea of Urban Legends/Folk Lore’s used within both of them – The Blair Witch Project focused a lot around The Blair Witch (info on the story is further down in my blog) and her alone – within the film it has two boys and one girl whom set out to uncover who the Blair Witch is and if it is really true. Like within our project we were going to use 3 actors – two boys and one girl, in addition to make our female actor the vulnerable one of the bunch. However due to unreliable actors we could only get two to ensure we get the filming done as we were already behind on our filming as there was a lot of bailing on their behalf. We also watched Urban Legend to gain an understanding of all the different forms of urban legends/folk lore’s (again all the info on different legends used throughout this film is featured further down in my blog)

Titles -
We asked Darren to create some titles in after effects (since me and steph both didn’t exactly know how to use it). He created a particle background which we asked to be red as it made it look like blood drops on the background. At first we used rotating white text to tell the audience which actors are within our trailer but also to put across slogans to get the audience excited and also thinking about what could happen within our films. However, we couldn’t slow down the rotation within our trailer and they were just too fast for the audience to read, therefore Mr Earl changed the text all together however kept the particle background, the text he used gave off a better affect as it looked more like it fits the horror genre than our simple white text.

To go against the ‘typical’ codes and conventions of a general horror trailer, we decided to have a twist within our film, throughout the trailer we are showing that the girl in our film (Emma) as innocent as possible, which goes with the ‘typical’ stereotype of females within horror films however what goes against the typical codes and conventions of a horror film is that Emma is in fact the horror everyone faces – Ruby, however the audience doesn’t see this but the signs are there within our trailer…

There were some complications with the voice for the narration we were going to use within our trailer, due to watching the Hatchet, we set our heart on using a little girl to do the narration within our trailer because of the story and the idea of children stories within our trailer. However this proved difficult as we wanted a typical ‘creepy’ little girls voice like in the trailer for Hatchet and also in adverts for Thirteen (Alton Towers ride) and phones for you advert with the attack in the car park. However we had to film a person with a similar voice or very close to a little girls voice, I asked my friends little sister; however she has too much of a south accent and also she stumbled a lot throughout the recording, it just wasn’t creepy enough. We then resorted to looking for people on YouTube who do voice and I found one in particular who said she would do it but she didn’t know when it would be done due to her busy schedule as she’s getting many requests off people for her ‘creepy girl voice’. This meant that I had to find someone else to do the voice over for us, I also messaged a few more people who do creepy voice on YouTube, however they didn’t reply until it was getting late or after we resorted to Emma doing the voice over and then changing the pitch in sound booth, this in theory made it more significant as Emma was telling a story about a girl who died who in the end turns out to be her.

Poster
With the poster we had some difficulties as we didn’t take any pictures when filming as we were planning to use some still shots from the videos we had already. However the quality was quiet rubbish in comparison to professional posters, we also had some complications with the fact that posters look posed to an extent; particularly in horror posters (you’d never find a completely posed poster for a horror film). So later on I went with Emma to take some additional shots for the poster and magazine in a wood that was similar to the woods we shot in but a lot closer meaning we didn’t have to travel that far again. We looked at the poster for Eden Lake, which wasn’t one of the films we looked at in addition to our trailer however we particularly liked the set out of the poster where it shows the girl hiding behind a tree and the villains are in the background. What is particularly significant about this to me is that she has a spot light on her giving her a lighter tone – almost a form of innocence and in the background you see silhouettes of the villains she is hiding from, therefore symbolising evil and darkness.
I had to go though many different stages to get to the point where we thought it was suitable enough to be a movie poster, at first we had just Emma behind the tree and the background in a blur, however we found it missing something, the background needed something to make it look like a horror film. Thus giving me the idea to get an image for the background, this is where me and Steph went to the woods again, to just get an image of me in the exact same spot as in the image of Emma originally, but instead of being where Emma was, I was stood slightly behind the tree on the upper level of the woods. I then cut myself out of the image on PhotoShop then placed it on the original image of Emma with the blurred background. I also placed the signature Red Woods titles across it however to make it look more like the title isn’t just placed over the top, I decided to put my leg through a letter to then make it look more like it’s there in reality. I also had to play around a lot with the brightness and contrast of the image to ensure I get the right bits dark but not too dark for the poster. I also placed a ‘lighting effect’ from the left top corner so it goes across Emma but not across her dark alter ego (me). I believe if there wasn’t so much bailing and more time, we could have edited it to make it look even better and also make another one featuring Liam (our male actor) so it doesn’t look like it’s all about Emma, therefore not giving too much away.

Magazine

The magazine personally is my favourite part of the project, it has worked better than the other elements as it looks more realistic than the other products in all honesty. It features the main parts of a movie magazine, such as the name of the magazine, upcoming movies, exclusives etc. We decided to have one main image on our magazine, which is the image off Emma looking terrified with her hand over her mouth (indicating she is speechless, cannot scream or has to be quiet as her life is at risk), I played around with the brightness and contrast of the image to make it really bright but with a very high contrast, this makes it look considerable more eerie, therefore indicating that it is a horror to the audience. We also choose to use the movie magazine Empire as our magazine as both me and Steph are a huge fan of the magazine but also because it is very rare to see a horror film as its main feature, so we really wanted to go against this typical theme. Again I went through a lot of trials to get the magazine cover to the way it is today as we had to make many changes to the image, what else is featured, text, correction in spelling and the fact that some of the corners were lacking business. We featured a lot of the elements that featured on other Empire magazine front covers, such as the film strip, however I choose to feature it with the “test your film knowledge” slogan on it, so it’s giving the audience an actual activity, giving them something back.

Poster - Landscape

Poster stages

I like how this poster has worked out, however there are a few adjustments that will be needed to make sure this is as professional as possible, one being that the date it is released is cut off at the bottom, it is also needing the name of the person we got our backing music off where the gap is places, where the second line is placed starting 'a stephanie martin....' needs moving along to fit in with the whole placement of the rest of the text, as the line seems to be shorter than the rest of the group of text, making it look sloppy

Trailer

Starts at 10 seconds

This is a rough idea of a poster i made up during this lesson. I have made the background and person in the background blurry so we are unable to see what is going on, and i have made our main lead Emma bold to draw more attention towards the main part of it, which is her.

I have also put a lighting effect on it called 'lighting effects' which is found by clicking on filter then render on photoshop.

you are able to choose how you would want the light on the image, which angle, how bright, the length ect.

FINAL PIECE!!!!!!!

This is the FINAL addition to our magazine. I have made some alterations which are, adding a tag line like the one in the Harry Potter empire magazine and also took off the full stop on the 'The Exorcist 40 years later'

 Minor edits, just realised when i looked over the blog i realised that Ryan Reynolds was spelt wrong, so i made that slight edit.

Extra few adjustments

 

Here is the final edits we are hoping to make, hopefully this will be to the high standards we must achieve to make our work seem as professional as possible. 

I have separated the test your film knowledge and the footer, to ensure that there isn't a link between the two. I have also added in more text down the left hand side, just like on the Harry Potter Empire Magazine example in my previous blog. With that in mind, i have also included an image down the left hand side to make it look like theres more going on, again like in the Harry Potter example previously.

Hopefully final edits.

I have done all the edits that i mentioned i needed to do on the previous blog entry, however i have also added in a footer like Mr Earl suggested, and i really think it's worked better than i thought.

I got the inspiration for the footer for our magazine from a recent Empire magazine with Harry Potter of the front, i like the effect of the double hash spacing inbetween the famous films, but instead i used actors.

I have high hopes that this will be the final edits and what emphasises this more is the fact that i was editing it in the sixth form area and a student thought it was an actual front cover of a magazine and never realised i created it myself :)

Further edits

I have recently re-created our magazine cover and put further edits in place to ensure that it is of an exceptionally high standard. The Empire logo, is exactly the same as it would be on anyother magazine cover. We have also placed the date and price in the above v of the M, just like how they do on the actually magazine itself. Thus making it as professional as possible. I have placed a tag line above the logo - THE ULTIMATE MOVIE & DVD REVIEW GUIDE - this is a significant part of the magazine as it is on more or less every single magazine cover but also that it tells the audience what the magazine is about, you wouldn't have the image we have say on the cover of a disney princess magazine it just wouldn't work. Another change was that i took out the exclusive with redwood stars, as it looked rubbish when the film was mentioned twice, it is clear enough as it is that they are mentioned throughout the magazine. Another minor change was the tag line underneither the Redwood logo - i changed it from
'do you believe in children's stories' to Do you believe everything you hear?
this seems to react better with the audience than do you believe in children's stories, as they'd think it's just another 'Blair Witch Project' film. Which in these days is getting repeated way to much.
I have also looked at many different Empire magazines to see what was included on them magazines and what could also feature on mine and Stephs magazine cover, what makes them as successful as they are.

What this magazine cover features:

- Empire logo
- Website
- Date and price
- The Ultimate Movie and DVD Review Guide
- Barcode
- Main image
- What the film is
- Tag lines / slogans
- Film tape featuring what other films are being mentioned within the magazine

What our magazine cover features:

- Empire logo
- Date and price
- The Ultimate Movie and DVD Review Guide
- Website
- Barcode
- Main image
- Title of the film
- Tag lines / Slogans
- Other films mentioned through out the magazine
- Film strip with images of horror films on.

This magazine still needs a lot of work as i need to fill in the gaps between
The Exorcist 40 years later
and
Best of 2012 so far
as there is a blank space between both of them, that really needs filling otherwise it will not look professional.

Edits

I have made many alterations to mine and stephs product, i believe it's to a higher standard than our origional piece and i have taken in the ideas from our audience.

Peoples opinions will be much appreciated.

Credits we are using within our work.

These are the credits that we plan to use for our trailer, we didn't do them ourselves as we were unfamiliar with the software - After Effects - So we got a friend to help us and we explained what we wanted and how we wanted it. I think the result is brilliant, and i believe without his help we wouldn't of been able to get it to the high quality it is. The only problem i have with this is that the text doubles back on itself, however this isn't a problem as we are planning to cut it to fit inbetween the shots of film we already have. Therefore making it as realistic as possible.

Magazine edits

MAGAZINE COVER

We are going to be doing a few minor edits to the magazine cover, considering the criticisms of our audiences and Mr Earl.

This will be done in the up coming days, it would have been done today however my laptop is currently getting a new battery put in and i wont be getting it back until tonight.

However the things that will be changed are:

- Text across the image
- Tag line
- Bar code being made smaller

POSTER

We are now focusing on getting our poster finished, it's getting to the standard where we sort of have the lighting effects under control however it still has a lot of work that needs doing.

Since we are planning to have it of similarity to the Eden Lake poster, as we like the style, we have to take in great consideration to how we are going to produce it and not make them to much alike.

Audience Feed back.

Recently Stephanie has done some questionnaires using our print product, I'll admit that i haven't had much participation in this as i have been focusing a lot on my art projects that had to be done by a sooner deadline than my media course work.

This is the feed back that we have gotten back from our audience:


Shot of the questionnaire and the image we asked them to give their opinion on, the only problem with this was that the image was in black and white, thus not giving the full effect of the actual product itself. However we did manage to get good feedback and some criticism of our work to there for enable to help us to improve the work.

The graph below shows the results Stephanie got -

This pie chart shows the answers. the question was " What genre do you think the poster represents"
This has made it clear that we have achieved our mission of creating a front cover of a magazine that is promoting a horror film. This is pretty clear as most of the audience put that they thought it was a horror film.


This pie chart represents "What do you think is the best part of the magazine cover?"
This shows that the audience we've asked to fill in our questionnaire actually was drawn more to the picture than the rest of the text, this is significant as the image is a representation of our film, thus more memorable than the text.


This bar chart shows the answer of the participants. it was "Do you think it represents the horror genre well?"
This graph clear shows that the audience can link our magazine cover to the genre with ease and there are no miss of communication between the image, genre and audience. We wanted to make this clears as we want to benefit our main target audience than draw in people who may not be interested in the film and therefore not giving it bad publicity to potential audiences.


Stephanie found that a lot of the audience she asked to fill in the questionnaire gave very positive feedback. She included on particular question that could either makes us or break us, to help us get the best possible out come that appeals more to the audience. That being:

                       "Please state on advantage and disadvantage of the poster?"

The answers she received from this question were:

PROS

- It advertises the film very well and looks very scary
- Very clear image
- You can understand straight away it is a horror film

CONS

- No tagline
- Some of the text is difficult to read

Potential Improvements:

We also received comments suggesting improvements we could make to potentially make it better and more attractive to the audience. These were:


"make the front cover less crowded"
and
"not to place a lot of text across the image."


So the main criticism was that our poster had to much font and looked a bit over crowed. To compensate this, we have returned to our print product and we are going to alter some of the text to different parts of the page and at different angles to make they visible however not overcrowding so our print products don't come across as "tacky".

Empire Magazine

This is our design idea for our front page of a magazine promoting our film.
We have a very striking close up of our female actor, with very wide open eyes and mouth covering her mouth, this gives the idea that she is very scared/shocked, and the covering of the mouth indicates that she cannot scream otherwise she is found by the "killer" or that she has a secret to tell, which is very apparent during our film, this is because we have a twist in our film where Emma turns out to be the killer.
We have also featured much text onto the front cover to make it look more like a magazine, we have stuck to advertising our genre by putting on tag lines/captions mentioning our film and many other horror things. We've used red text as it is a striking colour and fits into our colour scheme we associate with classic horror films.
We put most of the text in Consolas which is very bold but simple - it doesn't draw to much attention away from the image. However we used Chiller font for two parts of the the image, i think it works well for for the top 500 part however i personally don't think it fits the Stephen King part. Because of this i am planning on changing this to fit the rest of the text as it will look more appealing and not out of tune to the rest of the text on the page.
We have also placed white Render - lighting effects on the left side of the image, we thought this was very effective as it tells us that it isn't a image just taken out of the film but also that it isn't completely posed. It also gives a hint to the story as we cannot tell if Emma is innocent or guilty, or is shes real or a myth.







The alterations have been made as show in the image above.
Final out come featuring change.