media a2 eval question1 trailer thriller magazine poster

1. Question 1
In what ways does your media product use, develop or
challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

2. In what way
does your
media product
use, develop or
challenge
forms and
conventions of
real media
products?
My partner and I, decided on the psychological thriller genre for our
teaser trailer.These films often follow conventions of the horror
genre, the film ‘Split’ is a good example of this.We decided to take
the suspense elements of both horror and thriller trailers, and the
conventions of a horror poster design, to attract a youthful
audience.We therefore, chose to incorporate elements of a
possessed object into our storyline, highlighting the hidden horror
genre which creates a hybrid genre. Our film would include violent
and scary elements of a horror film with suspenseful, psychological
and complex thriller elements.This could be compared to the film
‘Split’ by M. Night Shyamalan, as they both follow similar story lines
of a character who struggles with Multiple Personality Disorder.

3. What media
platforms did
you use to
present your
task?
To construct the ancillary tasks, I largely used Photoshop as I feel
very comfortable with this software. I have used this to edit images
and create the title for our film, making it unique. Photoshop was
used to create the poster, as less layering was needed but more
emphasis on the editing of the image, creating a successful effect. I
was also able to adjust the exposure of images easily to make them
look more dark and mysterious, following the horror/thriller genre.
My partner also used InDesign to construct the magazine front
cover, as she found it easy to create different layers of shapes and
text efficiently.
My partner and I, chose to use iMovie to create our trailer since it is
an application that is of easy access to us, available on her personal
computer and the many school computers. Although never used
before, I found the software easy and simple to operate. Added
effect, transitions, text and audio can be layered by using its
timeline format. It also enable me to share videos online to
YouTube, Facebook andVimeo, in order to get quick feedback. I was
also able to convert the product to an MP4 format, so that it can be
viewed onWindows.

4. Genre
conventions
for the poster
The main film my partner and I took inspiration from was ‘Split’ as it
contains psychological elements. We also took inspiration for the
films ‘Inception’ and ‘Shutter Island’ to make the poster and
magazine cover as they all target similar age groups.
After looking at various posters, I was able to understand what the
generic conventions were. For example, commonly there is a billing
block, large title, release date and an eye-catching main image.

5. Forms and
conventions I
adhered,
developed and
challenged
In terms of colour scheme, we adhered to the horror and thriller
genre. After looking at various other posters, we discovered that
red, blue and black were the most prevalent.Therefore, we chose to
follow a similar colour palette to make the genre clear to our target
audience.The overall look of the poster is dimly lit with a dark
background and cold tones, which adhere to posters of the horror
genre, this is similar to the ‘Oculus’ poster. My poster follows the
conventions of this poster as they both use possessed objects as the
key theme of the image, rather than showing the main character of
the film, dominant in the poster.

6. Our film poster
To adhere to film poster conventions, I used a large title which my
partner helped to create so that it would be unique and could be
distinguished easily.The large size makes it eye-catching for the
audience and is location central to the poster. I feel like we
challenged conventions by doing this, as generically, the title is
located in the bottom quarter of the poster. However, I have
conformed to the common feature of a distressed font in
thriller/horror titles, giving a scary edge.
For the billing block, I challenged the convention of placing it at the
very bottom of the poster, as I wanted my audience to be pulled into
the middle of the poster so that the central image could be
recognised. On the other hand, I did conform to the convention of
having the block in a contrasting colour to the rest of the text. I did
this with the intention of it standing out, and by doing this, it still
fitted well with my overall colour scheme as usually, billing blocs are
either white or black, depending on the colour scheme.

7. Our film poster
For the release date, I believe I challenged conventions by simply
not giving a release date, which I found works well as it leads the
audience to looking online for the date of release.This also adds to
the sense of mystery in the film, as the date is also unknown.
Regarding the main image, I feel I have challenged typical
conventions as I didn’t include a character’s face on the poster,
which is something that the poster for ‘Oculus’ inspired me to do.
My partner and I, thought it important to include the possessed
object as it is the main prop in the film.Also, the hand and knife in
the shot, allows the audience to come to a conclusion on what they
think the film is about.We also felt that, due to the themes within
the trailer, the main character shouldn’t be seen on the poster as her
‘identities’ at this point are unknown.Therefore, by challenging this
convention, I am able to convey meaning to the audience.

8. Our film
magazine
With the magazine, we felt that most conventions shouldn’t be
challenged since there is the possibility of the product becoming
unrecognisable to some of our audience.Therefore, we chose to
stick to common features such as, the headline located in the centre
of the page, the masthead being in the largest font and placed at
the top of the page, plugs to benefit the reader and a main image –
a standard, medium close-up of the main character with cover lines
in corresponding colours, to establish the colour scheme.
We chose to use a still from the film (showing the character in
action) for our main image, conforming to the norms of a film
magazine and also helping to link to the genre of the film. My
partner also made the image overlap the headline, which is quite
unusual for a medium close-up shot as they normally have text in
front of the image.We thought this was best so that the image
wouldn’t be lost behind the text.

9. Genre
conventions of
the trailer
Conforming to typical conventions
Our film will follow the conventions of a psychological thriller film in
terms of props used, in this case, the possessed bear. Elements of
the plot will stick to a thriller plotline, as the protagonist faces
danger. Our trailer also adheres to the horror and thriller genre as
the narrative construction is dominated by the protagonist’s point
of view.The audience will empathise with the character as they
often are given a back story, which in this case is the character’s
changing personality/behaviours and the video diaries she makes,
helping the audience to understand her problem.
Challenging typical conventions
We believe our film fits a gap in the market, as various stereotypes
are subverted. In many thriller films, the protagonist is usually male.
We have instead used a female character, which will hopefully
attract a more female-based audience. One aspect in our film which
I find is very different in others, is the showing of the female
protagonist causing harm to a male.This leads to the male character
being shown scared, weak and vulnerable.This is something that is
never normally seen in thriller-type films, as the male is almost
always portrayed as the dominant character.

10. Mood board My partner and I, also took inspiration from the film magazines,
‘Empire’ and ‘Total Film’ for our magazine cover design, as we felt
the text and imagery were very effective.

11. Conventions I
adhered,
challenged or
developed
We included a cast run to portray the actors in the film.This is a
common feature in trailers I have looked at, since this is a simple
way to introduce the cast to the audience.The actors names have
been added over an over-the-shoulder shot of them in a mirror.
In terms of camera angles, I feel we conformed to certain
conventions.We used camera angles, such as close-ups of the
protagonist to create tension, like in many thriller films. In the film
‘Split’, lots of close-up shots were used to show the transformation
of the character, and I feel like we followed to convention of using
varies shots also.An example of this, is the use of an over-the-
shoulder shot to show the communication between two characters,
and a long-shot, to show different relationships throughout the
trailer. I believe we conformed to general narratives of existing
trailers by including the video diary clips throughout the trailer.To
conform to typical editing standards, we included a black screen at
the end of the knife scene, to keep the audience enticed.

12. Conventions I
adhered,
challenged or
developed
In terms of sound, we conformed to stereotypes by including a
sinister soundtrack on top of the visuals, which is often featured in
thriller films, such as ’Inception’.We edited the soundtrack to the
visuals which gave the trailer pace. Our teaser trailer included a
round-off effect, so that the rest of the trailer could be open to
interpretation.This is done in a lot of horror films, like ’TheWoman
in Black’, but it also a key element in thriller films.We did conform to
stereotypes of thriller films by using a voice-over to set the premise
of the trailer.
To adhere to conventions, we included the production company
logo. For this, we followed common conventions by placing the
production company information at the very start, and the film title
at the very end. Similar to the trailer for ‘Split’, we included taglines
that built upon the storyline, creating suspense.This is usual for a
trailer of this genre, and allows access to a wider target audience.
We also included a vague release date, ‘coming soon’.This indicated
the type of trailer this is, a teaser.