Evaluation Question 4

How did you use media technologies in the construction and research,

planning and evaluation stages?

From starting from scratch at the beginning to towards the end when I have finished my final products. I have used a lot of different software and types of media technologies to make this final outcome happen. To start this all off I signed into blogger.com this is where all of my work is going for the examiner to mark it. This is where I started off by putting down class notes at the beginning on different types of research.

Secondly we used YouTube to help us research on professional horror trailers and horror music. Also this helped at the end when we put the film trailer on to youtube so we could put this on our

blog.

After some research we did a grid of 9 this was hard to upload to blogger.com and we used a website called scribd.com which is where you can upload posts of documents and put them on to our blog.

Once I did a lot of research on movie trailers on Google and YouTube I started doing the practical

work. This is started filming with a camera and a tripod. We used a Sony Handycam HDR-XR100 this is a video camera which is HD this is a very good camera. Also we used a very standard tripod which I have used for a long time

.

Once we finished the filming I took pictures to evidence the location of the film set. I took this with a Canon 500d Slr camera which is also a very good 15 megapixel camera. I also took pictures with this for the promotional work for both the film poster and the film magazine cover.

After we finished taking pictures and filming we uploaded the movie clips on to a Apple iMacbook pro. This is where we was going to edit our film on. We uploaded the movie clips by using a USB lead and saving them on to the harddrive.

After this we used software called Adobe Premiere Pro Cs4 which is an editing software, this is where we edited our film for our film piece.

Once we finished this we used Adobe Encore to transfer our finished product onto a cd for the examiners to mark.

We finished the editing and now we moved the pictures from my Canon 500d to the Apple iMacbook Pro. Once we did this we opened Photoshop elements 5 which we used to edit both the promo packs. To help edit our photoshop files too we managed to find fonts on www.dafont.com which is a font website which helped us find a good font for our final products.

Once we finished this all we uploaded the video to YouTube, and we uploaded the magazine cover and the film poster both up on the blog so we could analyse what we did step by step and what we had included on this. I also managed to upload my blog onto my facebook so I could promote this so friends of mine can see what I have done say they could comment on this.

Evaluation Question 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

I have spent a lot of time trying to please the audience for my final product. Through doing my research I found out what they wanted to see in a movie trailer like mine. To get the customers advice for a film trailer we asked a questionnaire which was on my blog and got some people to answer the questions. Because this blog is hard to find I advertised this on to where some of my audience are and this is on facebook. I asked seven important questions I feel which would help me get the audience to answer these to involve their contribution. I managed to get 13 people to answer my questions.

This benefited asking the questions for the audience as for nearly all of my question I have used the audiences feedback and used this for my film or for my promotional pack of both the film poster and the magazine. I found out that 53% of my audience wanted to see both fast paced and slow paced in the film trailer. Also 61% believe that a house is the best place to film a horror movie. And finally 61% also think that the colour scheme should be red, black and white.

Whilst I was doing research I found that my target audience who I wrote about previously who is called Leon. He had helped me out with the movie trailer. Once I finished all my products before I released it to the media industry, I gave it to him as he was my target audience and see what he though of this. He analysed this and gave me back with a few opinions. He Said

" This is a very good trailer, but little things can be improved, such as you need a date on the trailer and the website. Also on the Promotional packs there is no website for the film poster. Apart from this, this is an excellent trailer."

Once I took this advice I managed to add these too my final pieces. On the trailer I managed to add another layer for after the title screen and this says "20/2/2011...Evil finds a way home." Also on the film poster I managed to finish off the little touch by adding the website and the name of the company.

Once I promoted my video on facebook and youtube, I got some feedback from people about this film. Below are some of the feedback from some people.

"Excellent Trailer, Truly Awesome, Cant wait to see it"

"I was so scared watching this trailer cant wait for the film to come out"

"I love the editing sequence at the beginning of the trailer"

"I think the captions are really good, make the film trailer scary"

"The music was so scary"

Overall I am very pleased with the feedback we got and the improvements we have been told we will know now what to improve on next time to make this a lot more successful

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

I think that the combination of all three media products we have made and the ancillary text are strong. The three products together are much stronger than if they are all separately sold. The three products we made were a film trailer, a film poster and a film magazine. We made a film

poster so that this can be sold on billboards or walls or bus stops, this was made to promote the film so that more people can watch this. We made a film magazine so that this can be sold in shops so customers will buy this and read our magazine. On the magazine we have put images of the film on the front with the title font on there too so they notice this. We did research on ways to get all three products similar so that they can sell and customers and our target audience will know that it is our movie trailer. This is called synergy and this is where two or more in our case three products merged together so that they come out as one result. In the media industry all films that are released they make sure that there promotional pack has great relevance to their final product.

For our promotional work we decided to keep the same theme to the film trailer for both the poster and the magazine. We did this so that the target audience and other audiences can link this well and them then know that this is “insomnia”. We used the same font for both the magazine and poster, this is important as the target audience will then understand that this is “insomnia movie.” We have kept the same style of images throughout the film and the ancillary texts. This is a dark bleak image which is used throughout the trailer and is also used in the texts.

As you can see below on the left is our magazine cover and the right is our film poster. As you can below they both have the same background image. Also the colour scheme is the same. The main title of the film and the font is used both for the poster and the magazine. On the magazine this sticks out as this is the house font for the movie and this will be used everywhere on magazines posters etc when advertised.

As you can see here also that the caption from our film trailer says “evil has a destiny” this is the same as our catchphrase which we have used for the poster which is also shown below. We have used this as if the audience has watched the film and they remember the captions they will remember this one because they have read this before on the poster or vise versa as they have seen the film trailer before and read this then they have seen this on the film poster. Also this caption is used towards the ending of the film when the climax is occurring so most of the audience will remember seeing this.

Evaluation Question 1

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

Film trailer

I believe my media trailer follows and challenges the forms of conventions of real and existing media products. My media product does challenge this because when we made the movie trailer we made sure that this was noticeable from other existing productions similar to this. We did this by making sure that our target audience would know that this is film is a specific genre, as ours is a horror and our intentions were to follow the conventions by doing this. Before I started constructing my final piece, I did a lot of research on which style of horror movie I want to base my film trailer around.

The main convention we followed was to stick to what is called “Freytag’s Pyramid.” This is where a movie trailer would start off with Exposition which is a slow paced start. This then turns in to rising action, and this is where the audience should start to get tense and scared as the action is building up and the pace is getting faster. After this there is the climax this is the top part of the pyramid and the main bit, as this is where the fast pace comes to the trailer and this is where the audience start to get nervous and tense. After this there is the falling action which is after the climax the pace dies down. The final part to the pyramid is the Denouement as this is where the end comes and either it dies down or there is one last jump to scare the audience. We have I feel used this in the film trailer very well as I feel this as we use the background music and the timing of the clips well which brings the exposition, rising action, climax, falling action and denouement out well. This I feel because the trailer starts off with quite piano playing with it being fairly peaceful. This then after about twenty seconds and bang from the background sound occurs and this is where the falling action happens. With the tempo changing the pace is getting faster and this builds it up to the climax. After the climax the tempo dies down as this is the falling action, this is when the title comes up after this the denouement occurs when the female protagonist is getting dragged down the hallway screaming. This is how one of the main reasons why are trailer follows conventions. This is because it draws the audience in with a slow building start, then to the rising pace action where there are scary clips to get the audience on their seat.

Another convention I feel that we followed was the location and mise-en-scene of the trailer. I feel this because after doing a lot of research we found that most horror movies the antagonist is normally dressed in black clothing with a mask. After finding this out we thought as an idea we would replicate this as most of my target audience like films with a antagonist dressed in a scary mask and dark clothes. We made sure that the main antagonist wore dark clothes. He ended up wearing a black jacket, black jeans and black shoes. I feel that this is important that the antagonist of our trailer has to dress stereotypically like scary characters. This is because if he was to wear a white t shirt and a pair of blue jeans with the scary mask, he wouldn’t look as near scary and then this would make the film less scary and the target audience will not then like this. Also in our trailer our four characters are all wearing clothes they would normally dress as a teenager on a night out or when friends are coming round. After doing research for looking at the type of clothing the protagonists wear we found that what they wore is not as relevant as what the antagonist wears. This meant that they could wear ordinary clothes. Also through doing research on film trailers on youtube etc, we found that the location is very important. Our trailer was filmed in a modern day house and just outside the house. This I feel is challenging the conventions as a stereotypical film is normally filmed in a scary forest or a haunted mansion. Our film is filmed in a modern day home and I feel this is different to the conventions of media. I think that this is different as the target audience would be a lot more scared as they normally watch a horror film which s set in a forest and this is scary but they feel that this is not real. But my film is set in a home similar to what they live in and this would make them think it may happen to them, this would make them feel a lot more scared. Also another factor that follows the convention which relates to the conventions of media are that the time of day is important as if the film was filmed in the daytime with a scary antagonist is chasing the protagonists with a knife it will not be as scary as if it is set stereotypically and at night. This i feel is where i follow the conventions well in this trailer.

Film Poster

I feel i have followed conventions well for the film poster as i have followed a basic structure to make this look professional. I have kept the main image in the middle which is what most of the film posters do when I have researched them. I feel that this does not need to challenge the conventions as i feel that if they were to be changed the film poster would then not look as good as it could. I felt that also the layout did not need challenging to the conventions as I feel this is important and i think that following a layout similar to other posters was a good idea. This would then appeal to the target audience as they would find this similar to other films they like.

Film Magazine

I feel I have followed conventions of media rather than challenge them. I have done this because for a magazine to be profitable you would want it to be similar to other magazines so it can compete in the same market with this. I hve followed conventions by adding things to my magazine such as a pug which is important and used in nearly all magazines for the design. Also adding a barcode follows the conventions but this is needed as then customers will not be able to buy this, so this is needed. Also adding banners to the top and bottom of the page is important as this advertises other parts to the magazine which is needed.

Camera Angles:

Different types of camera angles are important whilst shooting footage for a movie trailer. During our film we used a tripod for every shot apart from the shot where the female protagonist is running to the car. We have used a tripod so that all the shots are steady as this would then make the clips look a lot better where they could be bad if they were not on a tripod. We have used high and low angle shots in the film as this shows authority and power for both the protagonists and antagonists. We have used a high angle shot of the two protagonists on the sofa as they are the target and this shows that they are in danger. Throughout the film we have shown low angle shots looking up at either the antagonist or friends of the protagonists, this shows that they are in danger. Also throughout the trailer I have used a variety of medium close ups and long shots of the characters in the film.

Editing

For our movie trailer we decided that it should start off a medium pace due to the genre being a horror, this is how most horror films like to approach for there movie trailers. After doing research i thought that it would be good to relate my pace of the trailer to the freytags pyramid which has exposition, which is where it starts off slow, then to rising action, which is where the music and pace begins to fasten, Climax, which is the main part where it is aimed for horror fans to give them a glimpse of scary part of the film. After this it dies down with falling action and then it goes to a denouement which is where the pace goes slow and dies down.

Throughout the trailer i used six captions with one of them being the title page. The captions we have put in the trailer are made to make the target audience get the storyline and feel that they want to see the film. Whilst editing we had to make sure that the music timing is right this is a step we took a long on sorting out to make perfect. We used effects like fade out and black and white editing to make the music feel right for the trailer.

Music:

For the music in the trailer we searched videos and songs on the internet and we found a music soundtrack which worked perfectly with our pace of videos and I feel this is good. We decided to choose a horror style which represents well. This is because when the fast pace of the trailer comes the music keeps up with it and also when it gets to a climax the soundtrack follows this.

Dialogue:
For our trailer we did not use much dialogue as we chose to use captions and tense music to set the trailer out for us. We feel that this didnt need much dialogue but the only bit of dialogue in the film we did was the female protagonist saying " yh the powers back on,come over." We felt that with little text this would portray a scary theme and this would I feel not give away a lot of information.

Sound effects

In our trailer we used a couple of sound effects which I feel make this sound good. We used a scary bang to get the target audience scared after 20 seconds which was unexpected and i feel that this is good and this is were the rising action begins. The next type of sound effect we used was a twitch effect this I feel was a really good effect as when this happened at the same time the screen would jolt to make it look scary. We also use this again towards the end of the trailer. Our final sound effect we use is at the end when the protagonist gets dragged down the hallway screaming.

Setting :
All of the footage for the film was filmed at my house. Shots were involved in the bathroom, kitchen, back garden, front garden, outside and living room. This is where we intended to do all of our movie to be filmed at as we feel this was different to horror trailers where they are normally filmed in the forest or a haunted house. We filmed it in a typical modern day house as we feel that our target audience would get scared as they would believe that perhaps if it happens to someone living in a normal house instead of getting killed in a forest as a horror, they feel that this might happen to them.

Mise-En-Scene:
The Mise-en-scene is very important for creating our trailer. The clothing is a big part as this can separate someone being scary to someone being not scary. The clothing of the main antagonist was-black trousers,black trainers black jacket and a white mask for it to stick out. This would separate it a lot as you would be able to tell the difference from this and a normal character. The other characters are wearing clothes which you would if your going out or having friends round, this is jeans, t shirt for the male actors and leggings and shirt for the female actor.

Editing Process

To create our trailer we used premier pro cs4 which is an editing software programme. We used this to upload our footage on to create our finished product. To import the clips we had to insert the camera USB lead and convert the movie clips to BDMV this is so premier pro could read the files.

Once we imported then they came in the project section where all the clips go waiting to be edited and put into action. This is shown below. To get the clips from this section to the movie time line, all you have to do is drag the clip on to the time line and place it where you want it to be.

Below I will be showing you all the main buttons etc we used to make the film trailer. I will show print screens and write about which is what and what we used it for.

- We used these effects which are the main effects you can use in premiere pro. This is both audio effects such as fade in and fade out. And also video effects such as cross fade and cross dissolve. We used these to make the clips look more classier by showing a fade for example. To use them all you have to do is click on the icon you want for example video effects. You would choose which one you want and you drag the name into the clip you want the effect on. This is very simple.

- This is the toolbar where most of the editing is done. This is where the main bits to edit the film trailer we made. On the tool bar there are many different buttons which do many functions but the two main buttons I used were the top button which is the arrow and the 6th button down which is the cut tool. The top button is the select button and i did a lot of this is creating the movie trailer as you needed this button so that you could cut, move and delete the clip. The 6th clip was the cut button this was used a lot as on every clip we did not use the full footage from that clip so we used the cut tool to delete little bits to the clips.

-This is the zoom bar this was a key part to my editing as I used this to help me cut the right bit without loosing audio or video effects also this would help me as i could zoom in more to get a better view of what i need to cut or add an effect to.

-This is one of the problems I had as when i would move a clip into the time line and play it, it would not be to its full size, I struggled to find this as I couldn't find the problem to sort this out with.

- After I asked my teacher I managed to sort this out and this was by clicking the select button, then I would be able to drag the margins to make it to the full screen.

-This is what premier pro looked like when I edited the trailer. I found this hard to work out at first but i managed to work out how to edit a movie as I was experimenting and trying different ideas to get used to this. The more I would use this I would get the hang of it more and by the time I had finished i feel i learnt a lot over the due course.

Insomnia Film Trailer