Completed Website

Again, like my poster I have also changed my mind about the layout of my first design and opted for the second. This layout makes it look a lot more like a website, and although the images on both my poster and website are different you can still tell they are for the same film. The writing and colors match, even though the title has been reversed, and I thought that if I used the same image for both the audience would be bored. I have used a lot of red as it is contrasting to the white and really stands out so the writing is easy to see. Below is my final design.

Completed Poster

Here is my completed poster for the 'PLAY' film. I did initially like my first design, with one of the characters tied to a tree, but decided this gave away much of the film and was a hard pose to get the characters in. Instead I have gone with my second design of a bench and a broom. This may seem a bit random, but it is relevant to the plot and film. This leaves a lot to the audiences' imagination, and although it is not shown in the trailer would play a part in the film so the audience would see why it is relevant. I have reversed the colours on this heading and my website heading to coincide with the colour of the background. It is still however relevant and matches the trailer. I have had positive feedback from my class about my final design so have decided to keep it this way, and make no further ammendments.

Mine, Hannah and Amba's 'PLAY' Trailer

We unfortunately did have a lot of difficulty when it came to uploading our trailer to our blogs. After several hours of waiting for it to load I had to cancel it. So we have changed our minds, and instead of putting it on our blogs we are going to burn it to a CD so it can be viewed that way.

Keeping you posted

We as a group, are now editing our trailer. We wanted to wait to shoot at night time and when it was not raining to create greater suspense and fear throughout our trailer, however we did have to put filming on hold for a while due to bad weather conditions. We have now finished editing the majority of our tailer but we want to ask some people for some feedback so we could be sure that it is suitable for our age group. In my next post, I will upload the version of the trailer as it is at the moment, and depending on the feedback I will edit it.

While editing our footage we came across a number of difficulties such as finding suitable music without the problem of copyright. The music available to us we found was extremely dull and limited. We then decided to have a quiet noise in the background to create suspension rather than music. We firstly used a piece of music which was fast paced and eerie, but however after gaining audience feedback we decided to put this at the end of our trailer which builds up a dramatic impact and instead used a more subtle tune at the start to keep it simple and ease you into the trailer.

Another problem we came across was getting each clip to run into each other smoothly and easily. This required us to do a lot of cropping and changing for quicker clips which made it more fast paced and exciting for the audience which is what we wanted to achieve.

In our earlier research of analysing film trailers we came across a number of factors which we also wanted to appear in our film trailer. This included credits at the end, more snappy words and phrases which informs the audience more about what is going on and hightens the scary element. However one problem we came across when adding the titles was that we was not able to add them over the top of clips in the trailer so had to make individual slides.

First draft of my website

This is the first draft of my website. I will add a picture shortly when my camera is accessible to me, which will be in the next few days. I do however like the website without a picture, as although it is plain it is direct and matches the trailer in the sense of colors and font. The audience would also be able to navigate easily around the website etc this way. But in order for it to look more interesting, I will add the picture of the tree in the background, which will prove quite tricky.

Photos before editing

Here is all the pictures I took for my website and poster. Whether I decide to use them or not is a different case, but initially these are the few ideas I have to use. My design for the poster was initially one of the characters tied to a tree, but considering the position and it having to be in the dark, I decided against this and decided to take pictures that were not so relevant to the main plot of the film. This then does not give away important things from the film and lets the audiences' imagination do the work. These photos are also before editing, they are the original copies as I have taken them. My favourite is the second photo due to the composition and angle it is taken from could be like a video camera. With some editing on the tree pictures they could also end up looking good, but at the moment they do not look like part of the film as I have taken them in a different place to where we are going to shoot the trailer. They will also look better if made darker and scarier so I will play around with them.

Poster and Website Design

Below is my poster and website design, I will attempt to keep to these drawings as much as I can when it comes to actually making them, which is very shortly.

Screen Shots for 'PLAY' Trailer

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Analysing a Website

When looking at the 'Saw' website, I found many typical conventions of horror. The tall, bright and scary font is used throughout the website and it is made clear what your options are and where you need to click, so it is easy to navigate around. As there is a number of 'Saw' films, down one side there is a link to each sequel which then leads you to specific information and activities to do with each one. This is helpful to the audience as instead of having to go on different websites for each sequel, they can find them all in the same place and have no trouble. The same dark background is used all the way through the website pages which is good as it is constant so people are reminded of the film and the horror genre.

On the main homepage there is a reminder about the latest film coming out on DVD, if there are constant reminders then the audience will remember to buy it.

Down the other side, is the main navigation page that stays there throughout the website and helps the audience know where they are and how to get back to the homepage. There is also other links leading off of this, which tells you more information and gives a number of activities to do. If the audience like the website and find out more information about the films, then they will be more inclined to go and watch the film or buy the DVD, which tells me that advertising is a very important aspect of the film.

Analysing a Trailer

Blair Witch Project

http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi9044249/

Genre - Horror

Narrative - The Blair Witch Project is an American horror film released in 1999. The narrative is presented as a documentaty pieced together from amateur footage, filmed in real time. The film was produced by the Haxan films production company. The film relates the story of three young student filmmakers who hike into the Black Hills near Burkitsville, Mary land to film a documentary about a local legend known as the Blair Witch, and subsequently go missing. The viewer is told that the three were never found, although their video and sound equipment (along with most of the footage they shot) was discovered a year later.

Unique selling point - In 1999, there were very few movies that were filmed with a handheld camera, this whole effect makes it seem more realistic and therefore frightening.

Target Audience - Adults

Sound - Immediately loud, scary sound plays, it at first is very simple which will build up the tension in the audience as they do not know what to expect. When the first information is shown, the sound changes for the final sentence; a year later footage was found, to make a dramatic impact and scare the audience. There is no music used throughout the trailer, just long sounds for every clip transition to keep the audience unaware of what they are going to see next. There is then a number of different screams, and panicking voices which gives the audience a glimpse of what is to come in the film from the footage. This will make them very keen to see it and inform them that it is indeed, scary. The sounds stop for the title to be shown, when there is again loud, scary music. The screams then continue until the end of the trailer. This builds up the tension right up to the end of the trailer and keeps the audience engrossed throughout.

Shot types/Angles - There is not much of the film shown in the trailer, it is more captions and quotes. This is effective as then there is no problems involving the basically seeing the whole film before actually going to see it. If they are only shown short clips they will be more interested and then want to go and watch it in the cinema. There are a few close-up shots of the forest in which the actors go to, and someone with their hands over their face. These shots, like the whole of the trailer are fast and dark which gives it a more realistic effect. There is also a shot of someone running holding the camera, this is effective as it shows how scared the actor is and again shows the aspect of them filming it themselves. Throughout the entire trailer you do not see a complete figure of someone, the camera is very shaky and close up.

Pace - The whole trailer is very short, and very fast paced. The very few actual clips shown from the film highlight how quickly paced it is by the running and spinning with the camera. This builds up tension amongst the audience, they want to watch the whole film to see what actually happens and what they are running from.

Dialogue - There is very little dialogue used in the trailer. However, what is used emphasises the horror in the film as it is all screaming and shouting. This is very dramatic and shows from the beginning how frightening and realistic it is. The audience will then be scared by this and interested to know what all the screaming and shouting is about.

Voice Over - Throughout the whole trailer, there is no dialogue used. This is very effective as it is a lot more scary. The feel of the trailer would be ruined if there was a voice talking over the captions, so you are left to read it for yourself with nowhere to escape from the deafening scary sounds.

Credits - All the way through the trailer there is captions with positive reviews of the trailer. This will encourage the audience to watch it as when the feedback is good they are reassured it is worth watching. As you are not shown much of the actual film, the reviews are very useful to the audience. There is no credits showing the main actors or things, because that would also take away another scary element. If this is to be realistic, there would be no famous actors and actresses, they would be random people with no status at all. So again this is a positive aspect with this film, and emphasises the horror and realisticness.

Analysing a Horror Poster

The Conventions of Horror Films

Unforeseen Circumstances

Due to my partner having left school, I have had to change groups as I realised that it was too much work to be doing on my own with only 4 weeks left. So I have now joined Hannah and Amba's group, and am going to make a horror trailer, poster and website. The film will be called 'Play' and focus on 3 young boys, who go to a place that is forbidden and haunted. They know this but decide to go and see if it is true, and have some scary surprises in store. In order to catch up with the work as I am now rather behind, I will analyse a trailer, poster and website and look at different conventions of horror, to get a better idea about the genre.