1. Advanced portfolio evaluation.

3. Ways in which our media products; use, develop or challenge the conventions of real media product. Within our trailer, we used a range of different camera angles. Specific examples from our trailer; close ups helped in heightening the emotions of the character, in this case fear. This is something we drew upon from existing media texts as all the horror trailers we looked at in our initial research all had at least one close up. Another shot type we used was a pan followed by a whip pan, this helped build tension as the slowness of the normal pan creates a false sense of security followed by the sudden sharpness of the whip pan helped in creating a startled effect, much fitting for the genre. Another generic convention and purpose of any trailer, is to provide information concerning the actual film. All the trailers we studied for our initial research, contained at some point the following; a release date, film title and web address. We have both a web address and release date within our trailer. We subverted the convention of including the title, so to encourage the audience to find that out for themselves by visiting the website. Like most trailers, our trailer fits the convention of being no longer than 2 mins long. This is just enough time to give the audience an insight to the main feature film without giving too much away. Our initial research enabled us to identify a number of editing techniques that are generic to the horror genre.

4. Codes and conventions- Film poster. We loosely based our film post on The Blair Witch Project. We found a similar font to that on The Blair Witch Project poster. We used Photoshop to create our own version of the red symbol seen on The Blair Witch Project poster, this helps in creating an enigma for the target audience. Also the fact that it’s red, the connotations of which are; blood, death, danger and anger. Which are all common themes within horror films. Setting - Like The Blair Witch Project and many other horror film, we used a clichéd woods setting, this is a setting that has association with dark and creepy things, perfect for a horror film. We applied a negative filter to the image on the poster, this implied that there was some sort of super natural being involved. Again the use of a super natural being ; alien or monster. Is another common convention of a horror film. We used “If you go down to the woods today, you’re sure for a big surprise..” we used this as it supports the imagery. Also it’s a well known Childs rhyme so the majority of the audience will get the reference. This will hopefully create a sense of unease as the horror genre isn’t normally associated with children, yet we have used a child's nursery rhyme. We have fulfilled a film posters main aim/convention, and that is providing sufficient information so that the audience know the name, genre and release date of the film. We have tried not to give too much away so as to create an enigma. Colours- We have used only three colours so it’s not too fussy. We have chosen colours that connotation the genre so black and white for dark and mysterious.

5. Codes and conventions- Magazine front cover. Again, like our poster, we loosely based our magazine front cover on an existing film review magazine, Empire. This way we knew that we could meet the codes and conventions as best as possible. Image - We have used a mid shot and applied the rule of thirds to the main image used, which as seen on the second image down is very common with front cover imagery. Colours - We have only used four colours; red, grey and black and white. This keeps it simple and means the image won’t get lost. We made sure we used the same colours as in the poster and trail so that there is a clear house style through the three products. Layout - We have mirrored the layout of the second image down on the right. We have done this by having the masthead at the top of the page with a kicker about, a very common convention of magazines. We placed the strap and tag lines in roughly the same positions as on the authentic empire magazine covers. Our front cover.

6. The effectiveness of our three product as a whole. We have successfully managed to maintain a house style in our three products and from audience feedback it is clear that they are linked to the same film. When asked what made them successful in showing they are for the same film, the audience feedback was; “The use of the same colours for all three products works really well and makes it clear from an audience point of view that they are for the same film.” also “the colours are effective for the genre as they represent things associated with horror films, such as the way you’ve used red to symbolise blood and danger.”

7. Use of technologies in creating our three products Digital camera- We used a 12 mega pixel camera in order to capture the images for the poster and magazine front cover. By using a camera with a high mega pixel count, meant that the image quality was higher, meaning we could reach a more professional standard. We applied the rule of thirds when taking the images, to ensure that the audiences eye was drawn to specific aspects of the image when viewed. HD Camcorder- When shooting our main trailer, we used a HD camcorder. This meant that we had really good image quality and the depth of field could be adjusted which isn’t as easy with a normal camcorder. It also meant that we could zoom in further without the image quality getting worse. This meant we could perform a wider range of shot types. Photoshop-adobe elements 6- We used this in order to edit our raw moving imagery, we were able to apply effects and cut and re-arrange the footage to the order we wanted. We were also able to convert the footage to black and white so it was within keeping with the poster and magazine cover.

8. Use of technology during the research, planning stage and production. During The planning and research stages, I used Google in order to search for images of example posters and front covers and in order to find sites such as the Empire magazine web page. In order to view existing, similar trailers to what we wanted to achieve, we used you tube. W e then used the research to draw inspiration for our products. We were able to evaluate existing products looking in detail at conventions that we could apply to our products. In order to show the entire process of creating our three products, we uploaded our work as went went along to our individual blogs (as seen below)