Evaluation

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

For my coursework all three separate areas of my coursework task, my trailer, my website and my poster developed, challenged and used all of the conventions of real media products.

My teaser trailer did this in a number of different ways, the timing of my teaser trailer challenges the normal conventions, as a teaser trailer typically lasts around 60 to 90 seconds; mine however is shorter and lasts 32 seconds. The reason for my decision to challenge the 'normal' timings is because I believe that our trailer is substantial enough to full fill what we originally wanted to achieve, which is a trailer that will attract an audience, generate hype and make people want to see the film. I believe that by creating a 32 second trailer will not bore an audience when they see it and it will in fact entice them to see the film. Our teaser trailer does in fact "tease" an audience and shows everything that we wanted it to show without revealing the whole storyline. However, it does establish the storyline of the film, just enough so that people can understand what is happening and are not confused.
My teaser trailer used the normal conventions of informing an audience with information relating to the film. It shows an audience that the film is "coming soon" and tells them the production institution "CBMA Productions". We chose to place the institution at the beginning of the trailer and the added information at the end, developing the conventions and adding a different twist on to what normally happens with most trailers, as this is what normally occurs in a full length trailer and not in a teaser trailer.
My trailer uses the convention of establishing characters and showing a brief insight into character profiles. This is important as an audience relate to characters and so if they do not see them then they will not be interested in seeing the film and watching their story continue. In our trailer an audience can sympathise with Helen the mother, as she has lost her child and is grieving because of this loss. Sorrow and despair often attract people to see films, as an audience feels sorry for a character and want to see what happens to them. In our trailer we have tried to briefly introduce the characters without revealing too much about them, this allows a brief opportunity for an audience to identify with them.
In our trailer we tried to stick to the stereotypical conventions of a horror genre trailer, as this is what people identify horror to be like, we did this through the types of colour we used. We used darkness in our scenes and shadows to try and imitate the normal "scary" feel of a horror film. We also used dark, mysterious music with a heavy baseline in order to incorporate a horror aspect into our music, I think that our music works extremely well with our trailer and adds to the "scary" feel of the trailer. We also used text on the screen which is normally used in some trailers and acts as a guide to the story and explains what is occurring.
We tried to use a conventional horror film setting, which in our case is a big old house; this created the scary ambiance we wished to create. We also shot the driving scene at night and on an abandoned road again adding to the whole ambiance we wished to create.
The main props we used in the trailer was a knife as the murder weapon, this has been used in horror films gone before ours e.g. scream; however in our case we challenged the norm by using a young girl as our villain, as stereotypically young girls are sweet and innocent.

My poster also challenges, develops and uses the conventions found on "real" media products.
On my poster I have included a main image, which is the most dominate thing on the poster and will attract the most attention. I have challenged the norm of using a picture as I have manipulated my image and have not used a still from the actual film like many posters do. I believe that my image is extremely effective and creates enigma codes as to how it relates to the film, however it is a very scary image and this ties it to the horror genre. Just like a real film poster I have used bold, attractive writing revealing the title; this will attract people and also advertises the film clearly which is the main job of the poster. Challenging the normal conventions I chose not to include the actors names boldly on the poster, I did this as I thought that the names of my actors were irrelevant as they are not known and normally the reason promoters put the actors names on the poster is to attract their individual fan base to go and watch the film.

My website uses a lot of the forms and conventions of "real" media products and so I have challenged, developed and used a lot of them. Firstly there is the inclusion of the film trailer on the website, this has been put on the homepage and it is the first thing people will see when they go to our website, a lot of websites do this and it is a very effective way of marketing a film and reaching a bigger audience, as the Internet is the most used source of information in the world. By using this convention I too am attracting a bigger audience and broadening the amount of people being reached. On my website I decided to develop the use of different pages and create a range so that there is something for everyone. This includes, a gallery of pictures, film synopsis and character profiles, and a merchandise page. For my website I have also continued the stereotypical horror colour scheme of red and black domination, however we changed it slightly on our website to give it more of a dated feel, as this adds to the mystery of the film.

I think that all of my products successfully develop, challenge and use the traditional conventions of "real" media products.

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

Both the two ancillary texts and my main product combine extremely effectively in order to make a successful over all product. All of the tasks compliment each other nicely, the ways in which they do this is, both the poster and website include elements of the trailer, the website having the full trailer displayed on its home page and the poster having an image from the trailer used as its dominant image. Also to link the tasks I have used the same colour scheme, especially for the poster and website, the dominate colours of black and red come through, on the text and the backgrounds of the text. The colour scheme also extends to the trailer, through the red text, the black flashes and the darkness created through filming, all adding to the "scary" elements of our horror genre.
The pictures used over all of the products also link them together, the picture used for the poster is a manipulated version of a picture used on the website, and the website picture is used as one of the flashes of the doll during the trailer.
An obvious link making the combination of the tasks effective is the title. This is used quite clearly across all of the products, and only varies slightly with text style on the poster and website. However the colour is the same on all of the products. As well as the title the production logo also appears on all of the products except the poster, as I did not feel that the actual logo itself was suited to my poster.
The main prop; being the China doll, is used in and on all of the products, it is used as the main image on the ancillary texts, however in the main task it was not used as much as would have been liked. However if we were to re-do our tasks this would be changed and the China doll would play a much bigger role in the same, making a clear inter textual link.

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Throughout this task I have established that the audience play a key role in everything that I would produce, as I am in fact producing it for them, and so if they do not like it, then the products are not valid and should be changed until the audience do like them.
While completing these tasks I have had to correspond with my audience often in order to gain regular audience feedback, I used primary and secondary methods of gaining information. I also used the triangle of dependency, where the audience, institution and text all influence each other. In my case the audience definitely influenced the type of product and genre of product I created. I asked friends what they would prefer and by doing this I generated the idea, that a horror based teaser trailer would in fact generate the largest audience. The institution will influence the audience due to society and changes in society, and the text will influence influence the audience, as some of the scenes may not be to everyone's taste and so they may choose not to watch it, as they may find the fact that we portray a young child as a killer disturbing, on the other hand they may sympathise with the scenes.
I undertook 2 main types of primary research to find out audience feedback, questionnaires and a focus group. By using primary research I directly found out information from my audience and was able to manipulate my products to what they particularly wanted. Another type of primary research i undertook was focus group, this allowed my target audience to provide me with feedback on the plot of my film and suggested alternatives in order to make it more attractive to an audience.
I also undertook secondary research by looking at the codes and conventions included in horror films and trailers. I tried to follow the majority of the codes and conventions as this is what people expect to see. I followed most through all of my project; however some had to be changed due to personal taste and practicability. The spiral effect is very effective when using feedback, as it is continuous feedback which leads to the continuous corrections of the product. Applying the spiral effect is a good way of communicating with an audience and to make them feel involved; it will also ensure that the text will meet the requirements and expectations of the target audience, therefore creating a successful media text.

How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

IT in today's society is massive and plays an extremely important role in everyday life. That it why is has played such a massive role in the construction, research and planning of my products.
In all of the stages I have used a blog to document what I have done, inform and evaluate my products. The easy use of the blog has meant it has been easy to organise my work, making it easily accessible for anyone wanting to view my work. By using blogspot.com i have been able to do this successfully, on the site I was able to edit certain things like the colour scheme to add personal touches.
In the construction of my work (the teaser trailer), I used a JVC video camera to film all of the footage i needed. I then uploaded it onto an apple mac and using the Imovie software i was able to edit extremely successfully my scenes and create a finished piece of work. When creating my logo, I used an image and then edited it using "paint" and then inserted it onto the trailer. I was also able to add songs and sound effects using the Imovie software. The software I used was extremely easy to use and I believe that our film was finished to a higher standard due to the technological advancement of the software.
I used a free website program called wix.com to create my website. It allowed me to create things from scratch, and put my personal touch on the website e.g. allowing me to upload pictures in order to create a gallery. It also allowed me to use a feature known as e-commerce, which allowed me to create a merchandise page.
To create and edit my poster I used Adobe photo shop, which is a very complicated editing suite, it took my a while to come to terms with how to use it, but i think that the quality of my picture shows that I did in fact manage to conquer that element of it. However i did struggle to import text and this aspect of it did not turn out how I would normally have things.

Filming our trailer

We filmed our trailer in one day, when at the very least 2 of us were available. We attempted to use as many camera angles and shots as possible, although this was not always possible as it would not have given us the image we wanted.
The time of day played an important role in our filming schedule, we had to make sure we arranged a time that all the actors were available, and due to prior arrangements the easiet time to do this was late afternoon/early evening. This meant that due to the time of year, darkness falls quickly and posed us with some issues. To over come this we had to use the light on the camera, which unfortunately was very weak, and also create articifial light like, lamps and touches to create enough light to shoot and get what we wanted.

Editing

Once we had finished filming and gathered all of our clips , we were able to begin editing. We used the Apple Mac to edit as it had better software and I thought this would give us a better overall finish. Some editing of certain scenes took longer than others, for example the scene with Bryony by herself walking down the landing, took 3 different types of editing. We first had to clip the scene down from 5 seconds to 0.8 seconds to gain the flashing effect we wanted, we then had to adjust the colour settings, as for some reason the camera gave our scene a orange tint. After doing this we had to insert transitions between all of Bryony's scenes to create an effective flashing effect. During editing we also added music to play alongside our trailer, this worked effectively and the beat of the music matches up with the transition changes very successfully. However a problem we suffered was getting the music to play longer than the final scene, without just finishing abruptly. I think that the editing of our trailer has been successful and if we were able to change this minor music mishap it would have been even better.
Also the quality of picture on the trailer is not as clear as I would have liked, but this is due to the camcorder not us, and if I had the software to refine this then i would have.

Analysing my website

When producing our website we had to produce a main entrance page. As well as this we decided to create several other pages.

In this section I am going to analyse the pages I created.

Firstly there is my homepage:



We used the dominance of the doll as the main image, it creates a horror Ora and add's to the scary element of the website. The dark colours create and add to the horror genre, the red text is also conventually associated with the horror genre. We also included the trailer on the homepage, this is the first thing that people will see and so it advertises the trailer extremely effectively.

The second page is the contents page:



On the contents page, we again used the doll although in this image it isn't as dominant. The name of the film is at the top of the page, I left the title out of the homepage as I didn't think it was necessary to have it there. The names of the pages are written on the spines of the books, i think this was a very clever technique and works successfully. The subtle of the page names adds to the mystery element. The common theme of red text on black is carried into this page.

The third page is the gallery.


We chose to include a gallery to give the audience a further insight into the film and give them some bonus information. The theme of red and black is continued through and also the title is again situated at the top right hand of the page. The background on this page is slightly different however, we chose to design it in the style of a lullaby, this links to our use of a young child as the main villain.

The next page I included was the character profile page,





On this page we wrote profiles on all 3 of the characters and then on the opposite page we wrote some information on them; in order to give the audience added information on the characters that might allow them to sympathise with them.

The next page is the whole page synopsis, this has the same background as the previous two pages, to create a reoccurring theme throughout the website. The use of an old style book links back to the contents page where we used a book shelf to create the image.

The final page is just an image of our institution. I chose to include this in order to inform people of who made the film and gain recognition for this. The logo is on a black background again showing the reemerging colour scheme that has been present throughout.

Logo's

In order to make our film trailer look professional we looked at the type of logo's other institutions use in order to do this.

The ones we looked at were:

This logo uses gold lettering which signifies importance and makes the institutions name stand out extremely well. The fact that the institution is set up on a podium in the sky, meaning that it is higher than either institutions and in their opinion "better". The use of spot lights surrounding the podium again enforces the importance of the institution. Normally when the logo is shown at the beginning/end of a film, a musical fanfare is played. This makes the institution even more recognisable. The scene in which the institutions name is sat, is meant to symbolise a "virtual Los Angeles" which is the main movie centre of the world.

Columbia uses the 'Torch Lady' who is draped in the American flag as their main image, clearly showing that the institution is American. This is easily recognisable and gains global recognition. The use of the sky also shows that they believe that they are better than there competitors.

MGM uses golden lettering which shows power and importance. The film tape wrapped around the lion creating a crest is also in gold once again showing the importance of this institution.

The lion represents power, strength and domination. The Latin wording around the Lion translates as 'art for arts sake'; this shows the institutions age, as Latin is rarely used nowadays and also shows that the company take their work extremely seriously and believe what they create are not just 'films' it is art. This also shows the pride they have in their work.

This logo shows the peak of a mountain with the institutions name perched at the summit; showing that the institution has reached and are staying at the 'top' of their game. The stars circling Paramount shows the importance of the institution, and the 24 of them originally represented the 24 actors that held contracts with Paramount.

Just like some of the other logo's Warner Brothers reiterates the use of the sky to show importance and to symbolise its higher up than the other institutions. They also use gold in the lettering and in the surrounding crest, representing importance and royalty. The use of a crest also shows its important prowess, as normally a crest is associated with people of extreme importance.

After assessing these logo's I gathered a general idea of what to include in mine to make it look professional. All of these logo's have gold in them which is signified as being royal and important. They also include some sort of "sky" imagery, be it cloud or mountain peaks, this signifies that they are high up in the industry and very important.

For our logo, we used a scene of London at night, as we are from London and it is a well recognised scene, as this will gain us global recognition. We also included the name of our institution so that people will automatically pair the scene with our production.

Analysis of a trailer

I looked at the film trailer for the horror film "Soroity Row" released in 2009 as this is in the same genre that my trailer will be in.

Narrative

This trailer follows Todorov's theory of narrative structure and begins with an equilibrium of a "typical" American Soroity which lasts for around 20 seconds, establishing the story and characters. Text is seen over the top of the equilibrium, hinting at what may still be to come. This entices the audience and captures there imagination, making them want to see the film. It is quickly disturbed by a murder, showing the disequilibrium of the story, more text follows moving the story along at a faster pace. Dramatic events then follow, a chain of murders and mysterious events occur showing the horror aspects of the film, and keeping the audience enticed and interested in seeing the film.

In this trailer there is no repair of the disruption that the audience sees and there is no restoration of a new equilibrium; as by revealing these the whole story would be revealed and people would not go and see the film. This is a technique used in a lot of films and is extremely effective.

The voice over at the beginning of the scene also helps people to understand the narrative of this film. It is a guide to establishing the equilibrium at the beginning.

Audience

The target audience of "Soroity Row" would be teenage and young females, and also young males, simply because of the mix of attractive females and horror. Also females enjoy the "Americanised" social films.

It has been given a BBFC rating of 15, so this automatically suggests its content is unsuitable for anyone under this age.

Sound

This film trailer uses a lot of diegetic sound, the sounds of the screaming girls shows the horror that they are facing due to their actions. The speech is extremaly americanised and uses a lot of annurisms this shows the target audience, as this normally attracts young people and teenagers.

The speech of the characters acts as a voice over throughout the trailer, I think that this is extremaly effective and gives the audience a deeper connection and in sight into the film. The speech works in tandum with the scences and is very effective.

The non-diegetic sound is the music played, it is up to date so that people can respond to it. It corresponds to what is happening in the film i.e. the party scene at the beginning.

Mise-en-scene

Setting

The film is set in a typical American town, with a close nit community and a typical high school where the action is centred around. The majority of the film is set at night; which has a scarier, more mysterious effect.

Costume, hair and make-up

The costumes of the female characters are very up to date fashion, which is typical of the teenage generation as they are extremely fashion conscious and savvy. The villains costume is a black hooded clock, concealing his or her identity. This creates a scary effect as there identity is unknown to all.

The hair and make up for all of the characters is minimalistic and simple, as the circumstance they are in has no demand for heavy make up or complicated hair styles.

Theories

Hypodermic Syringe - developed in the 1940's this theory suggests that the audience is represented as being passive and media institutions/organisations 'inject' they beliefs and views into the audience and in turn they accept this information as being the truth.

Disadvantages of applying the theory is that we cant cross reference it to the 1940's as times have changed dramatically.

This theory can be strongly applied to young children as they are the leas likely age group to question what they see, quite often in U and PG rated films, life lessons i.e. smoking is dangerous are interwoven into the film so the children are taught.

An example of when the hypodermic syringe model comes into practise is on April 1st (April fools day). the media can release a story and more often than not the audience are likely to believe what they see. As people we like to think that we are active not passive but in this instance we are not.

The hypodermic model can be applied to the film "Natural Born Killers" according to this model, if an audience sees the characters in the film getting away with their crimes and being romanticised, then the view will take the message accept it and imitate it.

An example of this in the film industry is "Fatal Desire" a movie based on the real life murder of Brian Miller and has reportedly been influenced by other murders. Another example is "clockwork orange" which was banned through fear of imitation of the violence.

The hypodermic model should not affect our trailer because we haven't created any violence that can be replicated.

Storyboard for Trailer

During our planning, we designed a storyboard that will guide us through while we are shooting our trailer. We also provided a clip by clip commentary showing, the different techniques, camera shots/positions and edits that we will use.

Pitching our film narrative

In our lesson with both teachers and the class present, as a group we pitched the beginning idea's of our horror film and what would go into the trailer, we did this in order to gain audience feedback as part of research.

We originally pitched the idea of:

At the beginning a young family are travelling, they have a car crash in which the child dies and the parents survive. Throughout the car journey the child was singing a lullaby. As the film continues the reoccurring theme would be the lullaby being heard and the dead child being seen by the parents.

After we had pitched our idea, the class and our teachers asked us questions and suggested ideas that might improve and add to our trailer further. By doing this it was good to get audience feedback, in a discussion group. This will only help us to improve our coursework further and not hinder it in any way.

Some of the suggestion were; the idea of the child just reappearing throughout the trailer and not doing anything, was weak. This made us re-think this idea and we made it more interesting, now the child is more involved and does things to its mother i.e. pushing her down the stairs, this shows the child's thirst for revenge, as her parents appear to have moved on.

Another comment that was made was that we needed something extra in the car crash seen, like a tipping point that caused the crash in the first place. From this criticism we decided that an argument between the parents would cause the crash, so then the audience would witness why the parents feel the guilt they do, as they are the reason their child died.

What is the purpose of a teaser trailer?

The purpose of a teaser trailer is to give an audience a quick glimpse into the film, they usually last around 30 seconds. They are aimed at attracting an audience and generating hype around the film and to see the audiences reaction towards the film will be and from this they can determine the films success. They usually consist of jump cuts and quick edits between the film scenes, letting the audience see some of the action and story. The trailers are often shown during a commercial break on the TV as this means a lot of people will view it. The benefits of people discussing the film in advance is that, it generates interest around the film, it also attracts media attention as, magazines, websites newspapers etc. recognise people are interested in something and do features on this, to make them buy there product.

However, some teaser trailers do not contain material from the film as they are released well in advance and so often just show the film title and release date, an example of this is the 'Davinci Code'.

I also did some research into Horror teaser trailers as this is my chosen genre to base my coursework on.
As i viewed horror trailers, all that i watched stick to Toderov's theory, however some like "Orphan" left out an ending equilibrium - this makes people want to go and see it to find out the ending. Also the use of provocative language from the narrator e.g. "you'll never guess her secret" draws people in and makes them want to go and watch it.

The audience are in constant wait of something scary about to happen, however they don't know when this will happen and so this adds to the tension, and to the "scare" factor. People watch films in order to be scared. The action doesn't happen straight away - its delayed until around 1 minute into the trailer. Some of the main story line is established before the audience is "shocked". In sequels e.g. "S.Darko" and "Ghostbusters" the same piece of music is used so people can relate back to the original.

The trailers i watched lasted around 1 to 2 minutes.
In my opinion the more effective trailers did not use a voice over; they just have a recognisable song/tune played over the top of them. Although with the use of a voice over it can help people to understand the film a bit better. Words appearing across the screen also seemed to be an effective technique.

All of the trailers have quick edits, more towards the end to release the built up tension, the pace of the music also quickens and all edits are in time with the music, the music builds up to a crescendo at the end.

Research into the Horror Genre - Looking at the marketing of Cloverfield

Cloverfield

As part of my research into the horror genre, I evaluated the film trailer for 'Cloverfield' in order to look at the marketing aspects of the trailer.

Genre: Mystery/Sci-Fi/Thriller
Release Date:1st February 2008 (UK)
18th January 2008 (USA)
23rd January 2008 (France)
Certification:15 (UK)
PG 13 (USA)
Director:Matt Reeves
Writer:Drew Goddard
Actors:Lizzy Caplin, Jessica Lucas, TJ Miller
Institution:Paramount, Bad Robot
Marketing and Promotion:Website, Trailer, Posters

Conventions of Facebook/MySpace

• Display photographs


• User information - friends, general public, advertising
  
• Privacy Settings


• Free for users


• Instant messaging


• Global Community


• Isolating activity


• Elements of blogging


• Games

Cloverfield and Myspace

Before a film is release a company normally sets up a myspace or facebook page for the characters of the film. People then log onto these profiles under the impression that they are real people. this generates publicity and hype for the film as people like and associate themselves with the characters.

Film Poster

This is the film poster for the spoof film "Shaun of the Dead". The title of the film is directly in the middle, in bold white lettering, it can be clearly seen and so this is good for promotion and advertising.

The pun at the top of the poster relates to the picture, and shows that through the use of a pun the film is in fact a spoof. The colour scheme of red and black is still typically associated with horror, however the white is not, and so this challenges the normal conventions of a horror poster.

The poster still includes all of the normal conventions like, the credits at the bottom, informing people about who is/was involved. Also underneath the title, in smaller writing is a tag line advertising the film as "a romantic comedy with zombies", this will broaden the audience, as more people may be attracted by the "romantic" element advertised; particularly woman who may not normally go and see a horror film.

After reviewing some film posters, I recognised that the majority of posters contain 10 major components these being:

1.Classification - this is there to tell the audience whether the film is suitable for them to watch. The rating will be done according to the BBFC guidelines.

2. Main Image - often a still from the film or a picture of the characters.

3. Title - the title of the film is often at the top of the poster. This is how the audience identify the film

4. Logo - sometimes appears, not always though as often it makes the poster look too crowded.

5. Tag line - entices the audience in as it often sets an enigma.

6. Release date - lets the audience know when they can see the film

7. Names of cast - happens more often with a film that has 'big names' e.g. Tom Cruise, as they are globally recognised and bring a massive fan base with them.

8. Reviews - reference from critics, often a star rating

9. Names of producers - often at the bottom of the poster

10. Previous films by the producer - there best films are often referred to and so if people liked that film then they might like the new one.

Questionnaire

As part of our planning and research we devised a semi- structured questionnaire asking 20 people between the ages of 15 and 18 as this will be the audience I intend on targeting their opinions on film genres and teaser trailers. We did this in order to find out our target audience and use this questionnaire to help guide our coursework projects in order to cater for that audience.

1.What is your sex? (this is important as it may have an influence or show a link between answers)

2. How old are you? ( Also can have an important influence on any answer given)

3.What are your favourite film genres? ( We need to know this, to see which genre's are most popular overall)

4. Why do these genres attract you ? ( knowing this we will know what to include in our trailer)

5. What do you consider when choosing a film? ( It is important to know this so that i can include their points in my products and attract an audience)

6. What is your favourite film?

7. What promotional methods attract you to a film and why? (This will help me with production)

8. Do you find trailers helpful when deciding on a film?

9. What is your preferred method of watching a film?

10. Why do you tend to watch films?

Results

* 4 out the 8 woman asked said there favourite genre was horror, alongside romance.

* 10 out of the 12 men asked favoured horror and the 2 that did not favoured action.

* When it came to why people watch films, the most popular answers were, to entertain them, to scare them, to make them laugh and cry.

*Everyone said trailers were useful when making a decision

* The most common promotional method listed was, a poster in a magazine or on a billboard

Why people watch horror films

To over come fears = people watch horror films in order to face there fears. I.e. they might watch a vampire film because they have a phobia of vampires which they want to overcome, and by watching a film on them this is how they do that.

Socialising = just like any film, people enjoy watching films together as part of socialising and being with their friends.

Adrenaline rush = horror films, scare people which releases endorphins like adrenaline, as humans we like the way this makes us feel and so by watching horror films this can happen more often.

Exploration of a taboo subject = in horror films, themes and issues that are "wrong" e.g. murder, rape, torture are explored, and in normal life situations they are not, so people watch them because they normally don't get a chance and in horror films they are "acceptable" in some kind of way. Toolbox Murders and Saw are examples of the exploration of a taboo subject.

Intrigue = after seeing an advert for a horror film, or a trailer, this usually intrigues people to watch the film, this is especially the case with horror films as people enjoy being scared.

Escapism = as horror films are not real and are usually highly exaggerated, it gives people the opportunity to escape from there real lives and experience something very different. Stardust is an example of a film that can be used for escapism.

Codes and Conventions of a Horror Film

Their are a number of codes and conventions that appear in a horror film.


Setting - generally a horror film can be set in any location. However there is a theme that runs through the setting, usually they are dark, isolated places where people would not necessarily choose to go/be, as this gives off the scary, "horror" feel of a film. In trailers i have watched examples of settings are: woods, big, old mansions and "normal" civilian houses set at night.


Props - props that are used in a horror film are: weapons, that are used to commit the crimes i.e. knifes, guns, crucifixes. Fake blood is used to show the injuries sustained by the victims and the extent of the crime. Heavy make-up i.e. face paints can be used to hide the identity of the villain an example of this is the Joker in Batman. Masks can also be used to do this.


Colours - The typical colours used in a horror film are red and black. Red is often associated with blood, death and love and black is associated with mystery, darkness, death, all of these are main themes of a horror film. These are used through, clothes of characters (usually the villain is in black or red), the setting usually contains these colours and the props.
This is a screen shot from the exorcist showing the traditional colours used in a horror film scene. Red and Black are the most dominant, and shadows are used to create a horror atmosphere.



Sound -

• diegetic = this is always used, examples of this are general speech or stereotypically in a horror film screaming.
• non diegetic = this is added post production, it is normally sounds that cant be made naturally during filming and need to be technologically enhanced. i.e. a strong heartbeat
• sound effects = sounds that cant be made naturally as they are invented. E.g. a wolf howling
• sound bridge = music or a sound that links two scenes together
• voice over = generally a narrator speaking over and through the trailer, are very popular in all kinds of trailers, especially used in American made films. A voice over explains the narrative further and adds to the whole ambiance of the trailer.

Camera -

• establishing shot = at the beginning of a scene, it sets the scene and if used at the beginning of the trailer shows the equilibrium.
• close up = this shows detail of a person, this is very important in a horror film/trailer as it shows the victims face and emotions normally when they are being killed, so this allows an audience to feel close to them. Also used when a villain is found as the close up reveals there identity.
• mid-shot = this shows general action and is the main shot used most of the time throughout a trailer
• long-shot = this shows setting and surroundings which allows an audience to feel more involved.
• POV = would mainly show the victims point of view, as the audience would mostly put themselves in their position, not that of the villain.

Themes and Narrative structure

The themes of a horror film normally include:

- death

- murder

- mind games

- torture

- supernatural goings on (ghosts/curses/zombies)

Representations of Characters

Villain - cunning, clever, strange, troubled, twisted, in control, ecentric, crazy and holds on human compassion or remorse. In a trailer of 'Batman' that I analysed the villain was the majority of these characteristics and was easily recognisable because of this.

Victim - helpless, stereotypically an attractive female, attracts danger, weak and scared

BBFC - British Board of Film Classification

The BBFC are the organisation legally responsible for classifying films in the United Kingdom. They are a private company being funded through gaining a fee, for assessing a films classification. They are not government funded.


The BBFC classify different types of films into categories depending on their suitability for an audience. We will have to take this into account. The context of the BBFC is British specific and so only applies to British films, the films are classified post-production. The significance of this is that they can assess the completed film, as if they assessed it pre/during production and it was approved, changes may occur during the production which could make it move from one band to another.
Below I have summarised the different categories and once our trailer is made we will be able to apply the appropriate rating depending on whether the film meets the criteria of a rating.

U (Universal) - suitable for everyone, ages 4 and over, positive moral framework and should offer counterbalanced arguments to issues like, violence and threat of horror.
- Natural nudity allowed
- No discrimination
- No reference to illegal drugs or misuse of drugs
- Mild horror sequences
- Very mild bad language
- Mild sexual behaviour i.e. kissing
- Treatment of problematic themes must be sensitive
- Mild violence only Examples of Universal films are: 'Ice Age' and ' Fantastic Mr Fox'

PG (Parental Guidance) - general viewing, some scenes unsuitable for younger children.
- Discriminating language is unacceptable
- Reference to drugs must be innocuous or must carry an anti drug message
- Frightening sequences shouldn't be prolonged
- No dangerous behaviour children are going to imitate
- Mild bad language only
- Natural nudity
- Sexual activity can be implied
- Moderate violence
Examples of PG rated films are: 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' and ' The Chronicles Of Narnia'

12/12A

Both include the same content, 12 is used for the buying and rental of a video work and no one under 12 can purchase it. A 12A is used at a cinema and people under 12 can only watch it unless accompanied by an adult.
- Discriminatory language or behaviour must not be endorsed by the work as a whole
- Any misuse of drugs must be infrequent and should not beglamorised or give instructional detail.
- Moderate physical or psychological threat is permitted provided they are not frequent
- Dangerous behavior should not dwell on detail which could be copied
- Moderate language is allowed, strong language must be infrequent
- Nudity is allowed, but if in a sexual context it must be brief anddiscreet
- Sexual activity is allowed but must be brief and discreet, sexual references must be suitable for young teenagers
- Mature themes are acceptable but must be suitable for young teenagers
- Moderate violence is allowed but must not dwell on detail, no emphasis on injury or blood but can show occasional gory moments are permitted

Examples of 12/12A rated films are: 'The Wedding Date' and 'Tomb Raider'

15 Suitable for 15 years and over
- The work as a whole must not endorse discriminatory language or behavior
- Drug taking is allowed but must not promote or encourage it
- Strong threat and menace are permitted sadistic or sexualised
- Dangerous behaviour should not dwell on detail that could be copied
- There may be frequent use of strong language
- Nudity is allowed in a sexual content but without strong detail, there are no constraints on nudity in a non-sexual or educational context
- Sexual detail may be portrayed without strong detail, there may be strong use of verbal references to sexual behaviour
- No theme is prohibited, but must be suitable for 15 year old
- Violence may be strong but should not dwell on the infliction of injury or pain

Examples of 15 rated films are: 'Mr and Mrs Smith' and 'Daredevil'.

18 - The BBFC, will not override the principle that adults should be free to choose their own entertainment. Except for the following conditions.
- Where material is in breach of the criminal law
- Where material or treatment appears to risk harm to individuals of through their behavior to society
- Where there are more explicit images of sexual activity which cannot be justified by context

Examples of 18 rated films are: 'Gangs of New York' and 'Green Street'.

Triangle of dependency

The triangle of dependency suggests that institution, text and audience all interlinked and influence each other in a certain way.

So: The audience influence the text as it is written for them and so it includes what they want to consume and the text influences the audience as it attracts certain viewers.

The institution influences the audience as if things change in a society they need to change to adapt to these.

Finally the institution changes there text to keep up and cater for audience wants and needs.

It is important to meet the audience's expectations when making a film/trailer, as they are the reason people make films, in order to entertain them and make them want to watch the film. People do not make films for themselves they make them for an audience who will enjoy them and will go and watch them.