The document discusses the conventions of horror genre media products and how the student's projects followed or challenged these conventions. It analyzes the conventions of horror posters, magazine covers, and teaser trailers in terms of format, genre, and institutional norms. For each media product, it explains how the student's work adhered to typical conventions such as using dark colors, mysterious images, and unsettling sounds to create fear while hiding full details and building intrigue.

1. EVALUATION TASK 1
IN WHAT WAYS DOES YOUR MEDIA PRODUCT USE,
DEVELOP OR CHALLENGE FORMS AND CONVENTIONS
OF REAL MEDIA PRODUCTS?

2. CONVENTIONS
Within all genres there are factors that contribute to
strengthening the focus on genre impressions. The horror
genre depends on main factors that builds the genre and
create a strong base for the whole trailer. We followed the
conventions of stereotypical Horrors for the marketing
pieces.

3. OUR WORK
In this section of evaluation I will look at how each of my media
products use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media
products. The 3 products were made using professional standard
software
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htqeJbStCoY&t=2s

4. Format Conventions
The format of conventional posters will follow the same pattern,
they will all include a main character or aspect of the film that are
positioned central on the poster. The films title will mostly appear at
the bottom
of the poster; although the title can appear in other areas such as the
top or even central over the main image. Most Posters are portrait but
some are landscape.
For Horrors, the layout is generally a main aspect of the film that contributes to the storyline
being shown on the poster, but can also include main characters; although some horrors show
a key character as the main focus. Majority of posters for horror are set in portrait. Horror
posters will often have a slogan on them that relates to the film.
Our Poster follows the Format conventions of horror posters. It includes the aspects of
conventional horror poster layout and is effective as all the layout is positioned so that the
audience finds it easy to read and see aspects on the poster. We put the alternative
positioning of the Title being at the top with a release date and billing block at the bottom,
and finally a slogan in the left center.
POSTER

5. Genre Conventions – Poster
For Horror, the poster would have to appear to create a sense of
fear but also excitement within the audience. Posters for the horror
genre will nearly always use low-key lighting and make the poster
dark and mysterious. Main aspects of the poster will be shown
through highlighting them with a drastic change in color or lighting
that makes them stand out from the rest of the poster. They can
also show a location that could be a main aspect to the film such as
a house, but alternatively can be anywhere that is key to the film.

6. An audience would expect a horror poster to build fear but also
excitement in the audience through conveying the setting, characters,
iconography and style in the right way for a horror. If presented right
and staying to the conventions of a horror then it should work well to
attract the audiences attention and create interest. Color schemes will
be much darker colours than other genre’s posters, with backgrounds
being very dull colours or more traditionally black, grey and
occasionally whites.
Our poster follows the genre conventions for horror posters as it uses
low-key lighting, showing a main aspect of the film in it. It uses the
typical background colors of black and different shades of greys; with
our main focus being a much bolder color of red and white. Our main
antagonist being shown on the poster takes up the majority of the
poster to portray his importance and also to make clear image of him.

7. Institutional Conventions - Poster
On a poster company information is shown in the billing block, this includes production
companies, director, etc.; The billing block will show companies that involved in the
production and distribution of the film. Larger companies such as, Warner Bros. Pictures,
Sony, Walt Disney, etc. will have larger budgets for their films so they will have much more
resources, highly rated actors, etc. available to them. While low budget films might not
have highly know actors but instead actors that are starting off in their careers.
On our poster it follows the conventions of institutions as ours is a low-budget film where
we had less resources available to us and had a much strict time deadline for the
production of the film. Furthermore, software that we use was not the same standard
software that other companies use and didn’t have as many resources or time available to
us but did our best at creating a good quality poster with what was available to us.

8. Magazine Cover Format Conventions
The format conventions of magazine covers for the Horror genre are colors such as red and white for
the text. The magazine will have the title at the top of the magazine and the magazine will have the
featured film, with surrounding text and images related to the film or advertising other films. The
magazine that we based our magazine of off was Horrorville. This magazine uses the conventional
layout of magazine and conventional colors for text and the positioning of additional subjects on the
magazine cover.
For the format of our magazine cover we followed the format of the Horrorville magazine. The
positioning of the text was the same as 2 of the Horrorville magazines with other films being shown
on the cover to fill empty space and make the magazine appear as if it has lots going on in it. The font
was matched to the orignial magazines as well as possibly.
The magazine was originally
going to have the theme
colours of red and white, but
we then chose to go with the
main colour layout of green so
that it match the theme colour
of the magazine company we
chose.

9. Genre Conventions – Magazine Cover
Conventions of magazines for Horror’s would expect for a scary image to be shown
on the cover of the magazine to illustrate the genre it is portraying. Portraying
horror will generally involve the use of colours of red, white and black for
magazines; but can involve other colours based on the film itself.
The magazine cover had to suit the conventions that we required and also the
conventions of Horror magazines. Magazine covers within horror generally show a
key feature and/or a main character to the plot line. Although the magazine cover
in Horror wont show blood generally to avoid disinterest to the magazine due to
gore being shown that some consumers might not want to see. The magazine
cover will need to stand out to make it unique to other brands and to capture the
attention of the audience.
Our magazine follows the genre Conventions of a horror as it uses
traditional horror colours of Red, White and black; the image also follows
the genre conventions as it doesn’t give away too much but gives a clear
and strong image of the film and its antagonist.

10. Institutional Conventions – Magazine Cover
With magazine covers, conventions of institutes are that the big brands and highly anticipated films will get
spots on the front cover of popular magazines like Empire, Entertainment Weekly, Total Films, etc. Then
smaller films will get positioned as sub-topics on the front cover or have their spot somewhere in the book.
Although they can get a spot on the front cover on the less popular but still read magazines like Scream
magazine.
Company information is presented on magazines at the top of the magazine
through presenting their name at the top of the magazine. Furthermore, the
magazine will also include a website address so that consumers can go look
online where they can find in more detail the companies involved in the
production and distribution of the magazine.
We decided our Magazine cover to go on the front cover of the magazine
Horrorville. This was because this is a popular magazine that offered Horror
based subjects and suited out needs for the magazine cover. Furthermore, the
colours that the magazine uses go well with the colour scheme of our
requirements.

11. Teaser Trailer
Layout Conventions
The layout conventions of a Teaser trailer are that the trailer’s duration is between 60-90 seconds long, and that shots
within the trailer are commonly edited in a way that they are not actually in the order that the shot occurs in the actual film.
In horror teaser trailers, generally the trailer builds up tension, starting off quite calm and relaxed, then building up adding
in shots to make horror obvious to the films story. To make the shots appear like they are for the Horror genre the layout
must be accompanied by sound; without sound the horror part of the teaser trailer would not work to deliver an effective
view of a horror genre being in the trailer. Sounds will be eerie and will be made to make people feel uncomfortable to
build fear.
Conventionally Horror will use fast pace shots to keep the image of certain moments brief and keep the full plot hidden;
and also to build fear and build upon the Horror aspect of the trailer, finally when the visuals get faster and show more
horror like content, the sound work will congenitally change to match the visuals presentation.

12. The audience will be given an idea of the storyline and a brief view of
what the narrative is roughly, but wont get a full insight to what the
story is so that it keeps up audience interest in the film. Finally the
teaser trailer will show a date at the end and the name of the film but
the name of the film at that point wont generally be the final name of
the film.
Our trailer follows the layout conventions as it keeps the same structure as conventional Horror teaser trailers and also
generally teaser trailer. It keeps to the duration with ours at 61 seconds, ours follows the structure of both the visuals and
the sound work, both working together to build upon the horror aspect of the trailer, and using text towards the end and
finally ending with the conventional name of the film and the time. Finally the trailer will end with a quick shot jump
scare that is a final indicator to the genre and just to excite viewers more.

13. Genre Conventions – Teaser Trailer
In horror teaser trailers conventionally the trailer will use much more low-key lighting, and a darker atmosphere. The
antagonist will be briefly shown in the fast pace segments of the trailer so that the antagonist remains partly a
mystery still, and doesn’t give away the identity/nature of the antagonist. Furthermore, at the end of the trailer in the
horror genre of trailers, they will conventionally end with a jump scare. In teaser trailers for horror, they will mostly
start off by introducing a location then characters and the general plot but not too much of the plot.
Our teaser trailer has followed the genre conventions of a horror teaser trailer, as it uses shots in a way that they
appear and build an unsettling feeling in the audience, they don’t reveal the antagonist completely and it shows the
audience the general plot but doesn’t give away the complete plot while being effective at building up the sense of it
being a horror the further into the trailer. It starts off by setting a base location and then works on introducing
characters.

14. Institutional Conventions – Teaser Trailer
The institutional conventions for teaser trailers doesn’t change based on the production team behind it, all teaser
trailers will present the production company being the makings of the film. Although different companies might
have different ways of presenting it, some might have a still image while others might have a animated ident due
to having a higher budget and more resources. An example of this could be Warner Bros.
Pictures, where they can afford to make different versions of their ident depending on the film; while some
companies might have a budget that only allows them to create a still image ident.
The companies that are involved with the production of the film, will be conventionally stated during the teaser
trailer. This is conventionally towards the beginning where the ident of the companies will be shown. Towards
the end of the trailer when the date of release is shown, the companies ident are shown again with possibly
other companies being shown that have had some involvement with main companies with the production of the
film.

15. In our trailer we presented out production companies ident at the start of
the trailer, this was so that the audience could identify straight away the
production company behind the film. As a low budget production team
with limited resources available we created a ident that was formed of a
still image with an over-lapping animation to give the ident more
character and creativity to it.