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

The teaser trailer that I have made in my group with Samiul Rahman
( http://samrahmana2media.blogspot.co.uk/ ) is a one minute and three-seconds trailer. The total of clips that we have used are 39, including the name of the film, the actor’s names, camera footage, newspaper articles concerning the murder, the production company and name. This is an image of one of the newspaper articles that we have designed to place in our teaser trailer:

We have placed all the footage together and some clips are played on top of one another to show that there is something wrong and to make it as if there is too much going on and to frighten the audience.  We decided to scare and attract the audience by showing the daunting footage really fast and to make them feel that they didn’t see it coming. An example for this is:

This is an image of her crawling towards the camera. 

As you know in a teaser trailer it contains many fast different clips. I made certain that in our group we make our trailer very fast to draw the audience’s attention. The amount of film narrative that is revealed is a sum of 15, the two images that are revealed throughout the complete trailer is the image from above and this image of her standing with her hair covering her face:



We have used these images numerous times through the clip to give the audience an anxious and scary reaction; the use of these images repeating it self will foreshadow what will happen next. I have also used normal footage of the students in the car to show the two victims, which are the boys.

The audience will hardly see the female actress through the teaser trailer, there will be more of her voice rather than her face showing, I have made my female actress to speak as if she is scared and the responsible one so that the audience do not see it coming, as they would think that the females would die first stereotypically. The only footage that I have shown with a bit of her face showing is where she is sitting in the car with the hand held camera covering her face as if she is hiding.

The number of narrative clips I have used will help the audience know and understand the story line of the trailer, I did not give away the whole film, I wanted the audience to think of, why it happened? What happened? And when did it all happen? And how is it all going to end?

Our trailer is going to be shown on websites like blogs, Facebook, twitter and forum sites. This is because it is a film about students so therefore teenagers would be more interested in it.

 The way in which my media product is used in the forms and conventions of a real media product is that we have similar things, for example sound, mise-en-scene, themes, gender and characters. The sounds of horror trailers are usually tense, they start of very slow and slowly build up to make it seem very dramatic and scare the audience. The mise-en-scene includes the sets, props, actors, costumes, and lighting. All films and trailers include mise-en-scene, the setting are stereotypically places like the forest, abundant house, church , etc. It’s based in dark and empty places to give the audience a frightening feeling. The props that are used are; camera, tripod, knifes, blood, axe , etc. I kept my trailer simple and did not use any props apart from the hand held camera and the normal camera with a tripod. Real media products will use many props to make the trailer or film look better but as media students we cannot get hold of professional props like that. I have used typical kind of actors, for example the girls are always the victim, so I decided that the girl should be the one getting possessed but also being the killer too, and the two other boys being the victim. The costumes that we have chosen are casual clothing and that is because we want to show the audience that they are normal typical teenagers making a trailer for their film project. The lighting of horror films and trailers are always dark and damp, it gives it more of an uncomfortable and anxious feeling for the audience and foreshadows what will happen next. The way my film trailer is developing is that it’s trying to be as successful as a real media product and make it look as if its real to get the audience’s attention. I try to challenge myself to make my trailer look real with the forms and conventions of a real media product, the more realistic and scary it looks the better for the audience. I use similar settings and story lines as real films for example the ‘Blair Witch Project’ which uses a hand held camera, I used this idea because it makes the audience feel as if they are there to.

The way I designed my poster was by searching on a lot of film posters and they influenced me in many ways because i searched up many ideas. The posters i searched and studied were Batman, Perfume and Twilight. 
The information that I included in my poster was the picture of the forest and the names of the actors and the company information at the bottom which I took from another poster called 'Perfume' and I left the release date as 'coming soon'. I decided to choose my main image of the girl because i used that image for my magazine cover and i wanted my audience to recognise the trailer, poster and magazine.

The name of my magazine is called ‘SCREAM’. I used this as my name because it is a horror magazine for teenagers, and the films that it advertises will make you scream. Most horror films will make you scared so I decided to have that as a title and the colour that I have used for this is red to illustrate the icon of blood. The other colours I have used are mostly black and white because in the teaser trailer I used those colours for the names and titles of the film. The imaginative part of creating the magazine is trying to come up with your own unique idea to make the magazine look different and stand out from the other magazines that are being sold at present. I had the chance to use Photoshop and discover new ways in which to make the magazine look realistic. I tried many different types of pictures and writing to place on the front cover and had to decide clearly which one would look best. 

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

For all the three production tasks that I have produced has the same target audiences which are teenagers and young adults, the age restriction for the teaser trailer is the age 13 and over. As for the magazine and poster it is obtainable for everyone to see and use. The magazine and the film poster look very similar, this is because I did not want to confuse the audience and I wanted to make them recognise the film and I made the posters in big bold writing to attract their attention. The motif that I have used so that my audience can recognise the film is by the image of the girl with her hair in her face. The font of the teaser trailer is used for the magazine and film poster to unify the film. Within my portfolio the use of ancillary texts in my product is very important. It gives you a better insight of the trailer as it is very short and you have to make sure the audience are not confused and they get a clear understanding of the story line. In the magazine cover and film poster I placed a record label on them.  I did this because I wanted to show the audience that it is produced by a renowned company. In the trailer, the location of the film is in a forest far from where the students live. There is a scene where the girl is possessed and she is walking and crawling towards the camera. Here I used a shot of her standing with her hair in her face to show that she has become possessed. I decided to use this image for the magazine cover and the film poster. This was done to show to the audience that she is the main character and also to relate it to the trailer. The fonts that I have used for the trailer is the same for my magazine and film poster. This was done so the same theme would be noticed throughout my portfolio. The lighting of the trailer, magazine and film poster is very low and dull. This was done to foreshadow the upcoming events in the horror film.  I have searched a verity of different magazines for example, Empire, The Film and Fangoria. The magazines that I have mostly used ideas from is:
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=empire+magazine&hl=en&safe=active&client=safari&tbo=d&rls=en&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=Mx

This is because I liked the idea of the writing on the sides.

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

The audience gave me feedback on how to create an image for the film poster and the magazine, they recommended for me to place the same image on both magazine and trailer so that the audience do not get confused and recognise the film. The audience’s opinion was that I had to keep the sound of the film running through it slowly to build up the tension and catch the attention from them. They gave me feedback on the hand held camera and told me to make the sound much louder for them to understand and hear it more which will give them an alarming feeling. I decided to name my film as ‘Possessed little Niki’ but my audience gave me another idea to change it because it didn’t sound very eye-catching so therefore my group partner and me changed the title to ‘The Lost Trail’.

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

For my magazine cover and film poster I used photoshop to design it. The things that I have used were blending the pictures in and the tittles. I used layer affects like 'hard light' and used 'difference' for my image in the front cover. For the fonts of the magazine I used drop shadow, inner shadow, stroke, bevel and emboss. I did this to give the audience an idea about how the character is, her head is faded into the woods to show that we didn’t see her coming and give a meaning of her hiding away. The image of the forest at the background is the setting they where at. I got this image from google. When I recorded the footage it was all done on tape, I had to come in and place the tape into the tape deck and transfer it onto final cut pro and that’s where we started to make the trailer. 

My Magazine cover:

My film poster:

THE LOST TRAIL TEASER TRAILER: 

The things that I would change on my magazine cover is that i would place more texts on the side to make it look even more realistic and change the colours to make it look bright so that the audiences are attracted to it. On the poster I would have changed the names to make them stand out more and added the two boys on the front cover as well, but I decided not to use it at the end because i realised that the two boys will not be there all the way towards the end of the film, only the girl is the main character. 

Also the other things I would change on the trailer is that i would have put more shots and images init to make it even faster and eye catching. 

In my group I was the camera person, i had to shoot from all types of different angles. For example i had a medium shot of the two boys sitting in the car, low angle of her crawling on the floor, long shot while she's walking to the camera and whilst the car is parked up in the middle of nowhere. There are many hand held shots, when she is in the car the camera is still recording but she really doesn't pay attention to it, i gave it that feeling as if she is doing this all on purpose. i have learned many things whilst creating the trailer. poster and magazine, i learned that you have to have many different types of detail on magazines and posters and decide how to attract your target audience as it is the main important thing.

Props and Costumes

Props:
We are not going to use many props, where just using a hand-held camera and a personal car.

Costume:
We are going to use casual teenage clothing, for example, jeans, top, trainers etc

Audience reaserch clip

Audience Research Evaluation

Question 1 - What Do You Expect To See In A Horror Film ?
By looking at the responses , I can tell that people expect to see blood, gore, killings, ghosts, A conventional blonde girl getting chased, a little girl being affected, psychological horror, murder and general things that mess with your head.

Question 2 - Do You Find It More Effective If The Child Is The Monster ?
The response I got from these answers were that children can be effective if they are acted well, because they look innocent which gives mystery.

Question 3 - How Often Do You Go To The Cinema ?
The audience I used were from the 16-19 age group and the older people dont seem to go cinemas as much as the younger ones.
Question 4 - What Was The Last Horror Movie You Watched ?
Mostly the audience watched  Paranormal Activity 3/4 which they said was not as scary as they thought it would be due to the story line being very predictable. Sinister is very scary and is better than Paranormal Activity.

Question 5 - What Type Of Horror Film Do You Enjoy ?
Most of the audience prefer psychological horrors because they like the idea of the story line messing with their head, The parts which shock them and cause suspense

Research in Generic Codes And Conventions

A horror uses suspense and tension as the main elements throughout to create a response from the audience.

The main character is usually the one who is being effected and tormented by what is happening and the storyline is based around there psychological journey. Sound is also important in create response and meaning as it is stereotypical and makes a scary intimidating atmosphere which is enhanced with darkness and shadows.

• Typical storyline - involves victims who get killed without anyone being able to catch the killer out, sometimes one character survives until the end to tell of the terror.
• Typical characters - they are usually people who are in a vulnerable position and isolated from others, therefore making them an easy target and also a predictable one for the audience.
• Typical iconography - costumes for the victims are usually casual and average which creates a more scary atmosphere as the audience feel it could be anyone who is targeted including themselves. Dark settings and shadows are also key in order to allow the audience to expect the killer/stalker to be hiding and creates suspense.
• Typical cinematography - close ups enhance the emotions of the characters and creates suspense and tension if they feel unsure. Long shots leave room for people/things to be hiding which also puts the audience on edge. Establishing shots illustrate how the character is isolated and makes them a good potential victim. POV shots from bushes and things around the victim put the audience in the killer/stalkers shoes and gives them extra knowledge than the victim which creates tension.
• Typical sound - loud but mysterious non-diegetic sound is used to indicate something bad happening but this is sharply cut into by loud intimidating sounds when the victim is closer or being harmed.

We are going to focus on the group of teenagers and how they are going to be scared for their life.  The characters will be casually dressed to show they are normal and makes the audience feel endangered as it could be them. Camera shots from the teenagers will give the audience a heads up for all situations and make them feel more involved but also create more suspense as they know what may happen. This is used in Final Destination (2000) where the director (James Wong) focuses on the victims and there deaths are centralised throughout. This creates tension within the audience and puts them in suspense as they are waiting for something to do but not sure who, what, where or when it will happen.

Through the images and typography, the poster is trying to convey that this is a horror film. This is done in a long shot image by showing the characters reaction of fear and uncertainty to an unseen entity. The image also tells us that this could be a "found footage" film as it shows the time in the corner. It is also the posters intention to show that this is a successful horror film to attract audiences, so it shows a positive quote from "bloody-disgusting.com". There is a faint shadow on the door which can mean that this is a ghost story and one that will rely more on psychological elements as the ghost would be unseen for most of the film. The typography of the quote and tagline is similar to that of a typewriter meaning this . The red typography of the title can connote violence and is also similar to the colour of a light on a video camera further suggesting that this is a "found footage". The title is also slightly faded causing it to look ghostly. The image is in blue because it was taken in night vision and has the text at the bottom to match. Due to the night vision, outside of the door is pitch black so we do not know what is out there, but due to a shadow we know its there, creating uncertainty in us. The film appears to have two taglines, the first being a question igniting mystery and the second, a warning both attempting to grab the audiences interest. From the characters we see that they are  couple and that this could be a horror with a family situation like previous successful horrors "The Shining" and "Poltergeist". A preferred reading of this poster would be that it is very effective and does get the audiences attention. An oppositional reading however would be that this is a clichéd horror film poster and that the film will do nothing original. 

Actor release form

Production Schedule