COMPLETED TRAILER

After looking at our trailer again we decided to make a few changes, this included moving a few shots around, adding a slow motion shot and changing the lighting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9JV3AgczJk]

How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

I used a wide variety of different media technologies throughout my coursework which helped aid my research, planning, construction and evaluation of my project. However the main media technology that I used throughout my development of my coursework was BLOGGER. Blogger allowed me to keep a detailed journal of the different stages of my project, from research and planning, to the production and evaluating. It enabled me to store my work efficiently and was easy to access throughout the duration of my coursework. As well as this it also allowed me too upload images and videos which related to my work.

Research:

The main form of media technology used for the research stages of our coursework was GOOGLE.

Using Google allowed me to thoroughly research different genres and the conventions of supernatural thrillers, as well as this it also allowed me to research other existing supernatural thriller films.

Using the browser steered me towards many useful websites which helped towards my research stages of my coursework. One of the most useful website that Google lead me too was http://www.filmsite.org/ Filmsite is a online website which has been operated by Tim Dirks since 1996 and offers information concerning; Greatest Films, Oscars, Quotes, Genres, Scenes, History, Reviews etc.

This website was extremely useful for us when it came to genre research and it had a huge variety of information concerning different genres and conventions of genres. This website was ultimately responsible for our final choice of Supernatural Thriller.

As well as this, YOUTUBE also played a vital role in helping us research other thriller trailers and allowed us to see what forms and conventions were used in them.

Youtube allowed us to search different trailers for films which fell into the category of supernatural thrillers, such as Paranormal Activity and The Shining. Youtube played a vital role in the research stages of our trailer because it gave us the opportunity to analyse in depth real media trailers and see what conventions were used when it came to things such as; lighting, music, camera shots and angles. It was also very time saving and efficient to use, and it also meant that I could copy the URL link and post it on to my blog.

Planning:

When it came to planning the dates for our filming and arranging a time and place we decided to use the social networking site FACEBOOK to send out an email to all of the people involved as well as this we also sent out group texts from our mobile phones confirming of dates.

When it came to the planning of our film poster and magazine cover using media technologies was limited as most of our planning was achieved on print. This is because we drew several copies of potential posters and magazine covers by hand. However, in order to get the image onto Blogger we used an image scanner. This is a device which optically scans images and printed texts and converts them into a digital image. We also used this technology device to upload the images of our story board for our trailer which had originally been designed by hand.

For the planning of the film poster i decided to make a template version on the software package ADOBE INDESIGN. This allowed me to have a rough idea of how the final poster was going to look on a computer and showed me what worked well and what didnt. It gave me the opportunity to play around with different colours, backgrounds and positioning of different texts.

We also used PAINT and MICROSOFT WORD to help us decide what font we wanted to use for our main title "Darkness Awakens". In order to achieve this we used the popular website DAFONT, to look at different possible fonts that could be suitable for our poster, trailer and magazine cover. We then print screened the shot from the website, pasted them onto paint, which allowed us to crop the font that we wanted and then finished by pasting all of the possible options onto Word. This allowed us to compare the different fonts and come to a decision on want font we wanted to use.

We also used these two programs for the designing of our logo, we were able to use the images already provided on the software and play along with different pictures and texts.

When it came to the planning for our trailer, one of the media technologies that we used was a KODAK CAMERA. We used this device to take pictures of our potential cast members and also to record the auditions that we had taken. This was quick and efficient and allowed us to easily upload the images onto blogger. This was also the same camera that we used to take the images for the magazine front cover and the film poster.

Construction:

Media technologies were used most when it came to the construction of my coursework and they played a vital role in the development of the trailer, cover and poster.

To create the magazine front cover and poster we used a combination of different softwares which allowed us to edit the photos and put the whole product together. To edit the picture for the film poster i began by using MACROMEDIA FIREWORKS MX.

I used this software to edit the pictures of the house and the face and i aslo used it to put together all of the aspects of the poster. This was very useful in the construction of our ancillary task as it enabled us to add different effects to the images such as changing the colours and contrasts. I also decided to use this software because i found it easier to work with which meant i could be efficient and achieve the best results possible.

When it came to the magazine front cover, Charlotte decided to use INDESIGN instead. This has similar features to Fireworks but as Charlotte had used this program before she felt more comfortable and knew how the tools worked.

We filmed our footage for the trailer using a DV CAMCORDER with digital video tapes. How to use the camcorder was easy to pick up and we were able to use special effects on the camera such as night vision and zooms. We then uploaded the footage from the camera onto the program MOVIE PLUS 5, as this is the software that we used for the construction of the trailer. Although none of us had used this software before it was very easy to pick up and eventually we were able to get the hang of it, adding special effects such as slow motions, adding different transitions such as flashes and fades, adding text and images and also changing the volume for some of the shots.

Evaluation:

In order to achieve adequate feedback for the evaluation of our coursework we felt the best way was to post our poster, trailer and magazine front cover on FACEBOOK. We chose to use this social networking site because it is extremely popular with our target audience of 15+ and we are also extremely aware of how the site operates, which means we were able to upload the pictures and videos without any hold backs.

We also uploaded the trailer onto YOUTUBE, we decided to do this because it is used widely by millions of people and therefore we can gather a larger range of audience feedback.

BLOGGER has also been extremely useful when its come to evaluating all of our coursework. This is because it has given us the opportunity to keep a detailed analysis throughout and also talk about what went well, what didnt and what could be improved.

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Audience feedback is something which plays a vital role in the development of any media product. This is why I was determind to take all feedback as constructive criticism and use it to help improve our poster, magazine and trailer, to achieve the best result possible. Throughout the production of our coursework, we constantly had feedback from members of our class and also our media teachers, who were able to give us appropriate feedback as to how we could develop and improve. In order for us to achieve our audience feedback for our final images, we decided firstly to put our film poster and magazine front cover as an image onto "Facebook". The reason my group decided to do this was because we know that Facebook is extremely popular among our target audience and this would give us the opportunity to get appropriate feedback. Magazine Front Cover: This the feed back that we recieved for our magazine front cover, after posting the image onto facebook.

• Most of the feedback was extremely positive and people particularly liked the way we had placed the text "Back" backwards, comparing it to a "visual homophone".


• As well as this they also liked the way we kept the colour scheme throughout, with the reds/blacks and whites as this kept a theme running and also relates back to the film it is promoting.


• However, some feedback said that the tagline "do you wanna play?" could be slightly bigger so that it was more noticable to buyer.

In order for us to get an even greater insight as to how we could improve our magazine front cover we decided to ask the opinion of our class peers as they are more aware of the conventions and forms of a film magazine cover should have.

• The main feedback that we recieved was the fact that the border was not even, making it seem less professional. As well as this people also said that the pictures at the bottom did not follow the colour scheme and the tagline needs to be more noticable and obvious.

Film poster:

• Above is some of the feedback that we recieved on Facebook when it came to the film poster, the majority of people said that they liked the red colour however there was some debate as to whether Ellie should be in red or not. This is because some people said that maybe she should be in a green scale so that it made it seem as if it was in night vision mode but as a group and class we decided that the red kept the theme continuous so we wanted to keep it.


• One of the main positives about our poster was the different fonts that we used, as they were clear and related to the genre of the film.


• It was pointed out that may be the names at the top should be one colour rather than two. The reason we decided to make the last name a different colour and size was because we wanted them to stand out more than the first names.

Film trailer:

We also decided to put our film trailer onto facebook as well and ask for as much feedback as possible. We were able to gather a large amount of feedback from this:

The main feedback we recieved for our trailer was concerning the music at the start.

• A few people said that the music was too loud at the beginning, this made it difficult for the dialogue between Ellie and Lucy to be heard and also acted as a bit of a give away to the rest of the trailer. We agreed as a group that this was a problem so we decided to lower the volume of the music at this point.


• People also agreed that the shots ran well and the continuity flowed, as well as this they liked the way the shots were longer at the beginning and then as the pace built up the shots became faster and shorter.


• Feedback from facebook and class members also agreed that they liked the part were the Lucy pretends to be possessed. This is because they liked the way it builds a sense of faulse tension. This was the purpose of this scene, so we were happy that we were able to achieve this.


• After our class members and media teachers viewed our trailer they all agreed that the shots need to be more varied and disjointed, this is because a trailer are not usually shown in chronological order. In order to resolve this we decided to move the shot of the glasses in between the dialogue scene

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

I feel that the combination of our main product and ancilliary text have all worked well together in order to create a successful advertising campaign in an attempt to attract as many people as possible.
In order to clearly link our 3 products together (trailer-magazine front cover-film poster) it was crucial that we kept certain things the same. For example, we kept the colour theme throughout the products the same, this included red/blacks and whites. The reason we chose these colours is because they act as a signifier to death, blood, evil etc. all which are related to the genre of our products. This means that the colours act as an imediate indicator as to what the audience should expect when they go to see the film.
As well as this we decided to keep the font for "Darkess Awakens" the same for every product, at the end of the trailer, and on the magazine front cover and poster. The reason we did this is because we wanted a font that could be easily recognisable and linked from each product. This is also the reason why we included the same tagline "do you wanna play?" on all three products. The purpose of this tagline is to act as a clue into what the film is about. It is alot easier to relate the tagline to the trailer as the audience can clearly see that the tagline is a reference to the girls playing a ouija board, this is less obvious in the poster and magazine cover.
Throughout our media product we have always maintained the fact that Ellie is our main character in the trailer. This is why we used her face on the magazine front cover and the film poster. In order to ensure audiences could link the three products together, we made sure that Ellie was wearing the same clothes throughout and kept the same hair style and level of makeup.
On the film poster, we also used a picture of a house in the background. We made sure that the picture of the house was the same house that we used in the trailer. This ensured that our products linked and were relateble to one another.

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

Throughout our media production we have not only used a number of forms and conventions that real media products use, but we have also tried to challenge and develop them. Before we could begin the planning and developing of our trailer it was crucial that we did a vast amount of research into thrillers and supernatural thrillers so that we were completely aware of the forms and conventions of this genre. This meant researching conventions such as; lighting, sound, camera shots, camera angles, costumes and casts. Almost all of the trailers that we analysed during our research used a certain type of music. For example the music began calm and mellow before breaking into fast paced, high energy movement. This technique builds tension and helps build towards a final climax.

The screen shot of our music above emphasises the different levels of pitch used throughout our trailer. It is obvious to see that towards the end of the trailer, when the shots become fast and tense, the music is significantly louder and faster.

Another convention of a supernatural thriller movie is the use of dark sombre colours. We needed the colours to be dark in order to create an atmosphere. Below are two screen shots, one taken from the trailer for Paranormal Activity and the other from our trailer.

The two shots emphasise the dark/grey colours that are used in paranormal thrillers in order to create a sense of danger and evoke fear into the audience. One of the most obvious forms and conventions that we used in our trailer was conforming to the Longacre's theory and using these stages to develop our own trailer. However, Longacre's theory is specifically designed to help define the stages of a film, but as we were only using it for a trailer it meant that we had to alter it slightly by only using the first few stages rather than all 8 of them. We incorporated several of the stages into our trailer such as the aperture, exposition, inciting moment, developing conflict and the denouement. This theory is used in several real media products such as "The Shining" and "Paranormal Activity" and we wanted to mimic this in our trailer. This is why we began our trailer with the "once upon a time" opening where the group of girls are excited and preparing for their holiday, this is a common technique and we used it so that the audience would be unaware of the events about to occur.

This is used in almost all trailers but one in particular that I had used in my research is the psychological thriller "The Shining" (1980 Stanley Kubrick) were a couple and their young son are planning to stay in a hotel. The trailer begins by creating a completely different atmosphere; the lighting is bright, the music is mellow and the story line at this point is completely innocent, and this is what we wanted to achieve in our trailer.

Above is a screen shot taken from the trailer of "The Shining", here the colours are bright, the establishing shot is attractive and the setting appears completely innocent.

Giving the illusion that all is calm and well also links to Tristan Todorovs theory that most narratives start with a state of equilibrium in which life is normal and protagonist happy. This convention is used in the film trailer of "Shrooms". Although the film Shrooms does not fall directly into the category of the supernatural thriller genre it does have a similar story line to our trailer, in the fact that a group of young teenage friends are going on holiday together. At the beginning of this trailer the friends are excited and looking forward to their holiday, which is the same technique we used at the for the opening of our trailer.

Another formal convention that we wanted to include in our trailer was the use of "found footage". This style has only recently become more popular due to films such as "The Blair Witch Project", "Clover Field" and "Paranormal Activity" and is based on the narrative premise that the characters in the film are real people who have been shooting the footage themselves. This changes the way the audience reacts to the film as potentially they see the protagonist's as real people like them, which should ultimately make it more frightening for themselves as it is easier for them to relate to the characters.

We decided that as a group we wanted to go against the norms when it came to the decision of the cast members. Propp's theory is that it is possible to define characters and actions into clearly defined roles and functions, however this is not obvious in our trailer. We decided not to make this obvious because we wanted to leave a sense of mystery to our trailer and this is also the reason why we didnt show the villains identity. This concept is of not showing the killers identity is used in the trailer of thriller film "Prom Night" and we wanted to mimick this in ours as the fear of the unknown can evoke a real sense off panick for the audience and also leave them intrigued and aching to find out who the "killer" is.

When deciding who we wanted to use for our cast we also decided that we wanted to conform to the theory of feminism, this is why we decided to keep all of our cast females. This is similar to the film "Sorority Row" where the main characters are young female girls.

However, I felt that the girls used in Sorority Row are unrealistic and audience viewers would not relate to them as a character. This is why we spent a particularly long period of time deciding on what girls to use and what clothes they should wear as we wanted to ensure that the audience were able to relate to them therefore making the trailer more realistic. Although we wanted the girls to fit the conventions of film stars and draw people in, we didnt want to sexualise them in the same way sorority row did, by dressing them in short dresses and revealing tops. This is why we decided to dress them in "normal" clothes such as jeans, cardigans etc. When it came to the film poster we decided to conform to the conventions of real media products in order to create the most realistic poster we posibly could.

We decided to use the film poster for "Dead End" as an example for our own poster. The main aspect from this that we wanted to take was the colour scheme of red/black and white. This is the scheme that we decided to use throughout all of our tasks.

Release Date: we included our release date at the bottom of the poster along with the line "Coming Soon". This is also used in the film poster for Paranormal Activity.

Block buster draws: commonly the stars names are shown ast the top of the film poster, this is to attract more viewers and draw them in to the film. This is also used in the film poster for Dead End.

Billing block: this is shown at the bottom of the film poster and contains information such as production team, people involved and actors names. This is used in the film poster for The Box

Tagline: We also wanted to include a tagline for our poster that would be recognisable, catchy and also relate to the film. Examples of taglines from real media projects include "Because someone is dead, doesnt mean they're gone"-Gothika or "Oh yes...there will be blood"-Saw

We also decided to keep to the same theme when it came to the magazine front cover by keeping to the conventions of a film magazine front cover. The reason for this is because once again we wanted to ensure that the cover was as realistic as we could make it, and in order to achieve this it was crucial that we followed the forms and conventions of a real magazine front cover.

We wanted to ensure that our magazine title was bold and stood out from the page in order for it to be immediately eye catching. This is why, like the real film magazine "EMPIRE" we kept all of our letters in block capitals, we also wanted our name to relate to the genre of the magazine.

As well as this other aspects that we have used in our magazine front cover that mirror real media products are factors such as; a barcode, a reasonable price tag, a website adress and special features included. We also included exclusive story lines and interviews, these act as a feature in order to entice readers to buy the magazine ultimately attracting more buyers. As this is a film magazine all of our special features are related to the film genre, this maintains a theme and also conforms to the forms and conventions of a real film magazine.

We kept the colour scheme by using monotonous, dark colours which were also used in the film poster. Not only does this relate to the genre of the film but also links the media products together, which is essential for a successful marketing campaign.

Changed magazine front cover

After we had our media class look out each piece of our production we were able to gather useful advice on how we could improve our magazine front cover more. This is now our final magazine front cover with the changed we had made:

• The first thing we changed was adjusting the border around the edge and making sure that the sides were even


• We changed the order of the pictures below, this is because we wanted the colours of the pictures to work well with the colours of the main image


• We moved the tagline to the right of the title, this is so that it stands out more on the black background and relates to the film more


• The last change we made was making the text "FILM AWARDS-HIGHLIGHTS" into a white colour and the "2010" into a red colour.

Final Magazine Cover