Evaluation...

The objective of our coursework was to produce a film trailer, film poster and a film magazine front cover. These are all parts of a campaign to help sell a film. Before producing our media products we researched into existing film trailers, posters and magazine covers, we did this to see what conventions they used and how we can use them.

In what ways does you media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Our film trailer illustrates many of the conventions used in existing film trailers. Our first shot is of the legal age restriction but states that the following footage is suitable for all ages, this allows our film trailer to be seen by anyone, widening the audience of our film.
We have then created our own production logo, this adds a touch of professionalism and makes the film trailer look more realistic. We have then faded that shot to black to start our film trailer along with the start of the music.
When researching the film trailers, a key convention that is used alot is the pace. The beginning of all film trailers start off slow this builds up tension to the film trailer, then there is a change in the music and shots are edited fast together. The fast pace in the middle of the film trailer adds action, thrill and tension. Then at the end of the trailer the pace of the music is either slowed down or the trailer ends on a high note keeping the momentum of the trailer.
When analysing other film trailer we realised that they did not follow in a chronological sequence within the film. This is so they are not giving away too much of the film, just snippets that will catch the audiences attention and want them to go and see the film.
In our media lessons we learnt about different theorists and we decided to use Todorov's theory of disrupted Equilibrium...
The 5 Stage pattern structure of the plot:
1. State of Equilibrium - happy families, mum and daughter in the park.
2. Disruption of Equilibrium - Daughter is taken, we have decided not to show this in our trailer as we feel that this would give too much away. It also teases the audience and helps convince them to go and see the film.
3. Recognition of disruption - Mum finds her daughter missing.
4. Attempt to repair Equilibrium - The hunt for the daughter begins
5. Equilibrium is restored - The daughter is found? The truth is revealed.

Whilst looking at film trailers we noticed that when the shots are mixed together it gives off a good effect and when one person is looking for the other person and you can see the shot match shot it looks good. We have used this convention when the hunt for the daughter begins... We have edited together the shots  of the daughter being taken by the mystery man, the daughter looking for her Mum with the shot sequence of the mum searching for her daughter. There are many clever shot matches that link with each, for example the close up of the daughters face followed by the close up of the mums face, this two shots have been edited together so the transition crosses over, so you get an image of both faces at one time. Then when the mum runs up to another mum and daughter thinking it's her daughter matches with her daughter with the mystery man walking. And then another shot match shot is the spinning of the girl and then the spinning of the mum, this shot match shot has worked extremely well.

After researching many film magazine front covers, we realised that the main image had to be powerful. The main image is normally of one or more of the main characters and is a mid-shot, showing the key expression on their face relating to the film. For our magazine front cover, we used a shot of the mum looking upset and worried, this relates well the film as her daughter is missing and this would be anyones genuine expression.

The film poster needs one strong image that sums the film up but at the same time doesn't give too much away. Our film poster is a shot of the girl walking away holding hands with someone not known. The darkness and the shadows of the photo creates a spooky atmosphere.

Lastly another convention that is used in the campaign is that the same font is used on all products, this groups the different forms of advertising together and when you see one form of media advertising the film you can relate it to the film by the text. For example everyone knows the font for James Bond and the iconic "007" logo with the gun as the 7. So in our campaign we have followed this convention and used the same font in the film trailer and on the film poster.

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
To help reassure the Film company that the film is going to be a success, they need to create a hype about the film. To do this they need to advertise the film by posters, appearing in magazines, TV trailers, interviews on TV, billboards and many more.
The main part of our campaign was the film trailer and then with 2 forms of ancillary texts; a film poster and our film on the front of a film magazine.
A good way to link the film together was to use the same characters throughout, this was so if people saw the trailer and then saw the poster they would know who the girl was and then the same with the magazine cover. Even though we have used different people on the magazine and the poster, you know its linked by watching the film trailer.
Another way in which we have created a good effect for our products is by using the same font in all products. This collates the products together and helps the audience recognise the different forms of texts linking together. This gives the products a professional look and makes it clear that the three texts link together.
To promote our film trailer and campaign I have learnt that it is key that the actors can portray they right emotion and pull off the effect we are after. Locations is important but in our film we wanted to use an area that would be common to people but then to have the twist through the story line. So people would look at the location and feel that it would be all safe but its what hides underneath and the lies that are revealed that gives the story an edge. The camera work and editing relates to the genre, by looking at other horror film trailers, we noticed that it starts off slow with slow, eerie edited shots to then fast edited shots and with the shots flashing one after another to create an atmosphere and make the audience feel on edge.
If the film trailer was going to go into distribution we would have the trailer shown in cinemas about 3-4 weeks before the film is released. This allows time for the film to create a hype so that when the film is released the film will be a success. There would be a trailer on TV shown between 8-11pm as this is the time that our expect our target audience would be watching TV.


What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
During preproduction each member of our group posted a poll on their blogs so we could find out what our audience wanted from our product. By having a poll on our blog this allowed us to get our results immediately instead of waiting for people to hand our questionnaires back to us. On deciding what our polls would be about we all took a different area to do a question about; so either costume, locations, plots, etc. 
We then showed our target audience our film trailer, the majority of the group liked our film trailer but they did say a few points that we would look into to improve it if we could.
The main points that they said we could improve was the music, the music was a difficult process. To be able to find the right music that matched perfectly was a struggle. In the end we just went with one that sounded the best out of the hundreds we had listened too. In industry this would not be the case, we would have someone on our team who would compose the music, so the music matched the film trailer exactly.
Another point that they said we could improve was the fact that you don't see how the girl gets kidnapped, we decided not to show this as it keeps the audience guessing. We used our copy's to reveal what was happening in the story, but maybe a shot of the girl actually being taken could have worked well.
We used our negative feedback as constructive feedback and if we could improve our film trailers we would use their feedback.
But our positive feedback was encouraging as well, they stated that they liked how the music changes from the slow paced to the fast paced at the beginning, they said that it works well with the shots. Another point that they liked was the shot transition of the young girl spinning with the mum spinning at the end, they thought that it was a good way to end the film trailer.


How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
To help us with our research, planning and production we used a wide range of different technologies. We used old knowledge and skills along with learning new skills in order to use these different technologies.

Firstly we used Blogger as the hub of our coursework, we used the blog to show our research, planning and production. The blog was easy to use as it is easily accessible and simple to do. The blog allowed us to do online polls, link videos from youtube, upload photos and also if we wanted to change anything we could do it easily.

We then used Youtube to research our ideas, we used youtube to look up existing film trailers. We then analysed them and looked at the conventions they used. By having our work all on the internet it made it easier to use the embed codes and to be able to copy and paste onto our blog. 


Google was used to research films and our ideas, we googled theorists and existing film trailers and campaigns. we used google images to look at the film posters and magazine front covers.

We used Photoshop to produce our film poster and magazine front cover. We had already used photoshop in our preliminary tasks and our AS Media course, this made it easier for us to use as we already knew how to work Photoshop. We already had the skills for using photoshop so when compiling our products together it was done easily. Also in our AS Media we did a magazine front cover so the conventions that are used we already knew how to do it. We were able to adapt the images and give the images and font certain effects. This process could have been done by anyone of us, as we all understood the programme.

Lastly we used Premier Pro to construct our film trailer, prior to using premier pro we had used iMovie to construct our chase sequence. Even though it was using a different programme, we understood the rules of cutting and editing shots together, continuity was a main issue we had to deal with when editing our trailer together. By using premier pro it allowed us to create many effects on the shots and on the transitions of the shots.  It was a difficult software to use but after practising using it and trying out different ideas, we became to grips with it. I think that we used premier pro on a medium to basic level, as we didn't understand how to use the software fully. If we were to learn how to use premier pro properly, i think this could add so many effects in to make our film trailer look more professional.

We used a website called Free Play Music, which we could download and use. We used this website to search through the hundreds of different categories in order for us to find a matching soundtrack for our trailer. This was a very time consuming process but it was effective as the music had descriptions about them so it was easier for us when deciding what music to choose. Also when downloading the music, you could download a sampler of the music which made it quicker and easier to listen to the music.


Conclusion
When we were told we were working in groups we thought this would make it easier to complete the set task given, but even after the first meeting of deciding what to do, we realised it would be a struggle as people had different ideas and points of views. The way we solved this was to all come up with individual ideas and then to voice our ideas across and come up with something that included everyones idea. Another negative of working in a group was that when we were filming people were busy at different times, this limited when we could film. To overcome this we planned in advance and said keep this day free as we will be filming, this really worked and we stuck to it. On the other hand the good thing about working in groups was that we got a range of ideas and it allowed your ideas to be thought of outside the box. You could come up with something and then mix it with someone else's idea which would make the idea better, and as they say two heads are better than one, we had four heads so it allowed us to get the most out of our ideas.
Next time if we could improve our products, I think our main aim would be the music. We would spend longer in finding the right music that matched our genre exactly. The music we have at the moment is okay but it's not shouting out horror it's more action themed. We found the music a hard task to do as we had to use free unlegalised music, rather than using a song.
Also to improve some of our shots, the shot quality is quite bad due to the lighting, so if we could improve this, we would use a better camera and lighting would need to be considered.
Overall I think we worked well as a team in some areas but others could really be improved. I am pleased with the work we have produced but obviously if i could go back there would so much i would change. But on the whole i feel that the shots we have got and the way they have been edited together are our strong points.