storyboards continued...

Film Magazine Covers...

For our film magazine cover, our plan is to portray the face of a dead body. We're going to get a picture of the woman of the couple in our teaser trailer, partly because we've planned to use the mans hand in the film poster, so wanted to use both memebers of the couple in our ancillary tasks. Also, in general women are stereotypically depicted as more vulnerable than men. Our plan is to have crosses drawn over the womans eyes to emphasise the idea that she is dead, similar to how people are shown in cartoons when they are dead or defeated, an example being when a pokemon is defeated in the cartoon show, its eyes turn in to spirals. We are also going to put blood on her face as though it is dripping down from her eye, as seeing red will instantly make a person think of blood, which coincides with conventions of the horror genre, which is well known for its use of blood.

Film Posters...

For the film poster that would go with our teaser trailer. We wanted to continue the theme of putting emphasis on the fact that the victims are thought to be dead, but turn out not to be, as the conclusion of the teaser trailer, and the title of the film will do. We came up with the idea of having a hand, laying limp on a silver surface, with a tag attached to the wrist. Our hope with this is to give the impression that its the hand of a dead body, with the silver surface being a slab in a mortuary that a dead body would be placed on, and the tag being a death tag for the bodies identification. Instead of putting a persons details on the death tag, we're going to have the title of the film and the release date, to ensure that it is clear to people that the poster is advertising a film. The shot will be a close up/extreme close up, in order to take none of the focus away from what is believed to be a dead hand. The tag will be an equally focused on, if not the main focus of the poster, as that is what really puts across the message that this hand belongs to a 'dead' body, and it also has the important information about the film. I drew a sketch of what we hope the final version of our film poster will look like...

Film Magazine Cover Research...

Film magazine covers need to be bold and stand out, as they are always going to be compared to the other magazines out at that time, and being the only thing a person will see when choosing which to buy, it is essential that the front cover is as appealing as it can be. Most films which are advertised on magazine covers, show a picture of the/one of the main characters, as they are usually the face that will remind people of the film. In all three covers i've looked at here, the main character is the only person on the cover, and looking at the camera, to make a connection with readers. The text on the front cover is also something that is made to stand out, as people wont just buy a magazine on the cover, the articles inside are what make people spend their money. On the cover for sherlock holmes, the title and subtitle for the film take up the entire bottom half of the page, as that is the focus of the magazine, and therefore the part which the magazine wants peoples eyes to be drawn to first. A common feature of a film magazine cover is to have a short phrase underneath or above the title of the film. For the Star Trek cover, the phrase 'The boldest and coolest film of 2009' is used to really sell the film, to anyone who is new to the film, and has yet to choose to go and watch it. Films with an existing reputation are able to rely less on attracting readers with words, like the Harry Potter cover. The title of the cover film is in a list of a number of films, and while it is the only one written in bold, it doesn't stand out in the same way my other two examples do. This is something which Empire magazine can afford to do however, as by the 6th film, Harry Potter is a film franchise with millions of fans already, and simply by showing the face of Harry (daniel radcliffe), anyone who is a fan of harry potter will recognise it and want to know what about harry potter is written inside.

Film Poster Research...

I've already looked at some posters from my previous research, but i wanted to take a closer look at some of the conventions of movie posters. Just from looking at a film poster you can almost always correctly guess what genre it is, just by its use of colour and pictures. The poster for drag me to hell is a typical horror poster. The picture depicts a girl screaming, being pulled down by the arm of what looks like a zombie or something, and the flames add to the scary nature of the picture. Also the dark,dull colour of the picture in the background emphasises the genre of the film as being serious. This is contrasted in the poster for Up. The poster is made up almost entirley of bright colours, those mainly coming from the balloons on the house, but also the clear sky in the background. As well as this, the little boy (Russell) is clearly smiling, suggesting the film is of a happy nature, the complete opposite of the poster for Drag Me To Hell. The poster for burn after reading puts its main focus on the famous names starring in the film. With just a plain white background, all eyes go directly to the pictures of the people in the film, who are all well known actors, like George Clooney and Brad Pitt. Films like this, with big names filling the cast, have the option to use that as the main selling point for the film. Films like Up, which is an animated film, dont have the option to sell the film by who is in it, as you dont see them in the film anyway, you only hear them. The film itself is formed around the concept of the house that gets lifted off the ground by lots and lots of balloons. When a film has an iconic, memorable scene, such as this, it is often used to advertise the film in all types of media, be it trailer or poster, as the majority of people who went to see Up, knew it to be the film with all the balloons carrying a house. Up also has the luxury of a very well known production company making it in Disney PIXAR, which is also put on the poster to attract any people who are fans of PIXAR, but haven't heard or seen of Up yet, knowing its a disney film will instantly gain the film audiences. Another common convention of film posters is to have a slogan, representing the story of the film, on the poster along with the title. For films like Drag Me To Hell, a couple of short sentences have been used to swiftly describe the character seen on the poster, but on the poster for Burn After Reading, a short slogan has been used to give people whose first recognition of the film is this poster, a small taste of what the film is about, it also often relates to the genre of the film.

Locations and Props...

We listed what room, and what props we would need for each of the shots we had put into our storyboards...

Filming our Teaser...

Our plan is to hopefully get all of the shots we need in one day, as everything we are filming takes place in the same location. If we cant get everything done in one day, we may have to arrange another day for filming, to get everything done.

Target Audience Research Conclusions...

We wanted to ask people form our target audience questions with the main aim of having their answers influence the way we went about creating our horror teaser trailer.

• Everyone we asked said they would want a horror teaser trailer to scare them, as without being able to scare its audience, no film can truly be considered a horror. To try and take into account this response, we hope that we can scare people in the way that paranormal activity scares audiences, in that it makes people fear that a similar event could happen to them. Teaser trailers themselves tend not to make audiences jump, as it is just a foundation for attracting people to go and watch the film, so what we want to do is to make our teaser trailer scary in terms of making them think that this is something which could happen to them.
• A mixture of pace was something that our target audience felt was important in a good teaser trailer, as the contrast between slow paced and fast paced keeps the audiences interest. This was something we had initially wanted to do, but the feedback we recieved confirmed in our minds that we wanted to mix both slow and fast paced shots to make viewers hearts race, and intrigue them.
• Flashbacks were something that everyone we asked liked, as they felt it gave them more information about the background of the film, and also helps explain some of the confusing aspects of a film. Using flashbacks is something we definately want to do in our teaser trailer, to add an interesting aspect to the trailer.
• Our target audience told us that they prefer a teaser trailer to only show a little bit of footage of the film, as it means that less is given away. We respect this view and in some ways agree with it, but we feel that we want to use a good amount of footage, just to give the audience a chance to get a feeling for what the film is about, and hopefully want to go and see it. To try and meet in the middle on what the target audience told us and our personal wants, we know that we dont want to give away anything to do with the ending of the film, so that the conclusion of the story is kept a secret.
• There was mixed response to the usage of cliffhangers, some saying theyt didnt like not knowing all the facts, and some saying they liked being able to decide what for themselves what they think has happened. We want our trailer to have cliffhanger ending, mainly to give viewers that extra push to go and watch the film, as cliffhangers often leave audiences dyeing to know more.

New Target Audience Research...

Certificate...

Choosing a certificate for out film was made quite easy as we chose who our target audience would be first. By choosing to target the film at 16-24 year olds, we left ourselves with only one realistic option. However, this is just one of a number of reasons why we chose to make 'Presumed Dead' certificate 15. Taking in to account existing horror films, every film we looked at, both in teaser trailer research, horror trailer conventions research, and in the work we had done on our parody idea, was certificte 15.

• The Strangers
• The Ring
• Paranormal Activity
• Drag Me To Hell
• Mirrors
• One Missed Call

All of these films share the same genre as the film our teaser trailer will advertise, and some like Drag Me To Hell and The Ring involve scenes of a much more disturbing nature than anything we plan to include in our teaser trailer, or anything that our film would include in general, therefore meaing that only in a lack of good judgement would we choose to give 'Presumed Dead' a certificate any higher than 15, and as we'd previously agreed that aiming at a younger audience (12 and under) would be unwise, the only certificate we're left with is 15. Rating the film a 15 means that anyone within the age group of our target audience will be able to watch the film in the cinema, and also shows to anyone else thinking of watching the film, that any pre-conceptions of the film being unbelievably scary and gory simply based on the genre are untrue.

Target Audience...

Despite changing our idea for our teaser trailer, we didn't think that we needed to change our original target audience. We originally chose to target 16-24 year olds, for the main reason that our entire film was based around mocking horror films, and while not intentionally aiming to scare people with the film, the characters themselves were based on characters from real horror films, so to target the film at a younger audience would of been unwise and unrealistic. This is one of the reasons we chose to aim at the same target audience, as by changing to do an actual horror film, this was even further reasoning to avoid targeting the film at young people. We've chosen to aim mainly at the 16-24 year olds not only because of the genre of the film, but most importantly for the fact that they are the most frequent cinema go-ers. While there is no reason why our film would not appeal to an older audience, for the film to be as commercially successful as it can be, it needs to meet the criteria of a film that young adults would want to go and watch in the cinema. This age group are generally more interested in watching horror films at the cinema than any other age group, as the excitement of seeing who will be more scared by a film is something that 16-24 year olds get caught up in more than anyone else. The purpose of choosing a target audience is to focus your attention further in one particular direction, which we hope to do, while still trying to make 'Presumed Dead' a film that appeals to an older generation, as well as the young adults the film will aim to attract.

Film Title...

We came up with our new film idea before thinking about anything else, so we could work everything else around the storyline we had created. This meant when going on to think about possible titles for our film, we already had a basic outline of our teaser trailer, which we wanted to have a direct link to the name we agreed on. We brainstormed for a bit, shouting out any titles that came into our heads, and decided on a few which we thought were good, but more importantly suitable to the plot we'd decided on. The titles we came up with were...

• Awakened
  
• Easy Targets
  
• Chosen Targets
  
• Presumed Dead
  
• Breaking and Entering
• Intrusion
  

As we had already lost valuable time on our previous idea, we gave people an overview of our film, and then asked them to choose which title they thought best fit our film. The title which turned out to be the most popular was 'Presumed Dead', which we also thought was one of the better titles we'd come up with. It focuses on the fact that the bodies we assume to be dead for the maority of the teaser, turn out to still be alive. This is what we hope will be the lasting memory in the minds of people who watch it, as it puts questions into the audiences head, questions which can only be answered by going to watch the film. The title presumed dead emphasising this selling point, making it a great match for our teaser trailer.

New Plot...

After our decision to change our entire project, we had to completely start from scratch, thinking up an entirely new concept. Doing a horror trailer was something that we decided upon quite quickly, as we felt we needed to move quickly after losing time with our initial idea, and horror was the genre we both felt the most confident in doing, as it worked to the strengths we had gained in AS. The idea for our new teaser trailer is about a couple, who have their house broken into, with the film following the couple as they try to survive, and escape whoever it is that is after them. For the teaser trailer, its going to start out showing a person leaving the house, and closing the door behind them (this person turning out to be the villain). The camera then shows a room which has been completely trashed, and continues to reveal that there are two bodies, on the floor, not moving. This will lead into a flashback of what is actually only a few hours earlier, of the couple unpacking and hearing a noise upstairs. This shot will lead into a fast paced montage of clips, showing the couples attempts at getting away from the person who has broken into their house. To make the audience interested, it will hear the woman whispering, 'he's here', implying that they know who has broken in, and almost as if they've been waiting for the day when he would find them. This will hint further to why the couple are unpacking, as though they've just moved in, suggesting they may have had to move to get away from this person. The trailer will end with a shot of the one of the bodies which looks to be dead at the beginning of the trailer, making a sudden movement, such as grabbing onto something, or clenching a fist, to show that they are infact still alive, leaving the door open for the audience to want answers to a number of questions...

• whats happened in the last couple of hours?
• are both of them still alive?
  
• how did they survive?
• will the villain get away?
• what will happen next?

Horror Trailers Analysis...

After looking at some trailers which were aimed specifically at the horror genre, it gave me an insight into some of the common qualities of a horror trailer. Firstly, from all the the trailers and teaser trailers I saw for the horror genre, all could be grouped in to one of two categories. Some, like 'The Strangers' teaser trailer have little to no dialogue, leaving the storytelling part of the trailer to the music and the images shown. The other type of trailer, an example of which being 'Mirrors', depend more heavily on the use of dialogue, as the basic concept of the film is described in the teaser, with the images and sounds being less important to the story, and focus more on displaying to the audience that it is a scary film. In the trailer for 'Drage Me To Hell', the entire plot of the film, minus the may it ends, is given away in the trailer. This is something that horror trailer can afford to do more so than any other genre, as the makings of a good horror film dont depend to highly on a good story. The prospect of being scared is the main incentive for people to go and watch a film, so knowing the story before watching the film doesn't affect a films appeal very much. An aspect of horror trailers that is depicted in the trailers for 'Drag Me To Hell' and 'One Missed Call', is the focus on a single character. In both films, the entire trailer revolvesw around a single main character, and follows their story more so than anyone else, with other characters being almost completely shoved into the background. This is something that most horror films do, the only other alternative is for their to be a group of main characters. Films such as The Ring and Scream, have a single main character, and it is usually the case that that character is the only one to survive until the end. The difference between that and a horror film that has multiple main characters is that you can expect some of them to die in the film, as the foundation of a good horror film usually begins with a high death count. Even in films with numerous main characters, there is generally one who is focused on slightly more than the rest. such as Final Destination, where there is one character who is shown more than the rest, but there is a cast of main characters in the film.

Horror Trailers...

Change of Plan...

Despite not wanting all the work we had done to go to waste, we weren't happy with the progress we had made in filming our parody teaser trailer. While we were really excited about our idea initially, after filming most of our footage and beginning to edit, we realised that what we had wasn't very professional looking. Our idea turned out to be better on paper than it was on the screen, and when we asked our teacher to take a look at it, she agreed that what we had wasn't good enough to get us the grade we were hoping for. We didn't think we would be able to make the parody good enough, without re-filming almost everything we had done. So after discussing with our teachers what our best option would be, we came to the decision to start again with a new idea. Our new plan is to do the teaser trailer for a horror, as when brainstorming horror seemed to be the genre which we both had some basic ideas for.

Target Audience Research...

To get a better insight on peoples takes on teaser trailers and what is important to them, as well as what features of a parody are important to them, we asked some members of our target audience some questions, to help us out...

Voiceover...

From the teaser trailers we looked at, something we noticed was included in a few of them were shots of dialogue appearing on the screen, explaining in a way the story of the film. We liked the idea of including this feature in our teaser trailer at some point. As well as this though, after looking at the trailer for a parody film, an important feature was the narrative given by a voiceover, which added to the humour of the trailer. For this reason, we decided to combine the two features, mainly to set a serious mood for the teaser at first, but the the involvement of the narrator will become imperative to the actual lighthearted and humorous nature of the film.

Our Scenes...

Instead of filming a number of small clips here and there which you would see in a teaser trailer, we thought that might end up looking quite rushed, so we opted to film our teaser trailer differently. We decided to film a number of actual scenes which would be in the film our teaser trailer was promoting, and then edit and cut our scenes down to create the same little clips to put into the trailer, but have them looking more realistic and flowing. In all, we thought of nine scenes to film that, when trimmed down, would make up our final teaser trailer. These are the nine scenes in full length which we plan to film.

Introduction

Party Time

Play Time

Hide and Seek

Ring TV

Talc Scene

Firestarter

Tumble

Dragging Scene

Script...

The names of the two main characters will be Kristen and James, which hopefully people will recognise as being the names of the two main characters from the Strangers.

Intro

(DOORBELL RINGS)

Kristen: Whose out there?

Quiet Voice: You're going to die....

(KRISTEN OPENS DOOR, SCREAMS, RUNS AWAY)

Salesman: Thats right! You'll die of shock when you hear of our slashed prices on all sacks down at Insanesburys!!!

Firestarter

James: She has it in her head that somethings watching her...

Reverend: Kristen, why don't you start from the beginning.

Kristen: It started in our old house... it just... burnt down

Kristen: The police never did find out how it started (OVER FLASHBACK)

Play Time

Kristen: (AFTER SEEING KILLERS) Oh My God! MICAH!!!!!! (RUNS FROM THE WINDOW)

James: (FROM A DISTANCE) I'm James...

Kristen: Oh yeah... JAMES!!!

(RETURNS TO WINDOW WITH JAMES)

James: What? What? Kristen theres nothing there.

Party Time

(SAT IN THE BEDROOM) Kristen: I don't know about this...

James: Stop worrying, if theres anything here this camera will catch it.

Hide and Seek

(FILMING HERSELF IN THE WARDROBE) Kristin: I've never been so scared...

(FOOTSTEPS GETTING LOUDER... DOOR SWINGS OPEN) (KRISTEN SCREAMS)

Strangers Man/James: Tig! Your On!

Kristen : Dammit!

Fall Over

(NO DIALOGUE)

Ring TV

Kristen: Come on it's starting...

(JAMES SITS DOWN, THEY START THE FILM)

(RING GIRL WLALKS TO THE TV, BEGINS TO CRAWL OUT OF IT)

James: You didn't say this thing was 3D.

(PUT ON GLASSES)

Talc Scene

James: Nothings getting in or out of this room without stepping in this...

(NEXT MORNING)

Kristen: Oh my god, Look...

James: What is it- (PAUSES) What the....

Kristen: what does this mean?.?.?....

Dragging Scene

(NO DIALOGUE)