In what ways does your media product use, develop, or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Lyndsay and I did a lot of background research on teaser trailers, not just horror trailers but a different variety. We also did research on the conventions of horror itself as horror was the main genre for our trailer; these included for example weapons, villains, victim, shadows, murder/death, blood darkness, eerie music, weak/strong characters, haunted house, isolated settings, monsters, evil, storms, chase sequence, gore, violence, screams, ghosts, and suspense. These are what a typical horror film would have throughout so we used similar conventions, with an isolated setting, hero, villain and victim. We portrayed these by using a chase sequence, showing suspense to the audience which created an empty and isolated setting.Looking back at our research for a teaser trailer we found out that in order for our trailer to use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products we had to make sure it was under 2 minutes and that it should intrigue the audience by using lots of clips and not giving anything away, we incorporated this in our trailer by concealing the identity of our characters by hiding their faces. We hid the villains face to create a sense of threat that the villain is present, but still the audience is in suspense to find out who the villain really is. To show the difference between each character we used the forms of colour to represent who each character was, for the villain he was kept in quite dark colours so mainly black, as black is often used in films to portray the villain, we then used white for the ghost/spirit character as this represents innocence in our storyline. As for the main character we used the colour red as this colour represents importance and also shows danger and the hidden threat that the character is in.
Back with our research on horror films and teaser trailers we noticed that in a lot of them they usually used a male as the hero, but we decided that we wanted a female as out hero, but as we created our plot, in the end the victims brother becomes the hero by saving her, so the characters end up switching places.
I think that as a group Lyndsay and I did keep very close the conventions of horror that a teaser trailer is supposed to have. From the feedback we got for the two viewings we showed, both times the audience was not sure of the storyline which is what we wanted to achieve the main purpose of a teaser trailer to tease the audience into wanting to watch the whole film to find out what happens, a nice air of suspense to the film.
How effective is the combination of your main product and your ancillary texts?
A teaser trailer or teaser is a short trailer used to advertise an upcoming movie, game or television series. Teasers, unlike typical theatrical trailers, are usually very short in length and usually contain little, if any, actual footage from the film. They are usually released long in advance of the film they advertise, one of the reasons for the name "teaser" is because they are shown usually a long time (one or one and a half years) before the movie comes out, so as to "tease" the audience. Teasers are also commonly used in advertising. The so-called teaser ad/campaign consists typically in (a series of) small, cryptic, challenging, advertisements which anticipate a larger full-blown campaign for a product launch or otherwise important event. Their purpose is less to tell the audience about a movie's content than simply to let them know that the movie is coming up in the near future, and to add to the hype of the upcoming release. Teaser trailers are often made while the film is still in production or being edited and as a result they may feature scenes or alternate versions of scenes that are not in the finished film. Teaser trailers today are increasingly focused on internet downloading and the convention circuit.
We have created posters and also a magazine alongside our teaser trailer which will ensure ticket sales and profit. I think that the text with our trailer works very effectively, and I think that if this was a real film our media texts would be seen a lot by consumers.
What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
Lyndsay and I decided that we wanted our target audience to be in the age range of 15-19 years old. We created a questionnaire to help us find out what our chosen target audience liked and disliked about horror movies. This helped us get a clear understanding of what the audience wanted and to help us come up with ideas to give our audience what they wanted. After making rough drafts of our trailer and posters we created yet another set of questionnaires to help us find out if what we created as a group from our first questionnaire we managed to achieve knowing what the audience wanted. The audience is the main and essential part of making a film, they are the consumer of the product, without the audience they would be no film and no profit, so the audience is vital to the production of the film itself and also in the film industry. I think that by having a specific target audience to aim your film to it feels like having a specific goal to achieve by the end of everyday. I also think that with the help from the feedback that we got from our target audience we were able to fulfill what our audience wanted and produce a really intriguing teaser trailer that entices our audience to want to see our full film.
How did you use new technologies in the research and planning, construction and evaluation stages?
In the research and planning we created a blog instead of keeping sheets of paper and writing endless notes that would probably get lost, so the use of the blog was so much easier knowing that I could always access my work from both the school and at home and that all I had to do was type up my information and then post the blog, I did have some trouble trying to organise by blog so that all the research came first, then planning, then construction as the blog is laid out so that you have to start from the bottom of the page and work your way to the top which had me really confused and I had to create quite a few new blogs as I wasn't happy with the order. Although the blog was tricky at first I did eventually get the hang of it I was really enjoying using it as I found out lots of new things, for example Lyndsay found out how we could link each others blogs together, so when ever Lyndsay did something and I mentioned her name I was able to link it to the exact post on her own blog, this became very efficient throughout the stages of my blog and helped us to see what each other was doing and if we needed to refer to each others posts. In the construction of our trailer I got familiar with the video camera which I had not used before and was worried that it was going to be complex to use but was very surprised that it was really simple to use and that I didn't even need to use the instructions which was very handy as they were in a different language. The video camera was really easy to handle and use, I was really getting the hang of it after shooting some rough footage.
Although I didn't do the editing I did end up using the programme Adobe Premiere, (which Lyndsay used to edit our footage) as part of my research on horror, I created a presentation on the history of horror and when I saw Lyndsay also use Adobe Premiere for her presentation I also used it to help with my skills as it was a programme I had never used before and at first I found it really difficult but then after watching Lyndsay get the hang of using the programme I then found it a lot more easier.
I also used Adobe Elements 3.0 as I got really creative after Lyndsay had designed the posters to go with our teaser trailer, I edited the posters onto bus stops and also on the side of the bus to see what our poster would look like if our film was to be made. I have already used Adobe Elements 3.0 as I also study photography and I have become very familiar and my skills have developed a lot as I have been able to use it in more than one subject.
In conclusion I have learnt how to create and use a blog and also Adobe Premier which has been beneficial for my research and planning, construction and evaluation stages as I have developed new skills and also an understanding of how to keep my coursework electronically rather than hand written, and also I have learnt how to present my work more efficiently, I did originally use normal Microsoft Power Point to create my presentation of the history of horror, but then I adapted it by using Adobe Premiere as I was able to use my new found knowledge to make my presentation more advanced and I then was able to upload by presentation onto my blog which was another skill I was able to use.
