The early posters for Black Swan featured recurring ballerina and swan motifs to signify the film's focus on ballet and reference to Swan Lake, utilizing a uniform color scheme and Soviet propaganda-inspired visual style. Later posters for Black Swan prominently featured Natalie Portman's character in unsettling or distorted ways to hint at the psychological thriller elements. The posters for Little Miss Sunshine used a bright yellow color scheme representing sunshine and featured the iconic VW bus. The Ocean's Eleven posters had a cohesive black, red, and white color palette and focused on promoting the star-studded ensemble cast. The Sherlock Holmes posters approached character promotion differently for fans of the characters versus fans of the

1. Ancillary Task Research: Posters

2. Black Swan The early posters teasing the release of Black Swan (seen above) were seen long before the films release. These posters, whilst all having a different font, picture and composition, are all cohesive and identifiable as being for the same film. Even if the film and other text was removed it is clear that the posters are for the same film. There is a recurring ballerina motif on each one, a signifier that the film will be about ballet or that it will have some large significance. The swan also reoccurs on the posters, referring to the title. The combination of the ballerina and the swan would make people think of the Russian ballet, Swan Lake. The colour scheme is uniform throughout all the posters and the visual style is reminiscent of Soviet era propaganda posters, again referring to Russia. The primary cast’s and director’s names are also present on the posters which would raise interest for these particular actors fanbases. These posters where some of the first media to be released about Black Swan and are designed to raise awareness and get people talking about the film and look out for more information about it. I think that these posters striking and interesting design achieves this goal.

3. Black Swan The next set of posters to be released for Black Swan hold more cohesion with the other media released, such as the trailer, and the film itself. All three posters have a large picture of the leading actress, Natalie Portman. Two out the three posters have the same font and all three have the three main cast members as well as the director and other small print information. As these posters were released after a bit more hype and information was released as well as its numerous award nominations, these are also on the posters ad well as some favourable quotes attaining to the film. In all of the pictures of Natalie Portman, there is something wrong about them, going from the left there is: red, bloodshot eyes, a crack down the side of her face, this and her pale skin making her reminiscent of a porcelain doll, and a red arm, possibly implying blood. The posters also show Portman dressed as two characters from swan lake, the white swan and the black swan.

4. Little Miss Sunshine Little Miss Sunshine, about a dysfunctional family traveling across America so their young daughter can participate in a children's beauty pageant in California. The posters and other media associated with the film uses a very, very bright yellow colour scheme. The yellow is representative of sunshine and reflects the colour of the family’s bus in the film which has become a signifier for the film and is a very recognisable and unique image that can be associated with it. The main poster has the names of the principle cast at the top, which is a common convention for posters as well as preliminary review quotes and award nominations. The film’s title is all in capitals, with the font size increasing on each word. The quotes are, unusually at the right side of the page, in a staggered pattern as is the film title. The main image is of the bus and the family running to get inside it, one of the most famous and memorable scenes in the film. The smaller posters with the characters on continue the yellow and black scheme, but focus on one character and actor, with a small ‘handwritten’ insert about something they like and dislike, building a bit of background for the characters before people go to see the film.

5. Ocean’s Eleven The collection of Ocean’s Eleven posters have two distinct styles. Two of the posters display a heavily stylise, cartoon-like design. The poster to the top left is a teaser poster as it doesn’t even have the film title on it, just a date. All of these posters have a cohesive black, red and white colour scheme, and these three colours are present in some form on each. These colours and fonts are present in the trailer for the film, as is the heavy focus on the ensemble cast. All of these posters have the names of the biggest, and most well established actors from the film and most have photos of the cast.

6. Sherlock Holmes There is a large number of posters for Sherlock Holmes, and a primary focus of them seems to be on the characters and the actors portraying them. There are two sets of posters each showing one of the four main characters from the film, the main difference between the two is the names. On the set to the left the thing that stands out most is the character name, with the actors name, less imposing and in a smaller font. This suggests that this set of posters is directed at fans of the Sherlock Holmes characters, books and previous films and rely on the popularity and familiarity of the characters. The other set enforces the name of the film primarily and the actor’s name, the characters name is no were on there. This set is more likely aimed at fans of the actors in particular. The poster in the centre is a fairly standard movie poster, with a central picture of the two main characters, film title, main actor’s names at the top and small print at the bottom. All of these posters use the same colours and font and is in-keeping with the visual style of the film and trailer.