how i made my a level poster

1. POSTER
PRODUCTION

2. I began by looking at that of real media texts
and liked the You’re Next poster so typed it up.
After I had done this I changed the names and
companies to that which went with my work
and then added it in as layers on a Photoshop
template.

3. After I had made the layers I changed the font
to one more appropriate in order to make it
appear more professional. I also added in a
basic outline of where the title might go along
with a web address and a 15 rating.

4. After looking through all the
photos taken as a group we
decided which one would
look best and portray what
we wanted to show. After we
had chosen I added in the
photo and also put in the
logos of the production
companies associated the
trailer.

5. After the title had been created I dragged it into Photoshop and used the magic
wand tool to erase the background. Instead of having it at the bottom where we
originally planned for it to go, I moved it to the top as it looked better against the
background instead of clashing with the white jumper of the protagonist.

6. To try out some different design ideas I
tried a slightly different way of presenting
the poster similar to that of The Strangers
as we all liked the way that it looked,
however we did not like it very much and
so decided to go without having a border.

7. Eventually I decided that the picture did
not work as well as I wanted it to as the
presence of a hand made the villain
appear too human and less of an ‘other’.
There another issue with the original
picture as when I wanted to move it down
I was unable too because the image was
too short.

8. To give the poster a cleaner
and more professional look, I
removed the spots and
blemishes on the models
face using the healing tool. I
chose to manipulate the
photo this way as it made
the lighting look smoother
on her face creating a
stronger contrast between
the right and left sides of the
face. This as a whole makes
the poster look more
effective.

9. I then changed the
text colour to a
light grey colour so
that it could be
visible against the
black background.
However this made
the text hard to see
against the white
clothing and the
torch light. To
overcome this
problem I added
different blending
effects such as:
bevel and emboss,
colour overlay,
outer glow and
drop shadow.

10. As the original title (The Intrusion) was too bright and took a lot of the
viewers focus away, I decided that dimming it was the best way to over
come this problem. I did this by adding the satin blending effect over it.

11. To make sure that everything was centred and lined up I used the grid as in
making it neater it also made it look more professional as that is what is done
in current real media texts.

12. We noticed that there was a small corner not fully covered by the black backing we
put up to form the pictures background. In order to fix this we used the patch tool
and by sampling a small area of black, were able to carry the shade across to the
uncovered area.

13. Next we added a
release date and a
web address for the
movie. We chose to
release it on the 13th
of October as that is
the next Friday the
13th which is a date
traditionally
symbolising bad luck
and has many links
to horror e.g. the
film Friday the 13th.
It is also in the same
‘Optimus primus’
font as the title to
create cohesion.

14. To add a finishing touch to the text at the bottom, I added the same blending
effects that the title had to make all parts of the poster pull in well and work
together.

15. Before After
To make the mask appear more haunting I
selected it all using the magic wand tool and then
manipulated the image by changing the
brightness contrast. On the right the changes can
be seen and are only subtle as when made too
bright the mask appeared synthetic and looked
abnormal.

16. By this stage this is how the poster appeared.

17. Next I added in
the tagline ‘run
before he finds
you’ which played
on the idea that
the narrative
follows a girl being
hunted down.
Again using the
Optimus primus
font, I added the
same blending
options that I had
for the title, the
web address and
release date.

18. Finally as a group we made the decision to change the tagline as it made the
magazine and poster better link with the trailer as the trailer says ‘he will always find
you’ not ‘run before he finds you’.