First poster attempt

When creating my poster (link here to how I created my poster), I had a few different ideas when making it. Here are some drafts of my poster:


My first idea was a image of the main character but hidden behind the mask. In the character's eye would be a reflection of the little girl from the film trailer.

After many attempts, I realised to pull off this I would need a very creative images to work together. I tried many times but thought of other ideas I could do with the photos I took in my character poster photo shoot.

Here are some other small edits I tried with my images:

I took one image and expanded on it with some editing. I created a poster and asked around in my media class what people thought.

Even before asking, I was not impressed with this poster and therefore I decided I needed to make it look darker, more intimidating and like a psychological thriller.

Here are some edits I created on photoshop. Straight away I thought I was on to something good as I liked the change in the image.

 In the second edit of it, I made sure the face was more vibrant and therefore stood out more. I like the idea of a full black background as the film will be quite dark and daunting.

I added the extra information credits and my tagline, which I was both happy with.

Then I tried different coloured text.
One White with a Red outline.

 A second just plain Red.

 And a third, red with a black outline.

I genrerated a survery where I printed out a copy of each and gave to twenty members of my target audience to see which colour they preferred.

White with Red outline  4
Plain Red                       1
Red with a Black outline 15
When I asked these people what genre they thought the film was, they all said horror and some said 'horror/thriller'. When I asked why, they all said that the text reminded them of blood and therefore horror.

Even though my film features blood, it is not specifically a horror but a psychological thriller. Therefore, I am going to change the type of font so that is it more basic for a film poster (like the ones below) but stick to the colour of the one with the most votes. Red with a Black outline.

Ancillary task feedback

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.

Interim feedback part 2

After re-filming a few scenes and putting them together in place, I asked my teacher if my product fitted the requirement and made better sense.

Here is the feedback:

Point 1 - 'It is unclear that the first scene is a dream sequence. If it was in a different colour to signify the past or signify it was a dream, this would make it more clear for audiences.'

Point 2 - 'It's also unclear that the little girl at the beginning is the older girl as they don't look similar. In the beginning scene, if the little girl looks into the camera this might make it clearer.'

Point 3- 'The girl walking down the alley doesn't really add much or do much for the story. Improve on it.'

For point 3, I need to try and edit the 3 short clips of the girl being followed down the alley so that they create tension as mid points between the long montage scene. I like the idea of the girl  being followed closely, because it is a convention of psychological thrillers, but I need to find a way to incorporate it into the trailer better.

I asked my teacher if the short time of 50 seconds is enough for a teaser trailer for the coursework, she said that an aim of 1minute - 1 minute 30 seconds is more of a reasonable teaser trailer time.

My own feedback of my trailer so far is that I am not happy with it. To improve this, I need to re-edit specific dissolves and transitions, as they do not fit in with the trailer.

Other improvements I thought would be suitable would be to change the colour of footage which is meant to be from the past to colours such as black and white or sepia as it would be clear for the audience to understand that these scenes are to do with the girl's past.

My trailer is still unfinished though, as I need to look at my research into fonts and text for my subtitles as well as create a title for my project overall.

I also need to look at production companies to create my own, as well as finish the soundtrack for the end of the trailer.

Interim feedback: Teacher

After collating all of my research, I showed my media teacher what I have created so far to see if I'm on track and if my product is fitting into the right genre.

So far, my shots don't quite make sense because my teacher thought that the man in the mask was stalking the young girl.

Another big improvement that I noticed was that a lot of my shots are far too long for a trailer. I need to cut these down.

Ideas for improvement:

Historial background to the story.

I will be filming a few extra scenes of a little girl painting a picture of the masked villian. This is so the little girl at the beginning can be linked as the future young lady all grown up.

Newspaper shot
Using a newspaper will alert audiences as to what the story is about. This will show that the little girl was involved in a murder case for which she was found not guilty, the masked man was. This will hint as to why the woman can see the masked man everywhere.

Parrells to little girl and older girl
In a shot where the older girl is seen screaming, I could use another shot of the little girl screaming too but only use audio from the older girl screaming. This can show the importance of the little girl with the current story.

More montage shots
Light turn on and off and when on show little girl or masked villian in the corner. (or bother)

Newspaper shot to be used in montage

Identifying my target audience

Here is my audience feedback questionnaire that I used to distinguish my target audience.

I chose my genre of a psychological thriller, but I needed to find out who the direct audience is for psychological thrillers were, so I conducted a questionnaire to find out what age and gender people who liked psychological thrillers were. I didn't want my questionnaire to be too obvious, so I made sure I wasn't straight out asking if the person liked psychological thrillers.

 

Here are my compiled results:

From this I found that the majority of people who class psychological thrillers as their favourite films, are female compared to males. Males seem to prefer action, comedy and horror films whereas females prefer romance, comedy and psychological thrillers. After doing further research I found that because psychological thrillers are not completely horrifying and frightening, but instead work on emotions and mental tension, females are more intrigued by the story because they feel more sympathy for the characters because they are presented as being victims. It could be argued that females are have more sympathy for others in general, compared to men.

I also found that the majority of the people who selected psychological thrillers as one of their favourite genre were aged between 16-45, quie a large range. I think that psychological thrillers can play on people's minds quite a lot and could be seen as threatening, so audiences have to be aged 16+ in case the film is too frightening. I think psychological thrillers interest people and don't particularly show a specific aged character, so the characters can be young or old and therefore the genre appeals to many different ages. Therefore I don't wish to narrow the age of my target audience to speficially young people, so my age range will be from 18-40 but can expand either side.

I was pleased to see that the majority of people said that 'tension' was a big part of psychological thrillers, because that is what I aim to include within my trailer. The most selected answer was 'mental instabilities' and 'scary moments'.