Questionnaire Evaluation

Evaluation

My audiences most popular favourite genre of horror was teen, with supernatural coming second. In comparison, psychological horrors may be too complicated to understand whilst drama horrors may demand a high level of concentration too and possibly be too serious and heavy on the mind to watch. Therefore, I shall produce a teen/supernatural horror teaser trailer as the supernatural genre is very interesting, suspensful and exhilerating.

My consumers felt that they expected to see blood and weapons as conventions in horror films. This enables me to make sure my product includes popular conventions, therefore i will capture shots of weapons and blood. A very small amount of the population surveyed answered 'death', however, for a teaser trailer i do not want to give too much away so i shall not include any death sequences or shots. Also, 'witchcraft' achieved the same percentage but I quite like the idea of witchcraft so I might make it a vague storyline to catch on to in the teaser.

Famous actors/actresses were not important for a horror trailer according to statistics. My consumers stated that when the actors/actresses are unknown it makes the film seem more realistic and scary. I will use this knowledge to my advantage as my actors/actresses will be unknown.

Films rated 15 were preferred, rather than 18 films. This may be due to 15 rated films covering more of a variety of genres, 18 films seem to be narrowed down to specific genres such as graphic and violent action/horror films.

My audience were split between whether hand held camera technique is effective therefore, if i get the chance to use the technique i will but i will try not to use too much of it incase it places a distractive chaotic effect on the trailer.

On a scale of 1-5, 1 being the lowest, my audience rated the soundtrack to be of an importance at 4. This means I will need to emphasise and use the soundtrack to its advantage to make the overal trailer suspenseful and dramatic.

When I asked my audience what hooks them to watching a horror after viewing the trailer, the majority of them answered 'action', 'storyline', 'review' and 'actors/actresses'. This information will help me interest the viewers on a wider scale. I shall include reviews on the poster as teaser trailers don't usually have reviews in it, i will keep the actresses/actors i use anonymous, i will keep the storyline vague but interesting enough to pull the viewer in and i shall use a lot of action shots to capture the audience's mind.

Overall, the results have helped me greatly in making decisions about my film trailer.

Product Evaluation Questions

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

20 X Optical Zoom Sony Digital Video Camera, Tripod:

When filming our trailer, we used a 20 XOptical Zoom Sony Digital camera which we found easy to use and to hold/stand on tripod. The camera is very light and has an hand-strip enabling you to get the best camera shots you can. In our teaser trailer we used a lot of hand held camera shots. We done this to create an edgy spooky effect, as the genre of the film is horror. From using the camera hand held it gave out the feeling of someone was watching the character on screen. Even though we used a hand held camera for the majority of the time we always carried the Tripod along with us during filming, we done this in case there were any shots that we needed a still and steading shot, e.g. clock. The only times we needed to use the tripod was mostly in the non-action shots. We was happy our teaser trailer did not need a Tripod for majority of the trailer as it made the making of the trailer quicker and both the actors and the person filming could get into any position as we did not have to use space up for the Tripod.

3 X Optical Zoom Sony Digital Camera:

We used our own camera, a 10 megapixel Sony digital camera, to take the pictures of the locations, preparation of the teaser trailer and also of the actors themselves. We knew the camera captures and shoots in a high quality, and we wanted to have the pictures in the best definition that we could use. We also did not have access to the college's camera as there was not enough, but the quality of these camera wasn't as good as the ones we had at home, this was not a problem for us as we all had our own cameras. Using our own camera helped us with time as we could use them and upload pictures from home. This helped as we could spend time looking at the pictures and adding effects if we needed to. We also decided to show our storyboard draft by taking pictures of the location and adding information about what is going to happen in this location, this helped as it was quicker for us as no one in our group could draw.

Apple Mac:

To get onto blogger, and to edit and upload our trailer, we used an Apple Mac computer which I was able to go on both at college and at home as two people in the group have this computer at home. At home, we did have a problem using the macs as we did not have a programme (pages) that we used in college to do all of our analysis etc. We had to sort this out by converting all of our work from this programme to a normal word document, however we had to do this at college as it would not let us do it on our own computers, although this wasted time as we couldn't do the written work we wanted to do we started filming and this made us more determined to get the filming done.We also had problems with the internet access on the Apple Mac computers at college as it would not let us access all sites due to the college blocking them. We also came across a problem with the blogger website itself, as it wouldn't allow us to upload more than one picture at a time. Although this wasted time we got it done. For the editing of my trailer, we used Final Cut Pro which helped us create the effects we used in our trailer. Once I had logged and captured our scenes we started putting them together by using the tool pallet which allows me to cut pieces of work, When choosing our effects we tried out a few on a part of the teaser trailer thatwas getting deleted, we done this as we didn't no what was going to happen, we felt this was more safe as we was deleting it. One effect we used in our teaser trailer was altering the speed of the clip. We used this effect when the clock in our teaser speeds up. This effect added to our teaser trailer as it was showing time going by quickly the significance of the number 12 emphasizes fear as bad things always happen at this time. We felt the effects we used on Final Cut Pro were professional, and the video transitions we used helped make the scenes seem more professional as they go together better and made our trailer much more effective.

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

Analysing the three different horror trailers and three teaser trailers at the beginning of our research helped us to get some ideas of how we want our horror teaser to look once filmed. We was able to have many ideas on which footage we would like from other horror trailers. We put these clips in with our own idea of having the theme on a teenage school horror. We used the trailers effect of using short scenes and quick shots for the ending of the teaser, by having the start of our trailer with a more slow effect we believed it would get the viewers interested and then excited at the end due to the quick cuts in the clips. We decided not to use a voice over due to the fact we believed our clips were strong enough to get the message across without one, we also realised that other teaser trailers did not have a voice over either, this finalized our decision on if we should have a voice over. We wanted to keep the viewers watching our teaser interested, we done this by having dramatic shots with an interesting tag-line- life is a symptom death is a kill.

We decided to begin our trailer with a wide shot of the college, we done this as this would show the audience where some of the film would be taking place and also shows what age range this film will be about- college students (17-19). The dolly shot of the college is a slow shot compared to other shots in the teaser. We made this shot longer than others as we wanted the audience to engage in the beginning of the teaser so they would have an understanding about the teaser. We didn’t want to reveal any characters in this shot, we believed this shot should just give the understanding of the college setting.

From all of the trailers that we analysed, they had all begun with the music been quite quiet. We adapted this and made the music at the beginning of the teaser quieter than it is in the middle and end, we also felt this was appropriate as there was no horror scenes happening at this stage. Sorority Row trailer starts of with college life, this is where we got our idea of starting of with showing the college as it is showing who the target audience will be. After showing the college life in the beginning of Sorority Row it then made the up beat music louder and showed teenagers having fun at a party, after the party scene the tension starts to build up with more eery music. When the eery music starts a build up of quick shots takes place, this is a good timeto take place as people are waiting for something to happen due to the chance of the mood due to the music. We used a similar technique as we have a chance in the level of sound in the music followed by quick shots, we done this as we believed it would build up tension and excitement, also because it is a trailer we did not want to give to much away so quick shots would show events that happen throughout the film.

We turned our trailer from college scenes into a horror as a group of girls found evidence in the college library of the colleges past of when the college use to be a place where witches were burnt and are now in berried in the college grounds. As the girls found this, the spirits of the ‘witches‘ have been released and are now after the girls as they are apart of the college. After the spirits been released there are quick shots of events that take place in the film. The creates tension and fear. In the last clip in the trailer, we changed the non-diegetic sound to diegetic sound as we believed it was more realistic with the shot shown.

During the process of our research and planning, we realised that our ideas lacked in the horror originality and we didn't think we would really scare the audience with our shots. We wanted to have a jump scene at the end of our trailer to make the audience leave with the idea of an horror trailer by the end of watching our teaser. The ending shot we decided to use was a shot from Drag me to Hell, we believed this shot would be a good final shot as the fear on the girls face who is in the shot would come across to the audience. In this shot we sped it up so the shock would seem more realistic.

Jump shot from Drag me to Hell- 1:41

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUZTybLlWKI

For our poster and magazine front cover, we applied a number of different effects and techniques. Both the magazine and poster are vertical like normal magazines, we believed it was important to stick in with the trend and not to be different as we wanted people to recognize it and know what it was. In the magazine we wanted one of the girl's face to take up half of the poster for a maximum impact, we believed this worked effectively as our magazine is vertical and this meant that we could have a extreme close up of the girls face. For both the poster and magazine, we stuck by the 'typical' colours of a horror poster and magazine colour by using dark, symbolic colours such as black, dark grey, and blood red. We also used white in our poster to make the writing stand out and contrast with the black and red.

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

We felt the combination of our trailer with our poster and magazine front cover worked well together. We prefer my poster to our magazine front cover, but both symbolise the themes of my trailer and 'tease' the audience in what the overall film could be about. In our poster we have taken real life parts from our trailer and stuck the pictures in the poster, we believe this would tease the audience as it shows what the film will be about and what to expect, e.g. blood and fear.

Altogether, the poster and magazine front cover; are different parts shown of the film. The magazine front cover shows a girl who’s face is broken up, even though you do not see this in the teaser this girl is the most targeted in the teaser by the spirit as she was the one who found and read out the chant. As this girl is the most targeted she is slowly broken down throughout the film she is haunted by making one mistake, reading out the chant. The poster shows the part where the girls are in danger. We wanted to show this as we believed it captures what the film will be about and it will catch its target audience attention. We also put the disturbing pictures into a film role, we done this as we believed it was effective. We gotthis idea from the poster of ‘Sorority Row”. We felt it was effective how we showed different parts of the overall film as we wanted to evoke the audience's curiosity. We felt using variety was very important.

Above all, we knew the main way to find out whether my poster and magazine front cover were effective was to find out from my target audience. We mainly used Facebook as a way of sending two students from my college the poster and magazine front cover, and using the Facebook Chat to find out what they thought of it and any feedback/criticism they might have had.

The two shots below are about the magazine.

The two shots below are about the poster:

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

We used web 2.0 as we felt this was a very effective way of capturing our audience’s views on the products we have made. Through use of facebook networking, we asked people about our magazine and poster final products. We learnt that overall our magazine and poster have delivered the message we intended as we have received positive feedback from our audience. One person stated that the image on the magazine of the broken-faced girl adds real mystery and suspense which has taught us that imagery is just as effective in portraying a film’s storyline as much as text. We also learnt that the use of colours were well chosen and thought out as people described the effect of using the colours to be professional, realistic and refer back to the horror theme perfectly.

We even had one response claiming they thought our magazine was real for a second which could be due to our layout as they said it was good and not too busy which helps messages deliver clearly to readers.

Feedback on our poster was very positive too as someone felt that our use of reviews on it made them believe in the film more because using critics made it seem more realistic. Furthermore, another audience member commented on the tag-line, describing it as spooky and catching which taught us that we’ve successfully made the tagline do what we wanted it to do which was to stick in the audience’s heads and make them anticipate more. Also, the fact it has a spooky feel to it relates to the horror genre.

We’re really pleased with our feedback because we did thorough research on magazines and posters to make an ideal product to target the right audiences and relate to our teaser trailer and we feel that the quality of both products have lived up to this demand.

Magazine for 'Contageon'

Poster for 'Contageon'

Creating: The Newspaper Article 1890, The Chant, The Torture Pictures

The Newspaper Article 1890

We created this newspaper using Pages on the apple macs. In our film it was used during the beginning of the trailer to capture the narrative of the film and give an ambiguous idea of what the film includes. It shows that the college we filmed in, and the teenagers we followed are all victims of the past and history of the present college they attend. Spirits are around, Devil's attack them and mysterious events are encountered.

We decided to put a story on the bottom of the front cover with the date of 1890. This is a crucial point because it is immediate evidence of the past and history of which the story is based on.

The Chant

We did research on witchcraft and found that during the time of the civil world war, Matthew Hopkins is perhaps the most notorious name in the history of English witchcraft. He's believed to be responsible for the killing of around 300 women. After gathering more research, we found a poem by Samuel Butler, an early defender and critic against witchcraft (1612-1680). He was an English satirist. His most famous poem was 'Hudibras', published in three parts 1663, 1664 and 1678, and which immediately became popular for its biting satire against the Puritans. He wrote:

Hath not this present Parl’ament

A Lieger to the Devil sent,

Fully impower’d to treat about

Finding revolted Witches out?

And has he not within a year

Hang’d threescore of them in one Shire?

Some only for not being drown’d,

And some for sitting above ground.

Whole days and nights upon their Breeches,

And feeling pain, were hang’d for Witches

And some for putting knavish Tricks

Upon green Geese or Turkey Chicks

Or Pigs that suddenly deceast

Of griefs unnatural, as he guess'd

Who after proved himself a Witch

And made a rod for his own Breech.

From Samuel Butler's - Hudibras (first published in 1663).

We then improvised and changed the poem to suit our film. To make it realistic we wanted to give it an olden look which we did by dabbing a wet tea bag on it and then burning the edges.

Step 1: (Teabag Mixture)

Step 2: (Dabbing Teabag on paper)

Step 3: (Burning)

Final Product:

The Torture Pictures
We created the pictures by using uncopyrighted images through google search engine. We felt we needed to use them to show more historical background and storyline of the happenings in the past. Also, they met the horror conventions of suffering, terror, horror, mystery, evil and sinister.

We used the same techniques as above to make it look olden. The only difference is that because we were filming the college students finding the evidence in the library, we emphasised how long it had been there by scrunching it up and piling it altogether.

Poster Analysis- Paranormal Activity 2

The main colours in the poster are all dark. The deep blue looks like a night camera, this gives it a real life effect and makes it more frightening. The red text stands out against the black background. Red suggests danger and blood giving it the horror theme. It is also good that they have used such a bright colour against a dark colour as the title now stands out and people will be drawn to it. The main figure in the poster is of a dog barking at a slightly opened door and a baby standing up in his/hers cot. Although we cannot see anything at the door we know that this must be a ‘paranormal’ event taking place as we know dogs can sense spirits and abnormal events. There is also a shadow on the floor of someone standing at the door although there is nobody there. We can also see a mirror in the poster, in the mirror you can see the reflection of the dog and you can see the cot, however the baby is not in it, this could represent that something (a spirit) wants the baby. A persuasive technique on the poster is a critics review on the film, “your sleepless nights are about to return”, this statement made by a critic will persuade people to go and see the film who like horrors as they go to see horrors to get a rush of fear. “The most anticipated horror event of the year”, this quote on the poster suggests that the film is not like any other horror film out.

The information is important that is on the horror poster as it shows from a critic you are going to get scared and this is why people go to see a horror. It also says that the movie is coming soon, this shows the readers that it is not out yet but to keep looking as it will be out soon.

The poster is effective as it shows abnormal events taking place, e.g. the baby missing in the mirror, this is a type of event that people tend not to see but hear about and they want to see it. The poster communicates effectively with the audience as it states that it is coming soon and also has a critics view on the film written on the poster. The poster is not offensive in any way but it does not state a BBFC age restriction, this could give people underage a false hope to see the film.

Teaser Analysis - Paranormal Activity 2

Paranormal Activity 2 Teaser Trailer

We are told the name of the film at the end of the teaser trailer. This is done so the audience have to watch the whole of the trailer to get the name, this will make the audience either wants to see it or not as they have an understanding of what the film is to do with. We are not told any names of who is staring in the film as it has no big actors in due to the footage been from a normal family, this film is showing real footage of what is happening in the house hold. There is little text throughout the trailer as it is more visual images that get the message across to the audience. All the footage is filmed at night so the background is dark, the writing is white so it stands out to the audience. This is important as the audience have to be able to see the writing easy. We do not see any great action in the trailer as the footage is more mysterious, for example, pots moving on its own, dog barking even though there is nothing there.

The music played is footsteps, this noise makes the audience believe someone is somewhere they shouldn't be e.g. someone breaking in, this shows the film is going to be a horror as the thought of having someone in your house and you do not no is scary.

The speed stays the same throughout the teaser trailer as the footage shown is enough to keep the audience focused. The film is not an action horror, it is a horror which shows things happening in a household which is abnormal. The audience will be concentrating throughout the trailer as they will be looking for these abnormal events happening.

The information given to us shows that the audience will be scared and that they will not be expecting what is going to be shown. This makes the audience want to go and see the film as they have been told they are getting what they have paid to see, a horror.

The information about the film is given through the middle to the end of the teaser trailer. This is done so the audience do not get bored, they will be getting information to tell the audience things about the film its self and what the audience can expect. This film is aimed at people in the age range of 15-24. This is the age range that most people would go and see a horror. Also males are more likely to go and see Paranormal Activity 2. This is common in horror films as males are likely to want to go and see horror and action films rather than other genre films.