Monday, 4 April 2011

Evaluation Activity 1: In what way does your media product develop or change forms and conventions of real media products?

Within this post I will be looking at how conventional/un-conventional our teaser trailer is compared to a typical horror teaser trailer such as 'The Strangers' or 'Scream'.
Shot 1.) The first shot that we choose was the one of our victims (Milly) being dragged through the woods by the killer (Alana). We filmed this scene using a camera, we used a low angle shot so we were close to the ground along where Milly was being dragged so you could see her facial expression but still not know who is dragging her, after we watched backed the raw footage. The footage was creepy to watch and the action of her being dragged through the woods and screaming was frightening, but we wished to exaggerate this feeling in the audience. On Adobe Premire Elements we decided to reverse the shot and so Milly seemed to be crawling towards the camera which really did look eerie. We then wanted push the scene more and so decided to use the 'old film' effect over the scene and so it gives the audience the impression of these events happening in the past, I feel this adds to the narrative of our teaser trailer. Another reason we chose this effect was because the scene is stripped of colour which really gives the clinical effect that we wanted. I also feel that this scene works as Milly is looking directly at the camera braking the fourth wall and connects the audience and the character, this not very common in horror teaser trailer and so I think this offers something different for our audience.

Shot 2.) We chose this shot to represent how we introduced our characters throughout the trailer. We only have three characters within trailer. The two main ones are our victim (Milly), our killer (Alana) and the best friend (me). The shot shown is of the victim we used a mid shot which allows the audience to see the characters in enough detail that they will recognize them in the actual film but not know all the details of their face leaving a still good amount of ambiguity around the characters.

Shot 3.) Here is an example of our font type that we used. We used a 'Minion Pro Black 89' font type this gave us a ghostly effect that really added to the atmosphere of the teaser trailer and the actual font that we used was called 'Birch STD' this gave the long and narrow characters that would give the haunting effect that we see so often in horror teaser trailers. We used our created style of text in all three of our media texts (magazine cover, poster and teaser trailer) giving the continuity throughout the texts that we needed to make them compliment each other and I feel it makes it look very professional.

Shot 4.) Compared to last year we did not need that many props or costumes. The main prop that we used as our USP (unique selling point) was the mask that the killer wears throughout the entire trailer. I think the important part of mask is that it hides the identity of the killer making them mysterious and adds to the 'eerie-ness' of the character. We tried to create the same effect as with the film 'The Strangers' as what makes the killers in that film so scary is that you can never see the emotions on the characters face and this is something that we wanted to do with our killer. We also used other props such as a knife (seen in shot 7), pajamas worn by Milly and I. These give the impression of real-life horror where it could be seen by the audience as a 'it could happen to you' scenario, where they can empathies with the victims.

Shot 5.) I have also included this shot because I think again it represents the importance of the mask.

Shot 6.) We chose the night vision scene to show how we had used special effects in our teaser trailer. We created our own as there was no night vision effect already on adobe premire elements. To do this we have enhanced the spectrum of the balance in the green area and decreased the blue and red light giving the green lighting effect. The darkening the contrast we created a darker light enhancing the impression of night time.

Shot 7.) We felt that this shot really summed up the genre that we were trying to convey to the audience. The knife coming down on the blonde victim held in the hand of a masked killer really does set the horror genre tone that we wanted for our teaser trailer and I think that we were really able to successfully do this with our teaser trailer and I feel we generally do create the moods of fear ans suspense within our audience when they watch the teaser trailer.

Shot 8.) This shot of the garages are one of the main locations for our teaser trailer. We chose the two settings of the urban garage scene where you would not expect a conventional horror film to take place in contrast with the conventional woods where the victim is typically isolated and helpless. Both settings mean that it appeals to both sides of the audience can some who are looking for the classic horror film and those who are looking for something that is a bit modern and urban, making it relate-able to them.

Shot 9.) Again shot 9 is another great example of settings and how they can create the effect and enhance the horror genre.

Shot 10.) This shot we felt helped set the narrative of the teaser trailer where I write the words 'we want to join' this adds to the complex storyline other than the straightforward killer kills victim. This adds another story involved which makes the audience want to know more and therefore want to watch the full film. We do not let on anymore than this which lets the audience interpret this in their own way.

Shot 11.) Here we took a screen grab of the title of our teaser trailer this appears from the second to last inter-title and the last piece of information that the audience have in their minds and so are able to go and look at it in more depth and remember it when they see it either on the poster or the magazine cover that we had created. Again we used the same font and style as for our inter-title keeping with the theme and making the whole trailer fit together.

No comments:

Post a Comment