Evaluation Question 2 for media studies

1. {
Evaluation Question 2
“How effective is the combination of your main
product and the ancillary texts?”
Jade Fogg

2.  The overall aim of our short film Saving
Grace, was to truly catch the attention of
the audience and to get them to ask
themselves questions. We wanted to create
what Rick Altman described as ‘Intellectual
Puzzle’, one of the pleasures that
entertainment gives you. In order to do this
we made the audience believe the
Antagonist was one person however it is
revealed to be a different person. We also
wanted to aim for a similar style with the
Ancillary texts, in order to grab the
audiences attention even more and in
addition have the poster etc. make the
audience ask them selves questions as to
what happens, making a unique selling
point. In order to do this, we researched
multiple film posters and gained ideas from
these. In order to keep the Ancillary texts
similar, we created the tagline “Have you
ever woken up not knowing where you
are?”- a line picked from the short film
itself, not only does this create synergy but
it also creates suspicion for the audience
and tells them about the film itself without
giving much of the storyline away.

3. Poster
 Our group decided to search (using Google) for other
thriller film posters, and we found specifically the
poster for ‘Black Swan’. The black background made
the main character stand out as they were also centre
shot, we took this idea and made our main character
grace centre shot and created a black background.
However, we decided to make our character look
somewhat different to the main character in the
poster for ‘Black Swan’, as the character looked
focused in their poster, however the character in our
film has a change of state and has little awareness,
we tried to display this in our posters. We
individually created film posters to put our ideas
together and create a final poster. In my example of a
film poster for our film Saving Grace, I added
spotlights which focused on our main character, this
is to give the audience an understanding that the
film is about that particular character and what
happens to her. The example posters were created on
Adobe Photoshop which made it very simple to edit
photos to desire.

4.  The overall aim of the poster was to
attract the attention of the audience
and to ask themselves about the story
of the main character, which is the
selling point of the poster. Our final
Official film poster for Saving Grace
(to the right) was created using Adobe
Photoshop and was created to be
minimalistic, having a colour scheme
of Black, white and red. The colour
red contrasts against lack and white
but also connotes evil. The title of the
film was edited in a specific way to
make it look like a logo rather than a
title, in order for the film to be more
recognisable. The poster for our film
had the tagline “Have you ever woken
up not knowing where you are?” –
which is a very significant line in the
film as it tells the audience the choice
to make their own connotation of
what happened in the film.
Poster (Official & finished)

5. Poster (Official & finished)To create the effect
on the poster, a
spotlight was shone
on our main
character, which
made it easy to keep
with our colour
scheme of black,
which and red whilst
also focusing
attention on our
main character, in
addition to her being
centre shot.
In addition to other
editing, research into
other thriller film
posters influenced
ours (such as Black
Swan) as it is
minimalistic and
focuses the colour on
the character and
had none in the
background which
makes it intense.
The poster for our film
has a black background,
which exaggerates the
focus on our main
character, suggesting that
this particular character
is in fact Grace.
The title of the film was made
to look almost like a logo, which
makes it more memorable.
Underneath the title is the
tagline “Have you ever woken
up not knowing where you are?”
which is very significant in the
film. Both of these texts are
written in white making them
contrast with the background.
The date of release and the age
restriction of our film as these
are two important factors for
our audience to see, as not only
does it tell the audience when the film
is being released but it keeps the younger audience safe
due to the age restrictions by the BBFC.

6.  The purpose of our film ‘Saving Grace’ was to shock
people and create tension and also confusion. We
reflected this in our Ancillary texts by creating tension
within these also. Our film poster is very similar to
different types of thriller films. For example the poster
for ‘The Blaire Witch Project’, as the main character is
centre shot and the contrast of the picture has decreased,
the character also stands out from the background as the
background is primarily black, a colour which
represents Darkness. In addition to this a light is being
shone onto the main character from the right side,
making the character look powerless as the light is from
a high angle. This would make the audience feel as if
they want to know more about the character and what
happens in the film. Another film poster similar to ours
is for ‘Silence of the Lambs’. This poster is similar to
ours as a character is the focus of the poster and the
black background makes them more significant. In
addition to this the colour scheme is also identical;
Black, White and Red. However our film poster is very
different to both of these posters as ours lacks contrast,
this is due to the effect that our main character Grace
has on her, she cannot see clearly due to her change of
state which is portrayed to the audience through change
in contrast of the film poster.
Poster (Comparison)

7.  As a group, we thought it was very
important to gain audience feedback
from the Ancillary texts as well as the
final film itself, allowing us to gain
overall feedback. We asked 30 people
inside and out of college (making a
larger demographic) multiple
questions about themselves (age,
gender & occupation) and what they
thought of the poster. Questions such
as “Is the Thriller genre represented
well in this poster?” and “How likely
would you say you were to watch this
film after seeing the poster?” were
asked, ranging from open answer
boxes to likert scales. These examples
(to the right) represent the answers of
multiple ages, even those outside of
our Target Audience, of different
genders and of different occupations,
the most common occupation being a
student however being within our
target audience. The feedback we
gathered from the audience were
generally positive.
Poster (Audience feedback)
“How likely would you say you were to
watch this film after seeing the poster?”
“Is the Thriller genre represented well
in this poster?”

8.  In production of our Radio Advertisement, we decided we would
create synergy and also include the tag line: “Have you ever woken up
not knowing where you are?” however we included the whole quote
from the film, this was to create satisfaction for the audience. Our
Radio Advertisement included a male narrator with a deep voice,
which is typical for a thriller film, this also creates tension and fear
within the audience, an aim of ours. Our group understood that it
would be difficult to portray the struggle that is in the film in the Radio
Advertisement as it isn’t visual, however to represent the violence we
included a clip of one of our main characters Becky, screaming “Grace”,
portraying danger as she is shouting for Grace. In order for the
audience to gain a greater understanding of the film and it’s story line
we also included sound effects and music from the film that we
thought represented the Thriller genre well and also presented
intensity. Our Radio Advertisement Trailer was uploaded to YouTube
in order to reach a larger demographic.
Radio Advertisement Trailer

9.  You will find our Radio Advertisement Trailer below:
Radio Advertisement Trailer

10.  Similarly to our poster feedback, we asked 30
people within and without of our target
audience different questions about our Radio
Advertisement Trailer in order to gain feedback
and to be able to analyse it. We asked questions
such as “How likely would you be to watch the
film after listening to the trailer?” and “After
listening to the trailer, is there anything you
would change/improve on?” results were
analysed. It was found that only 2/30 would’ve
changed the Radio Ad, one person of the two
commented “I would’ve added more upbeat
music in the Radio Ad to represent certain
scenes within the film”. Results from the other
example question told us that although some
people would’ve made the Radio Ad differently,
every person that took part in the questionnaire
would watch the film after listening, which was
the main aim of the Radio Advertisement
Trailer.
Radio Advertisement Trailer
(Audience Feedback) “After listening to the trailer,
is there anything you would
change/improve on?”
“How likely would you be
to watch the film after
Listening to the trailer?”

11.  In addition to the poster and the radio
advertisement trailer, we also created
Teaser Trailers, which are similar to
television advertisements however
much shorter. Our teaser trailers give
the audience a little understanding for
the film and leave them guessing as to
what is happening. The overall aim of
the teaser trailer was to get the audience
to watch the whole thing by making the
teaser trailers intense and to include
actual footage from the short film itself.
We created 2 different teaser trailers in
order to gain experience in editing but
also to create more ancillary texts for
the audience in order to show different
parts of the film, these were also
uploaded to YouTube to gain a larger
demographic.
Additional Ancillary texts

12.  The same questions as the poster and radio
advertisement were used for the teaser trailer
however slightly differently worded in order to
make it relevant. Some of the questions that were
asked were “After watching the teaser trailers how
likely are you to watch the film?” and “Which teaser
trailer did you find made you want to watch the
film the most?”, these questionnaire results were
analysed. Results showed that the teaser trailers
weren’t as effective as the Radio Ad and Poster’s
were, however still successful in persuading people
to watch the short film. The second example
question represents that the first teaser trailer was
more successful than the second, however the same
amount of people thought they were equally as
good. This feedback evidenced that our other
Ancillary texts were more successful as the audience
gave better feedback on them, even though still
being positive.
Teaser Trailer (Audience
Feedback) “After watching the teaser
trailers how likely are you
to watch the film?”
“Which teaser trailer did
you find make you want
to watch the film the most?”