Evaluation Question 4: How did you use media technologies in the construction, research and planning and evaluation stages?

Evaluation Question 3: What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Our target audience is 16-25 year olds; we showed our trailer to a group of people who belong in this category in order to get feedback from them, so we would know what we could have done better.

The feedback we received was largely positive as the audience thought it was a successful trailer. Improvements that were suggested were: to make the trailer clearer as it was unfocussed at some times and to add dialogue into the trailer so that the characters’ emotions are more clearly conveyed and able to understand. We also agreed with this feedback however, we could not make the improvements as we didn’t have the equipment; we would make the trailer clearer, so it looks more professional, by using a HD/professional camera if we had the means to do this. Additionally, we didn’t have boom mics so we couldn’t add speech as it would be difficult to hear as well as drowned out by the soundtrack. Other suggestions for improvements were to add more blood and make it look more realistic; we used fake blood in our trailer, but we learned that we could have used a better quality of it or make our own to create effective looking blood. Also, a suggestion was made about the sound effects near the end of the trailer and that it was too much as it was used close together.

From the feedback we received, we learned that we could have made our trailer look more professional by using a better camera and making the blood more realistic, though the slasher sub-genre was conveyed clearly. We also learned that dialogue would have improved the trailer as we relied heavily on the soundtrack, to convey the characters feelings and the narrative.

Evaluation Question 2: How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

Evaluation Question 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

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Final Magazine Cover

After recieving feedback on the previous drafts of my magazine cover, I kept the same close up image but changed the colours to make my magazine cover look more professional. I have kept the marketing consistent on my magazine cover by using the same font and style for the title.

Final Poster

I added a website and facebook link at the bottom of my poster as most film posters do this and so that people can go on the websites and give feedback on the trailer. I edited the image at the bottom after receiving feedback; people thought the spotlight effect was too bright and that more of the character's head should be seen.

The Last Laugh Final Trailer

 

Trailer uploaded on YouTube

 

We uploaded our trailer onto YouTube because as it is a public website, anyone can view it and this allows us to get feedback from our intended audience.

Sound

We looked at existing slasher horror trailers in order to get an idea of the kind of soundtracks used for that sub-genre. We looked at trailers such as Texas Chainsaw Massacre and SAW as well as other soundtracks and decided to create our own soundtrack.We had two soundtracks and so asked our target audience and teachers which they thought worked best for our trailer. We decided that a combination of the two was a good idea and so, we added one of the soundtracks with a bit of the second one, to our trailer to reflect our narrative well.

Shooting the trailer

Magazine Cover final draft

From the feedback I recieved I decided to try out different colours for my magazine cover, but I felt that it didn't reflect the horror genre well and looked more like it was for an action film. I kept the marketing consistent by using the same font for the film title but as the colours are different, I felt that it didn't fit with the branding on my poster and in the trailer. I incorporated more characteristics of Empire magazine, such as the plain banner across the top rather than the ripped effect but, when classmates and group members, who are in my target audience, provided feedback, they thought the rip effect looked more attractive and professional.

Magazine cover third and fourth drafts

I tried out different layouts for my magazine cover so that I could choose which I though would look best and most professional. I used the same main image but cropped and resized it so that I could see what a close up of half the face wold look like, or if a close up of the whole face looked better. I realised that the half face background made the magazine look more like a music magazine than a film magazine and so, decided to go with the full face.

Magaine cover first and second drafts

For my magazine covers, I used Empire magazine as a guide because it is a popular film magazine.

Movie poster second and third drafts

As the landscape posters didn't work out, I decided to go with the portrait poster instead. I decided to base my poster on the Blair Witch Project movie poster as I liked the use of light effects in that poster and wanted to re-create them myself so that the poster had the same ambiguous effect. Whereas in the Blair Witch poster, the image of the female character shows her looking directly into the camera, I decided to use an image of one of our female characters already dead and looking away from the camera slightly to make it more intriguing for my audience.

 

I decided I didn't want the movie title to be red because, though it's connotations are fear, blood etc... I felt it was over used and that a grey colour would be more appropriate for our movie. Also, the grey colour fit better with the rest of the poster as both the images I used have muted colours rather than vibrant colours. I did this because I didn't want my poster to be too gory and have an ominous tone.

(The Blair Witch Project movie poster)

Movie poster first drafts

 

When I started making my movie poster, I decided to try out a landscape poster rather than a conventional portrait one because, I thought the image I wanted to use would look better like this and portray the effect of horror which I wanted. However, as I tried out effects on it and started adding text, I encountered problems; I found that the movie title would have to go in one of the corners as it would cover the image if I placed it in the center. I realised that I couldn't put a tagline on the poster without it looking cramped and that I didn't have anywhere to put expert witnesses as it would interfere with the image.

I decided to stick with the conventional portrait movie poster instead.

Facebook and Twitter Poster/Pages

 

Facebook Page

 

Twitter Page

We created Facebook and Twitter accounts for the trailer as they are the largest social netwroking sites at the moment and so that we could get feedback from our target audience, who use these websites. We made this poster to put up on the pages as it isn't too explicit and can be viewed by the public, but kept the marketing similar.

Magazine Covers and Posters Research

Covers and posters

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