Evaluation #1
Evaluation #1
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
In several ways, our film trailer challenges forms and conventions of real media products but it also conforms with real media products in several ways as well
Our trailer is edited in a different way from usual horror film trailers
It starts with a 40 second flashback sequence which is not seen in many horror trailers
The flashback sequence was used to give a small amount of backstory to the trailer...
...to help show the motivations for the psychopath to hopefully get the viewer more interested in the film
The flashback sequence was converted to black and white during the editing and on screen text in the very first scene let the user know that this sequence was set years before the events that later unfold
When in the production stages of our trailer, we decided to follow Todorov's approach to narrative. He suggested that all narratives start with equilibrium where everything is balanced and normal, which is then followed by a disruption. The main protagonist then realises that the original equilbrium has been distrupted and attempts to change this. The distruption is the resolved (in a good or bad way) to end with a resolution or new equilibrium.
So, in our trailer (after the flashback) it starts with it's relative equilibrium of the two characters walking down the road and decided to take a shortcut
This is then followed by the distruption which comes in the form of the two getting split up and then getting attacked by the crazy army man
This the then followed by the realisation by the main character that something is wrong
The very end of the trailer gives a small tease to the new equilibrium with one of the main characters seemingly breaking down
By using this narrative structure we were able to help the user roughly understand the plot of the film without giving too much way. This was they should be persuaded in to going and paying to see the full film
Another way in which our trailer conforms to
the forms and conventions of film trailers is by using the initial green screen when the trailer starts showing that it has been approved by the Motion Picture Association. I decided to do this because I saw similar things in several other film trailers and I believe it helps the trailer look more authentic.
We also added in still inbetween shots to give more information about the film. We used these mainly in the starting sequence to give more information to what is actually going on seeing as there is no dialogue in the scenes. It was also used at the end for the film title, although those title screens involved moving text to make the ending more interesting
When we created the storyboard for the film we decided that it would be best to use short scenes and quick cuts during the colour half of the trailer. This is because we had seen quick cuts used in other trailers in similar genres and it helps give a feel of action to the trailer.
We did, however, feel that it was best to stick with longer, slower cuts for the flashback sequence so that the trailer starts slow and gets more excited towards the end, when the music kicked in.
Towards the end of the trailer we decided to reference back to the flashback shown at the start. Theses scenes help show that the soldier is tormented by this past experiences and helps the viewer to understand his motives.
We used fade to white inbetween these scences and we kept the black and white colour for the flashback scenes to keep the trailer consistant. This part of the trailer was inspired from a similar scene in the 2008 film Rambo, where the main character flashes back to different moments in his past
Evaluation #2
How Effective Is The Combination Of Your Main Product And Ancillary Texts?
As well as the trailer, I created a magazine front cover and a poster for the film. This was done in order to create synergy, which is using different media texts together to give the audience a message
For my poster, I decided to be intentionally vague and mysterious to get people interested in the film. My poster consists of just a shot I took at the location where we filmed out trailer with the tagline of "Wrong place, wrong time" written above. I decided to use a tagline as I had seen them used on different real media products and thought that it can be very effective.
The synergy is created by using the a similar fonts for the movie titles so that they can be easily recognised by viewers
Evaluation #3
What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
To find out what my audience wanted in a horror film, poster and trailer, I created an online questionnaire using Google Docs
From this questionnaire I learnt many different things about what people want to see in horror film and their trailers which I kept in mind when creating my products.
After the creation of my trailer, I uploaded it to YouTube and several positive comments about the trailer were made which mainly praised the use of black and white scences at the start of the trailer
One user commented that they thought that we might have give to much away with the final scene of the trailer which is something that I would take into acccount if I was to ever revamp the trailer or when creating a trailer for a different film.
Evaluation #4
How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
To film our trailer we used a Samsung SC-MX20
This camera aided us greatly in being able to create a quality product because of the feature it offers. There was a grid view on the viewfinder screen which helped us effectively apply the rule of thirds to our shots to make them more interesting. Some of the more advanced features allowed us edit the colour, brightness and contrast of the shot before we short each scene. This allowed to adjust the colour to how we felt looked best before filming each scene.
For taking picture on site and for the promotional photographys I used a Nikon D3000 which is a digital SLR which, in manual mode, allowed me to adjust several advances settings to get good looking pictures.
To evaluate my products I used Prezi. Prezi is an online zooming presnation tool which makes it easy to bring text, videos and images together to explain different point easily. The placement of each item can be adjusted easily and when played back, a zooming effect is added to the presentation to make it look professional
I also used YouTube to upload out trailer to the internet so that it can be viewed by anybody with an internet connection. It also allows viewers to comment on the videos uploaded so it is very easy to get audience feedback
To edit our film we used iMovie. It allowed to to clip our scenes to the lengths we wanted and to arrange them in the order we wanted. It also allowed us to add transations between scence, edit video colours and add title screens, all things which helpe d make out trailer look professional