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

We used a lot of technology to produce our teaser trailer, teaser poster and magazine front cover.

Equipment for filming:
Camera- We used an ordinary standard camera to film our teaser trailer. We learnt from filming, that the footage that we got doesn't look the same on the big screen this is due to many different things like lighting and the camera being shaky. We did have problems with the lighting for this trailer, because most of the trailer was done in pitch black with very limited amounts of lighting which means that the camera had problems picking up the images on the screen and constantly went out of focus, which made it very difficult to film as we thought that the film was good but the quality was actually very poor. Another thing we learnt from using the camera was the zoom on the camera also made it lose focus and these two things made the filming very difficult an time consuming.

Tripod- We used the tripod to put the camera on which allows us to film shots that are much steadier than if we just used our hands. The tripod could be made bigger and smaller which means that we could add shots that are from different angles and different heights. We did have some problems with the tripod, these problems include the bit connecting the camera to the tripod was sometimes not there so we couldn't film as we would want to.


Editing equipment and research:
Computer- The computers that we used for our editing were quite slow and there aren't very many computers in the school that has the software installed on them and because there are quite a lot of people that do media in our school so the computers are limited to the amount of students that are doing it. We also used the computers for research and planning and for our ancillary tasks.

Adobe premier elements- This is the software that we used to edit together our teaser trailer, we used adobe to create our titles to put into our final product. We found it quite difficult at times with the editing of the film because the computers were quite slow and the film jumped so was very difficult to judge.
YouTube- We used YouTube mainly for our research as it allowed us to do some thorough research into similar teaser trailers, which will allow us to look at some that we can take ideas that we like from and some things that we don't like so specifically would not include. We also put our final piece on YouTube as we ask people for feedback on it.

Blogger- We used blogger as a place to put all of our research, planning and evaluation on to and we used it like a diary, with anything that we did to do with media we wrote up about it.

Slideshare- We used this to create powerpoints that could easily be put on the blog.

IMDB- We used IMDB for research into products that are similar to ours and so we can get ideas and statistics about other films in the same genre.

Pearl and Dean- We used Pearl and Dean as a major tool in our audience research, this is because it showed us what type of people watched the films that are similar to ours and so we could base the audience that will watch ours on others that are similar.

Creating the poster and the magazine front cover:
Adobe photoshop- We used photoshop to edit the photos so that they fit in to our ancillary tasks better, for example making our magazine front cover into black and white which makes the photo fit into it more.

Adobe Illistrator- We used this software to put the images together that was created on photoshop.

Evaluation 3:What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

For this evaluation task we showed the teaser trailer, the teaser poster and the magazine front cover to the rest of our media class and they gave us their feedback telling what the good points were and what we could do to improve it.





From the feedback that we got, we were told that our products all give away clearly that they are in the horror genre, by the colours that we used and the amounts of really fast shots and by the amount of dark colours we used like black. We we told that our original magazine front cover could of been improved on as it didn't look as professional as it could of been, so we did this and changed the picture which made it look a lot better than what we had before.

Youtube Comments:

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

For this evaluation task Amy (who is in my group) recorded a voice over telling how successful we feel that our three texts together have been together.

This is the script of the voice over:

This is the voice over:

We have decided to have a colour scheme for all three media products, which is red, white and black and this was used in the titles of our teaser trailer, our teaser poster and our magazine front cover. We decided to do this because it shows continuity between all three and when the audience sees one of the products they may remember one of the other two which means that they are more memorable.

We have chosen to have a different picture for our magazine front cover to our teaser poster, because it means that we can show more characters that are in the film and can start to introduce them to the audience.

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

I have taken 9 screenshots from my teaser trailer of what I think show elements of a teaser trailer such as-

Title of Film

Setting/Location

Costumes and Props

Camerawork and editing

Title font and style

Story and how the trailer sets it up

Genre and how the trailer suggests it

How characters are introduced

Special Effects

Title of the film- We have made the title very bright and bold and we chose to make it red so that it fits in with our colour scheme. We put the title at the end of the teaser and because its big and bold it means that the audience will remember it and will stick with them and after research of similar teaser trailers we felt that it looked professional.

Setting/location- This shot shows the main character of the film in his house when he was young and this was the time where he was being abused. This is typical of a teaser trailer of a horror film as it shows one main location and lots of others that all link back to the main location which usually is a house with shots inside and outside.

Costumes and props- This shot shows a prop that we used as a main part of our trailer (the candle) we have used this as it provides the lighting but is darker than using the lights this means that it is better for our teaser as it looks like it would fit into a horror film instead of bright lights. Also we have the main character in a dark costume, we did this because it adds to the horror film and shows that the clothes could be dirty because he was abandoned when he was younger he wouldn't of been able to have clean clothes so also fits into our story.

Camerawork and editing- This is a shot of one of the victims closing a mirrored door and in the background the killer is watching her, we used this shot because it was a very difficult shot to perfect and we managed to do it, we struggled because the killer wasn't in the right place or the camera was seen when closing the door, this means that we had to do it from different angles and heights to get the shot absolutely perfect.

Title font and style- We have used the same titles the whole way through the three media products that we produced, we have done this because it shows continuity and shows the link between all three things. We have also added the blood splat because it shows the genre of the film very clearly.

Story and how the trailer sets it up- The shot of all the pictures on the wall shows the story as it shows the list of who he plans to kill and who he has already killed but in picture form, this shows the basic storyline of the film as it shows who he is planning on killing. Throughout the trailer there are shots of the victims either being chased by the victim or with both being involved in the scene in some way. The film storyline isn't really given away too much by the teaser trailer but gives you a rough idea on what will go on and what has gone on in the past and this fits in with professional horror teaser trailers.

Genre and how the trailer suggests it- The shot I have used is the killer standing outside one of the victims house with a knife, this shows that it is a horror trailer because there is a weapon (the knife) that a lot of horror films have. Also because the shot was filmed when it was dark, it adds to the tension and makes it more scary and unsettling than it would of been if it was filmed during the day.

How the characters are introduced- In our teaser trailer we found it very hard to introduce characters as all the shots that we used were all very quick and this means that it is difficult for the audience to know who any of the characters are and what don't know what they have done to the boy to make him want to kill them. We have included a typical stereotype by having a blonde in a house whilst the killer was outside as this is seen in many other horror films and so means that it is professional.

Special affects- We used a picture of one the victims dead, we have done this because it adds mystery to what has happened to this character and the only affect we used was the flashing light which was made by a torch, we used this light as it is uneasy adn with the characters eyes being wide open it means that the audience will find it unsettling.

Ancillary Task: Magazine Front Cover

This is our magazine front cover:

We have decided to use a different character because it adds more mystery and makes the audience think what could be happening.

We manipulated this shot to make this poster:

Ancillary Task: Teaser Poster

This is the image we used in the end for our final teaser poster and this is what it will look like:

We have chose this image for our teaser poster because he is our main character, and most of if not all teaser posters have the main chaacter as the main image. This image is also a good one to use as there is a lot of shadow, which means that it goes with the colour theme that we have throughout the three products which is black and red, so with the shadow this creates the black colour and the titles are red. We have also used the tagline for our film as a main part of the poster, we have used this in all our products. We have put the "...grow up?" seperate because we wanted to put it in red and against the black so that it stands out more and it runs with our colour theme.

Poster and Magazine Images

We took a lot of photos of different people that we took so we could choose the best one for our teaser poster and our magazine front cover, we did this as it would give us more of a choice on what picture looks the best when we came to editing. These are a few of the photos that we took:

Final Film