Final Cut of Alter of Bones & Experience of filming

This is the final cut of our horror film trailer for Alter of Bones. 

Whilst filming 'Alter of Bones' our group all took it in turns to film parts of the film trailer. Myself only being able to film the parts in which I would not be in (as I'm the only actor in the film trailer), which is generally the clips which show the location and other spontanious filming in which we thought would be suitable for our psychological horror genre. Nick and Malcolm both took turns in filming the clips in which the actor was present.

Again, we also took turns in editing our film trailer together. This way it enabled us as a team to work together, share ideas in which we thought would be good for the layout of our film trailer and also to individually gain skills using Soundtrack Pro and Final Cut Pro.

Whilst filming we also made spontanious choices with what we filmed such as the girl sitting on the chair reading aloud to herself/ to an unseen apparition (psychological) we thought by doing this it would create a creepy feeling amongst the audience and also help promote the psychological genre.

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

Media Technology

Research

I research a great deal into my main product, though I also did research into my ancillary tasks.

I used Youtube to research into already existing horror genre film trailers. This not only helped us in creating our film trailer but to see what other people from all over the thought about the different film trailers. 

I used Slideshare to upload all the PowePoint presentations onto to allow me to then upload them onto my blog. It also enabled other people to look at what I'd put into them. This can be searched through google which enables anyone to see them.

I used PowerPoint to present ideas to the class. From using this program it allowed me to use many different types of animations, fonts and insert images. 

I used Final Cut Express for my final product and also to begin with on a preliminary task. Final Cut Express allows you to edit video clips together, to add filters, add a soundtrack, transitions, layers and effects onto the films. 

I used google to research images for my moodboard of horror images, from different horror films. It allowed me to gather research from other websites, and I could access Blogger, Youtube etc from it also. 

I used LiveType to create my production logo. I could then import the logo from LiveType to Final Cut Express easily. On this program you could change the font, the colour of the font, the effects and transitions too.

Production

For the production of my film trailer and ancillary products, I used a number of different programs and websites. These programs and websites are; Final Cut Express, LiveType, Powerpoint, Youtube (as mentioned above), Soundtrack Pro, InDesign, Photoshop, Microsoft Excel, Scribd.com  and DaFont.com.

As a group we used Soundtrack Pro to create the sound for our film trailer. This helped us gain skills whilst using this program as it can be quite complicated to use, though after a while of getting used to the program we managed to create the perfect sound for our film trailer.The program allows you to try different types of sounds together in order to find what's suitable for your product.

I used Indesign to create my ancillary products (film poster and magazine cover). This was relatively easy to use after getting used to the program itself.

I used Photoshop to edit the photographs used for my ancillary products. Photoshop was very easy to use as I've used the program before.

I used Microsoft Excel to create my target audience feedback survey tables and call sheet. I found this really easy and simple to use as I have used this plenty times before. It's a very helpful program to use, and makes things a lot less complicated.

I used Scribd to upload my word documents onto to allow me to add them to my blog. This was very helpful when updating my blog.

Dafont.com is a website designed for different types of fonts you can download or create and upload to share. I used this website to download the fonts for my ancillary tasks. This website was very useful as it had a wide range of different fonts that would be suitable for my products and the theme of them.

Evaluation Question Three: What have you learned from audience feedback?

Audience feedback from our film trailer was essential because it allowed us to see what we were missing, what could be improved, what we should change or take out completely. We gained audience feedback by asking five people of our chosen target audience to rate our trailer and ancillary products. We put this into a table which we created on Excel and uploaded it to our blog (few posts down). However, their criticism was very helpful. We changed what we thought needed to be drastically changed, we decided this as a group. 

From the feedback we received it helped us to see how important this feedback was in any case whether for our product or other things. Feedback allows us the chance to see inside the head of our target audience and to make something in which they would find interesting. This would make our products a success. Without getting feedback from our audience we wouldn't know what they would enjoy nor would we know if what we created would be appropriate and work as a whole in gaining the interest of our target audience. This had been particularly helpful with ancillary products.

Evaluation Question Two - How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

Evaluation Question 2 from Rosie_Buzz

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

My group based our theatrical trailer on the codes and conventions of existing media products. Before producing our theatrical film trailer we researched into existing trailers of different varieties (genres). After doing the research, we decided to focus on the codes and conventions of horror genre theatrical trailers.  Within the research we discovered that the use of camera angles, shots, music and mise en scene can specifically promote our theatrical trailer as a horror film.

We have used the codes and conventions within our theatrical trailer to ensure that our final product looks similar to those that have been created by professionals. Though, unlike professional theatrical trailers, our trailer does not include the names of any actors or actresses that star in our film- usually this helps to engage the audience into watching the film due to being fans of specific actors/actresses films. 

To follow the codes and conventions of horror genre theatrical trailers we used a variety of different camera shots and angles.

Long Shot

Establishing Shot

In our theatrical trailer we also included inter-titles. We used several of these through out the trailer to show the audience a quick viewing of what is to occur within the film. The inter-titles are at a specific speed to get the attention of the audience, and to help show the genre of the film. Most trailers have inter-titles included, so we followed the convention of that. Inter-titles work best with horror film trailers.

My group and I chose to shoot our film trailer in a church location. We thought this was a good idea because it's never really been done before, and also to some churches can be quite creepy so we went with the idea of shooting our film trailer in a church location. 

In some cases, a filter is used to highlight the atmosphere within a film. However, we used a filter to show that within the film the 'two' characters are from different times. This will help the audience to understand what is actually going to be occurring within the film. 

Overall Target Audience Feedback

Audience Comments on Ancillary Products

Film Posters Feedback by