At the beginning of my project, I created a questionnaire that 20 people answered for me, to help plan my project. (HERE)
Here are the results that were subjected around my ancillary tasks (film magazine front cover and film poster).
11. Most people are interested in buying a magazine just for the story on the front, so I will have to make sure my magazine front cover is engaging for audiences.
12. Even more people would actually buy a magazine if it starred a character or actor from a film they are interested in. This will help me when planning what to feature on my magazine front cover.
13. From this question I found that posters are still as important when promoting a film, so I will have to ensure that the poster aims to sell the film just like the trailer.
14. Half of my audience said that a character or icon from the film needs to be featured on a poster to make them want to see it or take an interest in the film. While a quarter say that a still image from a scene takes their interest. The actual film title or actors wasn’t such a big factor, according to my questionnaire results, so I will need to take more consideration when creating my poster to use a scene or icons.
The production company of a film is featured within the trailer for that said film. Depending on how big the film, a film can have a few different production companies and companies who represent the film, or if it is a smaller, more arty independent film there might only be one production company or sometimes even no production company if the creator has no sponsors.
Looking at existing film production companies titles in trailers, I wanted to see what they all had similar.
Black Swan trailer:
The Machinst trailer:
Donnie Darko trailer:
The trailer logos are relatively short in time (compared to their logo at the beginning of films examples are here, here and here), so I need to make sure mine is quite short in time too.
They don't include music, which is different to when they are used at the beginning of films, so they are either mute or have ambient sounds from the trailer or non-deigetic music over them, so they are part of the trailer and only a quick glance to the promoters.
They are shown near the beginning of the film trailers, but not always at the very beginning. Sometimes, a few scenes are scene as a 'cold opening' in a way, because they reveal some of the plot and introduce audiences to characters.
For example the trailer for Black Swan showed their production company at the very beginning, whereas Donnie Darko and The Machinist had a few scenes before to act as the cold open.
My production company must appear in the same way, by being short in time, mute, clearly showing who the promoter is as well as appearing near the beginning of the trailer or a bit after a few scenes.
Creating my own company:
I liked the idea of having '_____ productions' as my company, so I had to think of names that would work. I wanted a name which could be used for a person, instead of a physical object of thing. One of my favourite books is Catcher In The Rye and I like the named Holden Caulfield, and therefore thought 'Caulfield Productions' worked nicely. This is similarly to Walt Disney productions, Tyler Perry studios and The Weinstein Company as they are all named after people.
Caulfield also works because it does not necessarily have to be a person's name, and it works similarly to 20th Century Fox, DreamWorks and Columbia Pictures.
For my production company, I used the different techniques and keypoints within Final Cut Pro to create my own film visual jingle for the middle of my trailer. It will be featured after the 'cold opening' scene of my trailer, which appears first for audiences to become intrigued. I used a dark red background for my production company, because the film's that my company produce are recognised as being thrillers and quite dark, narrative heavy films. The theme of red also relates to my film trailer.
Looking at existing production company's of my inspiration psychological films I had to research what type of film's my company will produce and distribute.
Black Swan: Fox Searchlight Pictures and Crosscreek Pictures
Fox Searchlight Pictures began in 1994 and is a division of 20th Century Fox. Film's produced under this divison are usually independent or British films, as well as dramegdy's and horrors. The company is also known for releasing non-english speaking films. Fox Searchlight have a huge part in the production of their films as well as the distribution.
Donnie Darko: 20th Century Fox
20th Century Fox is one of the biggest American studios (2011), which release not only film, but TV shows too. It is part of the huge conglomorant of News Corporation Company (which is featured at the bottom of the logo)
They are well known for relasing huge franchise films as well as producing smaller films here and there. 20th Century Fox will usually buy a film after it has been made to distribute it, if they believe that the film will become a sucess.
The Machinst: Paramount Classics
Paramount Classics is a division of Paramount productions (as seen within the background of the logo underneath, as it fits in with the classic logo for Paramount). Viacom is the parent company of many different divisions such as Paramound and Paramount Classics. Now, Paramount Classics are renamed to Paramount Vantage.
When first launched in 1998, they were most known for their art house films as their parent company would deal with the more mainstream releases. Then in 2006, when the company name was changed (and previous owners fired) the company PAramont Vantage have stated on their site that they are a distributor of '"smaller, review-driven films including foreign-language acquisitions and documentaries."
Caulfield Productions will release films that are dark, psychological but also quite arty. It will be a well known production company for these genres of films, such as psychological thriller, thrillers, crime and action films too.
In recent years, film trailers releases have been premiered online as big releases which have gathered a following generate quite a bit of buzz when films are released. At the beginning of the film trailers, a green screen from the Motion Picture Assosication of America (MPAA) shows who the trailer has been appropiately rated for. Because America is one of the biggest countries to produce english language spoken films, the MPAA dominates the release of most films.
From the official site: http://www.mpaa.org/ratings/how-to-read-a-rating the MPAA explain how to read their ratings and how each of their ratings mean. Trailers are rated seperately to their films, so some trailers may have a lower rating than their film because of the content within it, therefore it can be shown at cinemas in conjunction with the film being screened ratings as well as the regulations for showing trailers on television.
Green Band trailers are usually approved for most audiences with the exception being children have to be accompanied by an adult.
Red Band trailers are for mature audiences, as they may show sexual content, strong violence or horror.
As my trailer is meant to be a professional trailer, I am going to follow how other trailers are created. Therefore, I am going to be using the MPAA green screen at the beginning of my film trailer.
