Evaluation - Question 1

In what ways does your media production use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Sabrina's Q.1

A teaser trailer is a short advertisement designed to captivate an audience to want to watch an up and coming film. It allows the audience to get a snippet of the film thus not to spoil or give away the plot. As we had to make a Teaser trailer, Magazine cover and a Movie poster we sat down and thought about what makes a good teaser trailer and incorporated those ideas into our media production. Various things we discussed where whether we were going to stick to the conventions of main characters being male as well as the ethnicity of the victims and the connotations that go along with different races in horror films amoungst other issues. There are many different conventions that are present in the horror genre. Those of the different settings used to establish were the characters are, costumes and props which convey the characters personalities and how they are represented, the way the music and sound combine with the editing to build the tension and helps to drive on the plot and storyline. The conventions of a dimly lit settings are also something that we used to meet conventions. The various colour connotations and meanings for example the colour red is a big convention and theme that we have used throughout our production which develops that of those used in real media products. Also the vari

ous different camera shots used in our project for example the use of close up’s and how they will allow used to meet conventions. All these things have been factored into our media production and are going to be explained below.

Monique's Q.1

The conventions within our film poster is relatively what the media industry is familiar with, so it's doesn't pose any challenges or develop what it already put forward in the world. Analysing film posters for our textual analysis' ensured that we had a good understanding of what makes a successful horror poster, we also established that it can vaguely be seen as one of the easier aspects in presenting a film to an audience and is definitely one which is needed to be a vital component for promotion. Film posters are found in many mundane places such as cinemas to spread the word, creating buzz around the film. As we didn't develop or challenge conventions it made it harder for us to create a which would capture viewers eyes and make them intrigued to find out more, so as we came together with drafts of possible posters, it became important for us to portray what a message would be to our audience surrounding this film.

With our caption 'What Will Happen When You Confess' we wanted our theme a never ending possible

events that can occur whilst laying down your confessions. Much like every other film poster, the film notes are located at the bottom as well as the institution name signaturing the product. The bloody hands is what is the main focus in this poster, this being our symbolic way of saying 'What you sow, you shall reap' which leaves a hidden connotation of what can possibly happen within the film making the audience more eager for more. We were also aiming to keep the killers identity more hidden which is why there is a shadows that covers most of the face and doesn't alert viewers to whom the killer specifically is. Below is a similar film poster that holds the same convention of having a

hidden side/identity towards the main character.

Similar colours are used in both of these posters, it carries the attributes of horror; Red, Black and White. Mystery prevails in all our media products which evidently allows it show good firm conventions relating to what is previously been released. Doing this has also highlighted to us that viewers will be connected to what we bring forth because of what they have already been accustomed to however is risks chances of being more unique and individual, not being repetitive in a cycle of media production. We are overall happy with what has been achieved in the poster.

Jide's Q.1

Our media front cover magazine shows understanding of conventions used of most media horror film magazines all around the world as when compared it shows similar conventions such as the use of a dark background which could be used to try and make the audience focus on a particular object or the actor/monster being shown. Our magazine is different from other magazines yet similar at the same time as with most horror magazines it shows bright coloured bold font with maybe blood drippings or something scary our magazine followed that convention the only convention our magazine may have challenged was the convention of how most horror magazines show the monster or bad guy on the front page which the audience can tell straight away that they are the evil killer yet with our film magazine we created a sense of suspense as the audience will be unable to know whether the model on our front cover is evil or is good which could lead to a larger audience being targeted as they may feel that this is not an typically deformed evil person created out of nothing killing people but could be interesting as it is showing a priest praying thus creating something new and at the same time slightly challenging a horror film magazine convention.

Leyla's Q.1

The first thing to mention about the ways in which our horror teaser trailer uses conventions of real teaser trailers is the length, its 32 seconds long and because most teaser trailers are between 30-90 seconds long, this was something we considered highly when cutting and editing. With mise en scene we tried to use, develop and challenge media conventions in different but obvious ways.


Costume and make up for example, fake blood was used as well as a latex wound, this uses conventions as these are frequently used in horror films and trailers, especially ones of the Slasher sub genre. The priest costume adds mystery which is a strong convention of many horror films, mainly ones with only one murderer.

The priest costume is unexpected because a holy man isn’t seen to be bad, so the idea someone respected like that can be a killer makes the storyline more intriguing because the audience wants to know if the priest ever get caught and/or killed, this is a frequently used convention to add suspense in a horror film. The costume we used had a cloche that covered the priest characters face, this technique is used in horror to create mystery: if the murderer isn’t seen, no one knows who it could be. The setting links into the idea of the priest character being unexpected, because its a church/confessionary, people are thought to be safe in such a place, and this being the plot of our trailer is a convention that supports how effective our trailer is as a horror trailer.

With the weapon of choice, we decided to use a weapon that was unexpected to challenge conventions. A priest using a hand drill is surprising and this can be used to intrigue the audience into watching the film because it’s another form of mystery. Although it isn’t actually seen as a weapon, the idea is portrayed with the sound of the drill noise. Props we used linked into the setting, the girl character is holding a bible at the beginning of the trailer and this works in informing the audience that the trailer has a religious storyline. W made a confessionary board that worked well as setting and as props because we were able to use it to add to the lighting. Buy holding it up over the lights with a dark orange filter across it, the idea of the confessionary being lit from behind added mystery as you never saw both the priest character and the girl character at the same time. It also worked well to create low key lighting which is a strong convention of the horror genre. NVC is used twice in very conventionally effective ways during the whole trailer: The slow walking of the girl at the beginning adds tension and the girl dying, because she doesn’t actually speak but it’s obvious she is dying. These are both examples of NVC used heavily in the horror genre.
The captions in the trailer are conventions of nearly every genre of film not just horror. The captions work as not to give away too much of the plot but to intrigue the audience into watching the film. The writing being white on a black background is a convention of horror as it links into the low key lighting and usually the colour scheme in the trailer. The font we used links into the idea of a church because of the medieval like qualities of the font. There is a misspelling of the word ‘you’re’ in the first caption in the trailer; it is spelt ‘your’. If we edited it again, this is something we would correct.

We used a blacking out when the murder took place to add mystery and show conventions of horror as this is used a lot in horror films, because you don’t see the murder taking place, it adds suspense and convinces the audience to watch the film. Non diegetic music used fits in with the setting, the music sounds holy but with a slight twist to the sound to appeal to 21st century cinema. The screaming and drill noise, added during editing, both show convention of horror genre as screaming is more that frequently used in horror films and the drill noise is the hint of the weapon that none one actually sees. The sound quality of the dialog is poor and something we would re-record and add later if we were to edit it again. The name of the film ‘SINNERS’ comes up at the end on a in white writing on a black screen, this shows convention as most films show the title at the end of the trailer and fact the word ‘SINNERS’ is moving forward the word isn’t just still also shows convention.

Sabrina's Q.1

Inclosing there are convention that we have mainly stuck to and developed rather than breaking them which in some cases is good as it will be recognizable from the genre that we are representing with our production which is horror. However we have broken them for example making a priest a killer is not something that people would expect which could cause people to complain as they may say its not reflective of the church, but that’s something that happens in some real productions. Reflecting on the teaser trailers and ancillary text that we used for our textual analysis we had to make sure that we used them effectively enabling use to complete our product to a good standard.

Update 12-1-11 (Distribution and Film Rating)

As the promotion of the teaser trailer, poster and magazine cover would be on-going for several weeks. we as an company would need to think of the distribution to cinemas, the cost of a ticket, profit etc...

A good relevant source that can help with getting the right strategy in pricing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pricing_strategies

When putting this into consideration we would need to be realistic and aim for targets that are attainable. So we as a small company would go to more cheaper cinemas because we are new, there is a tendency for people to get use to our workings with the type of flims we produce. We do not intend to con viewers with expensive pricing and the outcome of being disappointed because that would end us getting a bad name which would evidently cause a fall in all that we had done to achieve higher goals in the film.

The Licensing Act

Cinemas require a licence from the local authority in which they operate. The licence must include a condition requiring the admission of children (under 18) to any film to be restricted in accordance with the recommendations of the BBFC or the licensing authority. The objectives of the Licensing Act
are:
• the prevention of crime
and disorder
• public safety
• the prevention of public nuisance
• the protection of children
from harm.

As we chose our film rating we had to take into account of what would make our film an 18 being looking along the BBFC website to highlight the criteria that has to be issued within a film to be placed in that catagory which were

• material that is in breach of the criminal law, or has been created through the commission of a criminal offence
• material or treatment appears to the BBFC to risk harm to individuals or, through their behaviour, to society – for example, any detailed portrayal of violent or dangerous acts, or of illegal drug use, which may cause harm to public health or morals. This may include portrayals of sexual or sexualised violence which might, for example, eroticise or endorse sexual assault

We came together in the pre-production when coming up with the material that would be put in our film and we came to a conclusion that we would have a very excessive use of detailed portrayal of violent being very gory and explicit with what would be shown so that would of automatically lead us into the '18' catagory. We also believe that as our film is surrounding man-slaughter and religion which brings a lot of controversy with many different opinions with many people who will take offence or have challenges with our idea, this then highlights the morals of the criteria for this certain rating.

After the many weeks of being in the cinema and the predictable popular growth of the film, we then take it to the next level of distribution which is DVDs/Blu - Rays

We would essentially be expected to just have more focus on DVDs because of our new arrival and the short amount of funds that would be availlable to us however we think it would be more wise to have a higher focus on Blu-Ray discs. Although they are much more expensive in the use of HD, it makes more sense to have funds to make a film to be coded onto this optical disc because of the increase of sales into the purchase of Blu-Rays in the last two years.

Our ancillary texts

Above is our anchillary texts (Film Poster and Magazine Front) this is used to advance our promotion from what was previously about viral marketing to cross media promotion for billboards, magazine stands etc

Our Teaser Trailer

After spending several months in the filming process and then editing, Chaos Theory Pictures presents, 'Sinners' Teaser Trailer. This is available for streaming on websites which in the media industry would be usually to be used for viral marketing resulting in our trailer being more expandable to diverse target audiences along with our designated demographic audience.

Unmanipulated pictures

These are copy of the unedited images we took to be used for our anchillary texts

Update 10-1-11 (Costume)

When it came to selecting an acceptable costume for our 'priest' to wear. It was relatively easy, we where able to confer with priests that were available to us and ask if we may have some attire that has similarities to the image below.

Our final result was a black cloak with an all white geneva gown also known as a pulpuit robe or preaching robe and a purple stole with a gold cross embroidered on it, this completed the cleric look we were hoping to achieve and shall see the result of how effective it has been from the feedback of our media products.

Update 15-12-10

We as a group decided to do more research on religious thriller/horror looking towards the conventions within the theatrical posters and how we can either emand it towards our own poster or follow the similar ones that shows repetition for the denotations even if it conveys different connotations.


Stigmata released in 1999

In this film poster we see that the main colours are white and red, which seems to be a continuing convention for horror. The darker the better would be a plausible answer to why richer tones like maroon are used and then white is there to strike out what important information you want the audience to pay attention to. In this case that would be the title, tag line and release date, all essential components to what makes an successful horror poster.
There is also a connotation in this image combined with the tagline 'The message is here' with the person being crucified looking up towards the text, this is extremely clever and to be taken into much consideration when making the final draft of that anchillary text.