This document discusses how the media product of a movie trailer uses and develops conventions of real movie trailers. It summarizes that the author researched thriller film trailers like Contagion to understand conventions around building suspense, tension, and mystery. Their trailer used techniques like close-up shots, ominous text, a voiceover, and an ambiguous ending to intrigue audiences, mirroring real thriller trailers. The accompanying poster and magazine cover also drew upon typical conventions of those media like credits, taglines, and layouts to seem like real promotional materials. Overall, the author aimed to create a believable trailer, poster, and magazine that developed genre conventions while putting their own spin on them.

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

2. Movie Trailer
• For my A2 Media studies coursework I had to create a teaser Trailer and create
two ancillary tasks to go a long with it, which in my case was a film poster and
magazine cover. I chose to create a thriller trailer so had to work on the codes
and conventions within a thriller film:
Create a sense of suspense
Tension is built up throughout the film
Main character suffering
A sense of danger and enigma
Dark settings
• My trailer was intended to use conventions and forms of other real media
products to produce a suitable trailer for my target audience. Using ideas from
the influences I first researched have helped me a long the way to produce and
edit a believable product.
• In order for my trailer to follow these conventions of a thriller/drama film I
researched other trailers and analysed them. The research that I conducted
before starting the production helped me to understand and find the different
elements that would able to make a trailer in my chosen genre. My biggest
influence within this genre was the contagion film and trailer because it was
similar to my ideas.

3. • The shot on the left inspired me in my trailer and I used similar shots within
my movie trailer. In contagion these shots show how the illness is spread by
touch and uses close ups to show the importance. I decided that I would use this
too because I wanted the same effects within my movie trailer.
Shots
• Another convention I used from already existing
products was the idea of adding text throughout the
trailer. In my biggest influence I found that the
contagion trailer used effective words, such as ‘one
touch’ and other things like this. I used this idea
in my movie trailer and found it was effective in
portraying how much of a disaster the film included.

4. Sound
• Sound is important within a trailer because it can be used to add
dramatic effect and emphasise the action. In most movie trailers
that I had watched they used a voice over for their sound, I
thought this was an effective way to express the feelings of a
character within the film as it expresses their thoughts. This
makes the audience feel like they can understand the story better
within that short clip and are able to relate to the character,
making it more believable.
• To open a typical thriller opening scene in a trailer there is non
diegetic music to emphasis the drama. For my opening scene I have
used no diegetic music and I feel that it fits in well and creates
tension right from the beginning. I think it also creates mystery
for the audience. I also add a voice over which is also non
diegetic because you are not able to see the person speaking but
its more of a thought. It works well because the audience are able
to get a better understanding of the story from a thought than a
diegetic sound that comes from a script.

5. The Ending
For the ending of many existing trailers that I have seen the ending seems
unclear. For example in Contagion it showed the fact that the disease spread and
people were being effected but it was unclear as to how it started and how it will
end. This keeps the mystery within the movie which keeps the audience wanting to
know more. In my trailer the ending shows a world map and how much it had spread,
also with the effects it has on my main character. It is not clear how far it goes
or whether something is done to stop it. The audience will be kept on the edge of
there seats and will want to know more, which makes them want to go watch the
movie. This effect is a great technique in getting the audience to come watch your
film, this is exactly why I used it within my trailer. After the end of the
trailer it then fades and shows the name of the film. This is used within many
trailers and gives the effect of how important the title is.

6. Movie Poster
• For my movie poster I used other poster
conventions to help me create my movie poster. On
real media products I found that they included
credits for the film and the words ‘Coming soon’
or the date it would be out. I therefor included
this convention on my movie poster so that it
could be compared to already existing movie
posters.
I also included a tag line in
which most posters have, this is
the chance to give more
information about the movie with
just one short line. I felt that
my movie poster followed the codes
and conventions well to ensure it
was good for my target audience.

7. Movie Magazine
• In my magazine front cover the product challenges and develops many forms and
conventions of real media products. In order to understand other film magazine
conventions better I had to carry out research at the beginning to help me develop my
ideas.
The masthead is both red and bold so that it jumps out
of the page and attracts attention to the magazine name
as with other magazines this is what the audience look
for.
Distortion is larger that the rest of the writing as
this is the main attraction of the magazine. The font I
created myself and works well with ‘distortion’ as
the font looks distorted.
The main image takes up almost all of the magazine as
this is what attracts a large audience. From this one
picture we can tell that the film its advertising will
include tension and mystery as we can see she is ill or
‘distorted’ but we don’t know why.
• As you an see I have tried to follow and develop typical magazine conventions
whilst simultaneously giving mine more of its own theme. On my front cover I have
taken the typical forms and conventions of a magazine, for example I have added a
bar code and a website in the corner as other magazines would too.

8. • Overall I think my film trailer mirrors most of the typical
conventions of my chosen genre in order to create the right
style. It was important to look at films such as Contagion
in order to look closely at the conventions, and I feel that
my trailer has a similar feel to it. It sticks within the
time limit of already existing film trailers and I made sure
this was possible by editing and cutting the filming I
already had correctly and effectively. I feel my teaser
trailer developed codes and conventions of real media
products in order to make it look like a real media product,
whilst also developing it in my own way and keeping the my
genre well.