The document discusses techniques for an effective horror movie trailer. It examines how the trailers for Sinister and American Horror Story use techniques like a news report opening, quick cuts, close-ups, and photographs to set the tone and create a sense of fear or disorientation in the viewer. The document proposes applying these techniques to the author's own horror trailer by using close-ups, fast editing, and unsettling camera angles to portray a protagonist's soul being destroyed after death in a dark woodland setting.

2.  To make my horror trailer seem effective and 'scary' it's
important to make sure the editing techniques I use are
professional and stick to the genre conventions used in
horror films. To utilise the different techniques used in
existing trailers, I have looked at how the opening credits
to Sinister use a news report style at the beginning to set
up the narrative. This is something I wish to explore in my
own trailer. By using a TV broadcast the trailer starts to
enter the reality of the viewers, who will be familiar with
information presented in a factual style to report current
events.

3. Sinister
 The trailer for Sinister a quick pace to create a
disorientating feel to the spectator. I wish to do the same
with my trailer, focusing on the facial expressions of my
actors and cut the shots together with a sharp, edgy feel.
This idea of quick shot lengths emphasizes the
conventions to the horror genre.
 I may also wish to look at the location in a ‘snapshot
sense’ by shooting my trailer in a way that loos closely at
the iconography of a scary woodland. I will also need to
use a range of ‘interesting’ camera angles which will help
disorientate the audience, this can be through close
ups, extreme close ups, high and low
angles, pans, tracking shots and POVs.

4. American Horror Story
 To give my trailer a feeling of past and present, I
shall use photographs in a similar concept. The way
in which the photos are used to show death/ghostly
figures works well for my supernatural
subgenre, where I shall show my main protagonist
(who has died) alongside a photo of her being
destroyed as a metaphor for her leaving Earth and
entering the in-between.
 I shall use close ups and fast editing to show her
photograph being destroyed and her eyes reacting
to this as if it is burning/destroying her soul.

5. Stills that Inspire Me

6. What I have learnt
 From these two examples I have learnt the
importance of speed and how the use of closes ups
can be used more often than in say action films or
romances. This is because the way in which horror
films shock/scare the audience is by showing things
in a subliminal or very controlled way. I shall
recreate this idea in my own trailer to give a lost and
panicked sense of loneliness in my woodland
location.