Evaluation

The option I chose for my Year 13 Media coursework was to make and produce a film trailer with two ancillary tasks. The two tasks I chose was a film poster and a magazine front cover featuring the film. I chose this particular ancillary task as I am familar with making magazines, but by choosing the trailer, I wanted to set myself a challenge within this task.
I started by planning for my trailer to be of a horror trailer and my target audience to be over 18's. The audience for my trailer will have to be interested in action-packed movies with a lot of intensity.

The first thing I started to work on was the script and the storyboard for the movie. By doing this first, it would widen my perspective on the way my trailer is going to look and what atmosphere it would bring. I drew the storyboard first to give me a mental image of what to work with. By drawing the storybaord first, I could then write an ideal script to use and follow when making the trailer. I did follow this plan and by doing this it allowed me make appropriate changes to the storyboard to improve the narrative. Once I had finalised the storyboard and script, it then allowed to move on with my ancillary tasks.

The first ancillary task I has produced was the movie poster. Due to making the script and the storyboard first, it allowed to see what type of image would be appropriately themed. I decided that the main iconic character should be feautured on the front of the poster, although I did want to leave an idea of mystery behind it. The first plan I came up with was to draw out some mock-ups for my poster. I did this by hand.
The first idea was to have the main character dressed in dark clothing, posing a very dominant look to the audience. However, I then thought that this picture would look much better on the front cover of the magazine. When a movie comes out, the poster is supposed to act as a teaser to the audience to make them interested in going to see it. After the movie has been released, it is then featured on a magazine where the characters are more recognizable. This is when I decided that the face of the main character should not be featured on the poster.

I started to make the poster by taking shots of myself posed in the iconic mask that the main character will be wearing. I used a tripod and a HD camera of my own to take this image. I then uploaded this image on Photoshop CS3 and edited my photo to make it look a lot more dark and mysterious. I used a lot of different filters and layers on the image to create the right effect I was looking for. I edited the photo to look very dark, so much so that the only part of the image that the audience could see was a hand holding the mask loosely. Due to nothing else being in the image, I knew that it already started to raise questions as, you cannot see who or why the person is holding the mask. When the photo was edited and completed, I then decided to look at other posters to see how they are produced professionally. Once doing some research on other posters of the same genre; I knew what features on the poster I could add. The first being the title of the film. I knew that the title had to stand out from the rest of the font featured. In order to successfully acheive this, I had to use a wind effect on the writing, to make this recognizbale to the audience. The style of the writing I created did suit the thiller genre, as the writing was mysterious just like the narrative of the movie. After this I completeed, naming the main actors and actresses in the movie along with a slogan that can be associated with the narrative of the movie which can also be used on radio advertisements, posters, banners and television.

After making the first ancillary task, I then proceeded to make the magazine front cover. The same procedure was used for this project as it was on the poster. First of all, I did research into other film magazines that feature the genre I am working with. After doing this, I work on my mock-ups which I had an idea for already. I then proceeded to take the appropriate pictures for my magazine which I also edited on Photoshop CS3. I wanted to create the same dark effect as I had made on the poster so that the same theme would run throughout both. I used the same font on the magazine as used on the poster so that both would be recognizable from the movie. After creating both items, I conducted a survey between 20 people based on their opinions of both the ancillary tasks. After taking the positive criticism, I then made minor adjustments to both and then proceeded to make my film trailer.

Due to me having all the neccessary work done, I could make trailer with ease. I had made my location accessible along with planning the costume and scenic props. I had found myself an actress to suit the genre and had tested to see whether she could play the appropirate part. Once all these details based on the trailer were finalised; I then began filming with the HD camera's. All the filming was planned so that I had enough footage to edit.
The filming was very successful and it was then time to edit on Final Cut Express Pro. At first, the editing was a little challenging but after picking up the skills fairly quickly, I managed to complete my trailer within the required time.

After completing my trailer, I also showed and surveyed the product to the same people as before to get their opinions. Although I completed my trailer fairly quickly, I did not have much negative criticism and nothing needed to be changed. I was very happy with the success of my trailer and ancilary tasks. I had put a lot of effort and planning into each product and so the work was easier to do than I once thought. The target audience and genre for the movie did change once I was in the process of making the products. The genre changed from a horror to a thriller.

I wouldn't change any large details about my products except to maybe add some more interesting effects the trailer; a little more use of creativity. I am happy with the positive reviews I had on my products and I am happy that I could complete them all in a short space of time due to me having complications with my project at the start.