Final Press pack https://new.express.adobe.com/webpage/2cP8KsbnxNROL
Final Evaluation and Reflection
The production feels like a real media project because I created a film trailer and a press pack that helps promote my trailer. I created a poster to market the film trailer. The film trailer was made with a team of actors to create a trailer based on a horror theme. We put together a storyline and filmed the trailer together as a group.
It all felt like a professional media project because of the lighting we used, we chose to use a mix of natural lighting and low-key lighting in my film trailer. Examples can be seen in this blog entry
Also, all the practicing we did, running through the speech, and shouting action and cut and spending time in a Green screen workshops. This helped us work as a team. We learned about studio protocols and how to use the slate. We identified our job roles so we all knew which part we played in the production. We also discussed ideas for the CCTV parts, which characters were going to be used for that scene.
We all worked as a group together for the production to come together at the end. We discussed everything before we started and created storyboards to follow, which made it feel like it was a real media project. We used special effects like the flashing lights in the corridor and the candles, cloaks, the red lights. I liked how it all came together at the end so it looked like a professional media project.
I used Life on Mars camera work for ideas for our film here. In the scene, Sam Tyler wakes up. There is 360 shot in an arc using a dolly, this goes around Sam in a circle and starts to reveal where he is. He is in the past and in a different place. We used a similar shot in our trailer by revealing the cult members standing in a circle.
The feedback I received about my film trailer, overall, was quite positive. The comments I received about filming were that I used a wide range of camera shots and a good choice of clips.
The comments I received about editing were that I used good music. The levels were appropriate. Some people thought I used nice visual effects and audio. This is helpful because it gave me confidence about the choices I made when choosing the visual effects.
Some people did say that to improve my trailer, they said I needed to speed up the pace a little more and add some sound effects. This feedback will help me to improve my projects in the future.
In my research I Watched The Vampire Diaries series 1 trailer it included a series of shots for example close-ups, montages, dramatic camera angles, fast-paced shots, different types of lighting, stars of the film, small snippets of conversation, and suspenseful music. A trailer typically ends on a cliffhanger creating more suspense and gripping the audience, making them want to watch more.
Comparing my production to The Vampire Diaries Trailer, I have also included a series of shots that include close-ups and dramatic camera angles. I also used dark lighting in particular scenes showing the characters in various situations. I also used suspenseful music to create a sense of mystery for the audience.
The poster for The Vampire Diaries has a dark image set at nighttime with the moon in the background. The location setting was in the woods. There is a strip of red, which is wrapped around the V in Vampire. This drips, like blood, below the V. In the poster, it shows the 3 main characters with the female being close up which could possibly be the main character in the programme.
In my poster, I have shown two of the characters and they are dressed in cloaks and dark colours to show a sense of mystery and intrigue. The font I have used gives a sense of horror and cult feel. My poster shows many of the key themes that have been presented in The Vampire Diaries, I replicated these for The Forbidden Faith. One example is the dark lighting, creating a sense of mystery. Also, key characters just like my poster portrays. I have two key characters within a dark scene.
Merchandise
I created a mock-up of a hoodie that had the image of my poster on the front, which the audience can purchase. This looks effective and is targeted at my fan base which allows the fans to identify as part of this group.
I did some research to explore different types of merchandise, that is currently available. I looked at the website, Netflix shop, to give me ideas, the hoodie has a picture of a character from the series Stranger Things. This has given me the idea to put my poster on a hoodie as a form of merchandise. This will help advertise my Film trailer and encourage future viewers.
The image below is a screenshot of the website I used, I went on to the website and decided if I wanted to create a shirt, a sweatshirt or a hoodie and I chose a hoodie. After that, I went to my poster, which is in photoshop and saved the image I wanted to use on the merchandise. I uploaded the image onto a hoodie. I then decided which colours I wanted to choose for the hoodie, I went on to add the image on my merchandise to my press pack.
My project was to produce a film trailer and a press pack to go with it and the theme was horror. The plot is about a group of students and teachers going missing. In my group we brainstormed ideas and used Stranger Things to gather ideas for the narrative. I used photoshop to create my poster to go with my trailer and also used blend modes and transitions. I also used Adobe Express to create my press pack. I feel that we do have a project that was agreed in the proposal because I have followed the protocol of a typical press pack.
On the 19th February, we created and set up a new WIX blog for our final major project unit. And then on the 26th we did an in camera workshop, with the new technician. We discussed our narrative and looked at the themes of Stranger Things. On the 4th of March we created our storyboards and had a different camera workshop. On the 11th of March we chose shots, props, costumes and locations for filming. We also did some product research and researched the film industry. On the 18th March we did all the paperwork and our final checks before filming on the 25th of March we did filming in the studio. On the 15th and 22nd of April we did location filming. On the 29th of April we did our editing and we finished our project on the 6th of May. We did our final edit and transitions and created our poster and started our press packs. My trailer was then complete.
The weekly schedule helped to keep us organised because it helped us know what shots we were filming on which days and the props and costumes we would need. We also used one called Netflix trailer planning this helped us know what locations we were going need for filming and the props, costumes and equipment we were going to need to help us film the shots. The storyboards helped us keep track of the shots we had filmed and the ones we had left to film. We put the numbers from the storyboard on to our weekly schedule, this works because our team remembered all the props and costumes and equipment we needed to complete our filming and we also had access to the rooms as they had been pre-booked.
The time plan and planning documents helped me because I knew what I was doing each filming session and it helped us to avoid confusion and helped keep us organised. It kept everyone on track, so that each session we were all working towards the same goal.
In my future projects I would make my time plan more visual because I found that I didn't use it as much as the weekly schedule which was more colourful and contained less text.
I believe that my production followed the techniques used in the horror and supernatural genre In my trailer I used flashing lights, dark lighting and music that created tension, some of the techniques that I didn't use were jump scares or silence, to create tension and scary sounds. The reason being, I didn't want to create that kind of horror trailer as I'm unfamiliar with that type of horror and it's not something I wanted to create because I don't like jump scares in the genre of horror.
My film trailer follows the genre of horror because I have included music to create suspense and tension. My music is called "secrets of the hidden forest". I got this music from the audio section in 'we video'. I also did this by adding transitions and special effects. One of the transitions I used was 'fade to black'. I used this to show the passing of time in the narrative.
I used the convention static in my trailer. This was typically used during 1980s horror movies like Poltergeist, which creates a feeling of mystery when the screen is breaking up. This effect was used in my trailer and related to the CCTV image.
In my codes and conventions for my press pack I talked about the elements a press pack should contain and the process of how I created it.
The problem I faced while planning the production was not having the people who were drawing images for the storyboard due to absences. We solved this by finding other members of the team who could do it instead.
During the filming stage one of the problems I faced was not having enough people for certain scenes, to solve this we had to get a member of staff to film for us. Another problem I faced was that we were sharing equipment and it was hard to keep to the time frame we had. To solve this we used our schedule to keep to the time frame and booked the equipment we would need. Lastly, we had a problem with the lighting with the room being too dark and the light not being bright enough. We fixed this by experimenting with different coloured gels to see which colour was the best to use.
This year I have developed my skills in photography, videography, editing and creating posters.
Some of the things that were new to me this year included paperwork, for example- time plans, storyboards and risk assessments. I had also never created a press pack before this year or used the software Adobe Express.
I have done this by practice, asking for help and people demonstrating to me how to do it.
In addition to the above skills, I have also developed my skills in teamwork and communication. When we were talking about our initial ideas in the planning stage, I found this difficult. I feel it has shown me the importance of taking turns when talking and not speaking over one another. I developed my skills in teamwork during the filming process because everyone in the team had a specific role, which helped us be more efficient. This gave me an idea of what each job role involved, giving me responsabilty within a team.
These skills will help me in the future, on a Level 3 course in Media. where I will be able to use and further develop all of these skills.
I believe that we did our production justice because we achieved what we set out to do.
We successfully made a trailer in the horror genre, told the story of students being kidnapped and produced posters and advertisements that appealed to the target audience.
When I did some research on the horror genre it helped me know the codes and conventions that I had follow to produce the trailer and gave me an idea of what I wanted to create and achieve.
However, I didn't include some of the codes and conventions such as jump scares, scary sounds, silence to create tension as well as flashbacks, voiceovers, enigma codes, unusual perspectives and action codes. If I were to do the project again I would consider adding some of them to create something scarier and more in line with the horror genre codes and conventions.
We managed to complete everything within the limits we had set on the time plan. We had to ask other people to help filming and we had to switch people's roles within the team to be able to finish filming on time because some team members were absent. We all worked together to overcome this difficulty which was a good achievement, I will use this skill of teamwork and time management in the future.
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