Media evaluation

Question: 1 in what ways does your media product
use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real
media products?
 For my A2 project I have been asked to create a movie
trailer, film poster and a magazine front cover showing the
film. My media products follow most conventions found in the
horror genre of film, I know this as I have carried out prior
research into horror before commencing with the production
of my media products.

My media products use, develop and challenge
current forms and conventions of real products
in all of my media products of the trailer, poster
and magazine. For the name of the film, our
group decided on the name Intruder for the title
which would be featured in all media products I
have created. We began the decision making
on the name when brainstorming possible
ideas that suited the style of film with a villain
breaking into a house.
We decided on Intruder as we believed it most
suited the genre and gave an edge into the film
when hearing the title „Intruder‟ straight away
giving that someone has intruded into a house
and even gives an edgy angle to it. My poster
uses, develops and challenges conventions of
media products firstly with the title I have used
which is Intruder. I have kept my poster
relatively simple in the layout. As I have
explained in my mock ups I kept to a basic
sketch of where certain features of my poster
would be featured.
Movie Poster

 The title of my poster has Perpetua MT light text. I
have inserted a text and once it is in place I
flipped the text 180` so that the top half of the text
mirrored the bottom half of the text. This is an
effective style as in my research I noticed several
film titles that have used this and with the image
they have used it looks very effective in drawing
people to the poster. I also chose to use this
mirrored affect as it links in with drips of blood
going from the top half being white going into the
bottom half which is of a blood red text mirroring
the top half showing another side to the text. My
main tile section challenges conventions also with
the positioning of my title.
 I have place in dead in the centre of my poster
were as I have found the high percentage of
movie posters place their title three quarters of the
way down In the poster. I wanted to place my
main title in the middle as it is where the person
would look first followed by the next main image
which in this case would be the intruder. Having
my text centred it made room for other sections of
the poster to be brought in at a larger size e.g.
images. I tested having the title near the bottom
but it did not look that professional in the sense
that it left no room for my images I would be using
for my poster.

 Another convention my media product
uses is the Billing block. This is used in
both my poster and also the trailer. The
billing block has been used to give
credit to people who were involved in
this production. The billing block sets
out different categories of the
production such as producers, directors
and writers. We have used this billing
block as it is what is used in real
productions and also their media
products such as movie posters. Our
billing block includes everyone that as
involved in the production from casting
to directing it. All of these roles were for
filled by our group members. As you
can see from the example to the right
we have followed this convention of the
billing block from a blockbuster film to
our own.

 Another convention used for my poster is the date.
This is used in real media productions and is used to
show when the film‟s release date is. I used existing
conventions using numbering to show the date
instead of using words. Having numbers was more of
an advantage as it made the space for the date
shorter which makes up more room for my poster.
 Another convention is the use of a website link. I have
used this convention as every recently released
production will either have a website or if not the film
company‟s website. I have used this with
„WWW.THEINTRUDER.CO.UK‟.
 The next convention I have developed is the use of
social media links. I found this effective to a movie
company as the use of this will get the film and any
information out to its audience through social media
sites such as Facebook, twitter and YouTube. When
designing my poster and inserted these entire social
media site with the correct name of our film name.

 I have used another convention of including a tag
line in my poster. Through researching other
horror posters I came across the use of tag lines
in every poster. This was important to use in my
media product as it is a hook to audience if a
clever quote is to be used for this. In my media
product I have used “Home Sweet Home”. This
clever quote is short but also effective relating
back to a house where our trailer is based at. This
quote is often used when describing a house so I
believe this is a great benefit to my poster.
 Images were another convention I challenged in
my products. I have taken two images for my
poster one on top of the other. I challenged the
conventions of the stranger‟s poster which was
released in Spain. I took this and went on to
develop it to make it my own product which I
believe I have done effectively. I have positioned
the protagonist on the top of the two main
characters with the protagonist looking straight
into to camera with the two teenagers looking out
to the distance.

 My next media product I have created is the movie
trailer with conventions. In our trailer we produced a
voice over to introduce the trailer. To do this and make
it effective we created a script for someone to read out
making the broadcast sound like a radio
broadcast, this was followed up by our group having a
teacher from another class read this message out
while we recorded the speech. We challenged this
convention by putting out own version of a radio
broadcast to it. The next convention we challenged in
our production was the variety of shots we produced.
The first area of shots would be a slow pan. This initial
shot was used for the Maghull sign in which we based
the trailer off showing its initial location. We also used
a pan when shooting the scenery and housing estate
which we would then go onto shoot the interior house
scenes from. We progressed on to use more up close
shots when the trailer moved to an inside location of
the interior house scenes.
Trailer

 Our first shot type is the medium close up which was a well-
used shot type as all shots were inside the space was
restricted so a medium close up was an ideal size for shot as
it still left room for movement in shot. We moved on to
capture aspects of the house such as shots of the kitchen
sink dripping water with a close up to gather the whole motion
of the tap dripping. Another shot we challenged and used in
our production was an over the shoulder shot going into a
shaky cam.
 This shot was from the intruder‟s perspective when he was
standing behind the teenage boy who shows him turning to
look behind him and then going straight into a shaky cam
affect when the character notices the intruder. I found this
type of shot to be interesting to incorporate into our
production because it made the camera work look more
realistic and seem as the intruder to be up close with the
teenagers

 Another way in which my media trailer challenges a real media product
would be its location, when scouting locations pre-production we wanted
to use establishing outdoor shots of scenery to establish the interior
shots would be away from a city and in a rural location. Interior shots
were filmed from a group members house were all interior shots were
filmed. This being we wanted to have a film inside were aspects from
other films researched such as paranormal activity were creepy and
abnormal things happen when a central protagonist enters the story
plot.
 Music is the next section when we challenged conventional uses of
music and changed the style of it. When researching into current movie
trailers of the horror genre we all found the use of earey music with a
chilling edge of creepiness to the them such as Insidious „tip toe through
the tulips‟ song which when listened to instantly makes you think of the
film and its series of films. This style of creepy music with high pitched
audio challenges current media products and we have challenged this
by using a similar audio clip through half the trailer which like the real
media product gives a creepy feel when listening to it. Researching into
horror trailers we noticed certain aspects about cuts in the production of
the trailers. These tend to be fast paced and close to the end climax
with an action packed scene. This would be something we would use
and challenge for conventions when filming and later editing the clips on
the Macs with iMovie.

 To build up the story we had to tell a plot and
show action sections that would appeal to the
target audience. Dark editing was another area
we used for our trailer when later on in the
trailer the story becomes more intense with
added action scenes so with these, this dark
editing makes the scene look more darker in
the sense of scare quality was essential to be
managed as if the clips were edited incorrectly
and made to look too bright then this would not
appeal to the target audience and also leave
viewers confused on why colours have
changed from dark colours to a sudden bright
change. This style of editing has been seen I a
lot of my research on new trailers such as the
marked ones, Devils Due and Repentance
which all use this style of editing.
 Another section like my poster media product
is the billing block which is important to use as
it would show the people involved in our
production of our trailer. Using this convention
made our production even more like the real
thing because it would be used in the film
industry giving credit to the main people in the
production.

 The next section in which our trailer uses
media conventions is the use of title frames.
We have used fived title frames to add to the
developing story being told. These sections
would break up the trailer through text being
shown on screen. The images on this slide
show all the title frames we have included to
the trailer. The frames are also linked to the
viewer asking them what would you do if your
home became your worst nightmare? The
text was edited through Photoshop with a
rugged aged affect giving it a creepy shadow
with the text. We changed the colour to the
last frame which was Nightmare to give a
bold ending to these title frames with the link
of blood through the blood red colouring in
the text.
 The intruder title would follow at the end of
the trailer which connects with the title frames
with the colouring of red and whites.

 My last ancillary media product is my movie
magazine. For this section I used all sections of
develop challenge and used forms and
conventions of media products. I researched into
many magazines in my chosen genre of horror. I
wanted to research into horror magazines rather
than conventional film magazines such as Total
film as I wanted my magazine to follow the
conventions of our trailer with horror so I believe
keeping it within this genre will make it more
affective.
 Researching into many magazines such as
Fangoria which instantly gives away the horror
genre just by its title giving it a unique selling
point and something I wanted to incorporate into
my magazine.
Movie Magazine

 The next area of my magazine is the
masthead of my magazine. I chose a
bold text that would stand out from the
rest of the text on the front cover. The
main masthead is a dark red with a white
shadowing outline giving it a bolder 3D
effect.
 My magazine front cover challenges
current media conventions through the
use of imagery in my front cover. I have
used one main image which helps to
make the front cover more eye catching
with its bold image being dark and being
so large it will catch readers attention. I
have developed the images through the
use of Adobe Photoshop to edit the
images from a raw image into the
finished product it is in the magazine
front cover.

 The intruder title I have used for my
magazine front cover is the exact same
layout and positioning as found in my
movie poster I have also created. I will
challenge this media convention of
carrying the text on through to different
media products in my magazine which is
seen here in my front cover. The text
layout is still reversed.
 Another section of the title is the tag line I
created to accompany the title of the front
cover mains story. For the tag line I used a
quote saying “Are you really safe at
home?” followed with “We go behind the
scenes of the new hit” coming from the
magazines perspective.

 Modern magazines have used well
recognised social Medias to attract more
people to their website. I have used this
convention of including social media to link
to the magazines name along with social
media logos such as Facebook & Twitter. I
believe this makes my product look more
like the real thing. I wanted to include social
media links down to the fact that all Medias
now a days will include these links in a way
of attracting audiences that use such social
media sites as Twitter, Facebook and
YouTube.
 The black screen shot shown below is my
social medias used in the front cover, these
include the twitter bird logo and the „F‟ logo
for Facebook.

 The next section to my movie magazine is the use
of the Magazine date, magazines website, price
and barcodes. The first section of my magazine is
the issue date, this is a part I wanted to include as
other sections like the website, it is a little added
extra feature but makes the magazine seem more
real as this date is a well-used feature to
magazines as it sets out what date it was issued
on.
 Like my other ancillary product I have included the
magazine‟s website. This feature like the social
media links will bring extra customers to view the
link on different platforms. This was a large feature
to include because throughout all my research on
movie magazines this was seen in every front
cover.

 The last feature was price and barcode, firstly pricing I have
priced my magazine at £3.99. Many movie magazines are
set at a higher price e.g. £4.99-£6.99 but to be more
competitive and still attract my target audience I set mine at
£3.99 a price that is reasonable for a teenage market. I set
my pricing in the same text as used in my front cover and
also placed it on top of the barcode to make it more legible
for anyone reading it. The last section barcode has been
used to allow more efficient purchasing when scanning the
magazine. All products will have this barcode and has been
used for many reasons.
 Firstly is the look of it, if it was not to be used then my
magazine would not be able to be scanned when being
purchased. Secondly it makes the overall look of my
magazine more professional having it. I have placed it at
the bottom of my front cover with the price on top of it. I
believe using this convention makes my product look more
like the real thing because I have recognised all magazine
front covers I researched into have used a barcode so was
necessary for me to carry this feature out into my movie
magazine front cover.

Question 2: How effective is the combination of your main product and
ancillary texts?
 My main product and ancillary are effective with each other for many
purposes. The first one is text styling. My group‟s trailer has used a text
for the tile Intruder which I have kept the same for my two ancillary
products. Research told me that it is rare for a film to change to its text
style when broadcasting the film through other Medias like movie
magazines and social media. So to act on this I have kept the text the
same throughout all three types of media products to manage the
continuity of my films style of film.
 Perpetua MT was used in all three which I know makes the film look more
realistic to a real film because changing the style of text in other styles
would be confusing for the audience as it would look like different film all
together if a different text was to be used. I have also kept the styling of
the text the same in both of my ancillary products with the two layers of
text with the bottom layer being flipped to be upside down which is also
included in my movie magazine front cover. Using this same style will
make my products easier to recognise through different types of media
and more professional looking because it is unlikely for a branded film
series to change their text on their products.

 The billing block is another area of media products I have combined
both main products and ancillary texts. This area was key to giving
credit to those who were involved with the overall production. This was
devolved in Adobe Photoshop for all the different sections that needed
to be mentioned in it. Once complete it was inserted into our trailer at
the end. Finally I have inserted it into my poster. I have placed this at
the base of my poster where the space was available to put text of this
size here.
 Image is another area for my media products. From my main media
product the trailer I was inspired for the style of photography to be used
to use for my ancillary products. I was inspired by the dark cuts we have
used in our trailer and the edgy shots of the teenagers who are scared
in these scenes. So to build on this I have used images to act on this
showing the two teenagers with frightened looks on their faces. This I
believe is effective for my poster as I have also inserted the Intruders
face in the background of it adding a sense of creepiness to it.

Question 3: What have you learned from your audience feedback?
 I have learnt from my audience feedback received many things.
The first way is the constructive criticism I have received from
peer‟s feedback. I printed versions of my poster out and gave it
out to friends and also random people when they had spare time.
The second way of giving it to strangers was a better and more
reliable as they do not know me and would not feel bad if they
found something wrong with it to criticise it.
 I would use this criticism to build and change my products to
better my work in the long term. I also gave it to my family
members as a lot of my family work in the media world so would
obviously have a good knowledge of such products as this
poster, I received both good and bad feedback but however I do
not see this to be bad feedback as it will eventually be corrected
and turn into my final product.

 Another area I have learnt from my audience feedback would
be when carrying out a questionnaire to identify my target
audience in which I would aim my products at. I asked closed
questions to find out straight answers for specific needs I
would need to know for example the age group of the person.
The first question was male or female and there were more
males than females with 70% male and a remaining
30%female. The second question was one of the most
important to be asked. I asked what age are you? I wanted to
ask this as this because it will tell me exactly what is a popular
age range for a trailer to hit a target audience. The most
popular out of all age ranges was the 16-20 and this is the
range I would be targeting. I selected this range as it is a
teenage range and the most likely to go view a horror movie
rather than older ages like the 45+ range with no one selecting
this age.
 We used two main characters who are both teenagers so this
would appeal top our audience as well. Another important
question I included in my questionnaire was where does the
user usually view movie trailers. This would tell me what
platforms they would view trailers off. This was important as to
hit my target audience I would use the same platforms to
promote my groups trailer on. The most popular answer for
this out of all options was online through YouTube. This is
where we have published our trailer as it is a wide audience
that uses it and we can gather people‟s opinions through
user‟s comments.

Question 4: How did you use new media technologies in the
construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
 I have used new media technologies firstly with my
construction stage of my media products. Firstly I used camera
software to take the raw image files for my media products.
This was done through my Nikon D3X camera. This new
media was used effectively as I have a lot of experience when
using the camera and its settings to alter the images when
taking them.
 Blogger was another useful tool that was used in the new
media technologies stage. This was a necessary asset to be
used as it was where all of our work was to be published from.
All coursework would be put on here and could be edited at a
later date to add to a certain post. I have found using blogger
useful because of its simple layout and its accessibility as it is
available on different platforms in which I downloaded onto my
smartphone.

 Another new technology I have used to create
my media product was Adobe Photoshop. This
tool was a great benefit to my finished product. I
found it easy and was comfortable to use it as I
have had prior experience using this software. It
was the best package to edit my photos on as
using other software‟s for it would not be as good
as the standard of Photoshop.
 I found using this package a great benefit as I
had to crop my main two photos down to a size
were they would fit in with the size I needed. If
Photoshop was not to be used to edit my photos
then I believe the images would be of a low
quality and not look as high quality as they do
now. Overall this software was excellent tool to
be used because of its many of options available
to alter images which can benefit my images
being used as this now meant my images could
have more alterations through edits unlike other
software that may have been used, so overall
this was a beneficial package to use for my
images throughout my media products.

 IMovie was another new technology myself and
our group has used in the editing section of the
trailer. This was the section where the raw
footage would be cut down and edited to piece
together in the needed order of our trailer. This
would be performed on the schools Macs in our
media class room.
 Using this software meant we could edit the clips
in a professional editing suite giving the group
more of a stronger benefit instead of using
alternative editing packages such as Windows
Movie Maker. I had little prior experience using
IMovie but quickly became well experienced
when using it to edit the footage. This screen shot
shows the basic layout of the IMovie layout we
have used in class.

 The next media technology I have used is
YouTube. This tool was necessary to publish
our finished product online through this online
tool to reach a wide audience. We have used
this tool to give our audience a know how about
or trailer with an added benefit of that we can
receive in viewers feedback through online
comments left below the video which can help
improve and alter our productions for future
reference.
 The screen shot below shows our actual trailer
once we have published online. Our trailer has
been received positively I believe because of
the amount of views received since publishing it
on YouTube and through other social
medias like Twitter.

 Microsoft office is the next media technology to be used. This
was simply a necessary package to use for creating any word
document to be uploaded to Blogger. This was beneficially
helpful to my products such as blog posts as creating them in
Microsoft Word came with spell checker so the chances of
publishing any posts on Blogger with misspelled words were to
become less likely to happen. To structure the texts correctly
this was helpful when completing analysis's of trailers which
would include images in between the paragraphs of each other.
 Another office product I have used is PowerPoint. I have used
this package when creating my evaluation of the A2 Course.
Which when finishing polished it through my blog with Slide
Share which would allow this document to be inserted onto my
blog.

 Padlet is another media technology I
have used when gathering research
on my final media product my poster.
Padlet is an online post it note
allowing people to leave comments
which was helpful for my products
when feedback was necessary. On
blogger I have linked in the Padlet in a
blog post to show my final post for my
poster which will receive feedback
from people on my final product.
 As you can see from this print screen
the use of Padlet is effective for
collecting feedback with the
comments I have received in this
software.

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