1. Evaluation Question 1:
By Louie Bennett-Walsh
In what ways does your media product use, develop
or challenge forms and conventions of real media
products?
2. Teaser Trailer Duration
The duration of our teaser trailer was 57 seconds. We chose this time because it is
similar to most other teaser trailers.
Most teaser trailers seem to be around 30 to 90 seconds. Around 60 seconds was the
time we aimed for because it enabled us to get all of the shots in we wanted and
followed the conventions without the trailer dragging on. Most films in the horror/
thriller seem to follow the length of 30 seconds to 90 seconds so we tried to aim for the
middle of this so we could follow the conventions.
3. Teaser Trailer Editing Style
We wanted to start with continuity editing and then it would follow into a montage. We did it like this so there
is a feeling of suspense being built throughout the trailer. The beginning of the trailer was dialogue between
two characters so it sets an understanding of what is happening in the trailer. These shots had a duration of
around 3 seconds each because they were having a conversation so we used a shot reverse shot. As we got into
the montage we made the shot duration short so it would feel intense and we could get a number of shots into
the sequence. We changed most of the shots in some way or another in the montage so we could really portray
how the main character (adam) felt and I feel we achieved this in the way which we edited the shots. This style
is used often in other trailers of this genre to give the film a suspenseful feel to it. Trailers will begin with
dialogue between characters and the editing style would be continuity and then it would progress to a montage
of things which happen in the film and the shot duration is short to create this fast feel effect on the audience.
4. Teaser Trailer Sound
The sound was something we played around with a lot in our trailer. The trailer has a number of non-diegetic
and diegetic.
Diegetic sound - The main diegetic sound we had was the dialogue between the two characters. This was split
up throughout the trailer. I decided to detach the audio and split it through the montage so it created this
voiceover effect of the character explaining what was going on with his head so it matched the shots and fit well
with the montage. This is quite common effect to use in psychological thriller trailers because of the effect it
creates of the dialogue with the characters and can show what the character is talking about.
Non-diegetic - We add a number of different sound effects to our trailer. The sounds we added included
whispers and a number of tracks which built suspense in the trailer. This is common in trailers of this type of
genre because they tend to build suspense throughout to intrigue the audience so that they want to see the film.
There is usually one main track used on trailers, we used one which Dan made on a software called ableton.
This track had a number of layers which slowly built up which made the trailer feel more intense as it went on.
Usually teaser trailers of this genre have a soundtrack like this so suspense it built.
5. Trailer example of diegetic sound
In the beginning of this trailer it starts with a
voiceover effect similar to ours where she begins
to talk and then the audio carries on but it moves
to the next scene with the voice continuing to
talk. This effect is a good way of building
suspense because it creates this effect of someone
talking over something that has already
happened so it makes that character seem like
they know something that the audience does not.
6. Trailer example of non-diegetic sound
Throughout this trailer there is a steady
background non-diegetic track which starts of
with a normal sound to it with the piano and
then slowly builds suspense. This is done
through more instruments being added and
certain sounds in this track to make it sound
eery. This sound in this trailer is very common
to what would be in a psychological film trailer
because it is very suspenseful and makes the
trailer more intense.
7. Teaser Trailer Text and Graphics
We used the font called Birch Std because it overall fit the theme of our brand identity.
I feel that this font worked because it gives quite a professional look to it and was quite
sharp looking. This font was used in all three media products, the poster, the trailer
and the magazine cover. We tried to use it throughout so we kept the brand identity
and a theme of it ran through. The colour we chose was all white and then made the
two i’s in the word red to contrast the white and create a creepy effect.
8. Teaser Trailer Narrative
The story begins with two character, one being the psychiatrist (Dr Miggy) and the
other being the patient (adam). Dr Miggy starts prescribing Adam drugs which are
meant to help him but makes him go into this state of anger. He then cannot control
himself. The teaser trailer goes into a montage of Adam going crazy and hearing
whispers etc. At this point the dialogue continues of the two characters and Adam is
getting heated. The trailer then reveals Adam has hurt Dr Miggy and then the trailer
ends.
A number of other films gave us ideas for our film and we came up with this story with
help from them. One of them being Donnie Darko. The storyline of this film gave us
inspiration for our film. It gave us the idea of the psychiartrist.
10. Poster Layout
The title of the film is an important and usually boldest part of the poster. It is bold so the audience see it
straight away and can link the poster to the name so it creates a brand identity. Our film poster was the biggest
text and had a white and red colour scheme so it stood out. The colour scheme was also there to create this idea
of something becoming sinister with the red effect on the letters so it creates this feel of uneasiness.
The tagline on the poster is something which should create mystery and intrigue the audience so that they want
to find more out about the film. In our poster we used the tagline “everyone has a darkside” this was to show
that the film was dark and to give the idea of a twist in the plot. It is similar to other taglines because it's there
to create mystery like in inception it is “your mind is the scene of the crime”. This also creates the feel of
mystery because it doesn't really make sense unless you watch the film which means it's a good tagline.
11. Poster Layout
The image is the main part of the poster which gets the audience's attention. This is why it is an important part
of the poster. It creates the atmosphere of the poster and creates a picture of what the film director wants to get
across to the audience. The main image is usually something important or related to the film which makes it
stand out to the audience. It is meant to intrigue the audience so they want to find out more about the film. Our
poster we created had a distorted effect on the main character who has an angry face. The audience would be
interested in what was happening to him to cause this stress and anger.
The billing block is on pretty much all posters with a few exceptions. It is a block of text which credits all of the
people which helped with the film in any way. This is in the poster so people get credited for their work and so
that the audience knows who has helped in the creation of the media products for the film and the actually film.
Our billing block is fake because we needed to make up names to fill it up but we laid it out the same as the
conventions of a real one so the continuity of the poster would be kept. This is so we could make the poster as
professional looking as possible.
12. Poster Layout
We followed a number of conventions with our poster. Most film posters have certain
features. They have the main title of the film, a tagline, a main image and a billing
block. Making our poster we took into account a number of different posters so we
could get inspiration from it and follow a similar layout to it so the conventions of the
poster were met. We chose to do the poster landscape also because the photo we had
fit better and we had space to input the text. We also did it because from our research
we found that lots of other film posters use this layout sso we thought it would work
well. Some examples include Gravity, Lincoln, The Shining and Sinister
13. Poster
We follow a similar theme to another poster, it was
from the film called Jacob's Ladder. This film poster
inspired us because we found it very interesting with
the font and the main image of the poster. The image
we tried to make our own version of this because it
created an effect of mystery which we wanted to
achieve in our poster. This poster we felt worked well
because of the contrast between the black background
and the red and white text so we followed this with
our poster and created an image similar to this one
because it worked quite well to create this effect of
mystery.
14. Magazine Layout
For our magazine we used Sight and Sound. We
chose this magazine because it tends to focus on
genres like our film. It also has a layout on the
front page which we felt would work with ours so
we created a magazine cover with the conventions
of the magazine company and put our image and
text on it. I feel it came out good and looked like
an actual version of Sight and Sound. We tried to
keep the features of the magazine as similar to
what would actually be on it so that the realness
of the magazine was kept. This is our magazine
alongside other sight and sound magazines to
show the layout of it compared with others.
Our poster
15. Genre Conventions
The genre that we followed in our film was a psychological thriller. This genre has a number of different of
conventions. The main convention of a thriller is to create suspense and and excitement for the audience which
I feel we achieved with our teaser trailer. To make our film a psychological thriller we created a character who is
psychologically disturbed and then created the plot line around him and his psychiatrist to try and meet the
elements of this genre which I feel we have done. For this genre there is usually a dark atmosphere created
through mise en scene. Low key lighting and shadows are something which usually are used in this genre so we
decided to use this to create a dark atmosphere. Some of the shots in our trailer were filmed with low key
lighting for example we went into the dark room and used the red light in there to create this dark shadowy red
effect on the shot so it created this dark atmosphere. Another common convention with psychological thrillers
would be costumes. The main villain of the film usually wears smart clothes in this genre because they are
meant to look professional but have a dark side to the character because they are usually psychopathic. The
main villain in our film dressed smartly as he was the psychiatrist and had a professional role which he had
power over people to abuse because of this psychopathic trait. The location we chose for this was based in more
of an urban area because usually in psychological thrillers they are based more urban or in the city so they do
not get mixed up with horrors which are usually based in the countryside.
