Music And Editing

Blogged by Group

After making a rough cut of our trailer, we set about looking for music to use as the soundtrack. We wanted a piece that built up and that would fit with the cuts and running clips but that wasn't too busy as to disturb the dialogue.

We listened to existing movie soundtracks on YouTube, such as the 28 Days Later music (John Murphy) and the Saw theme (Charlie Clouser). We found that these soundtracks were too recognisable and that they didn't fit the feel of our trailer.

After looking for quite a while, we found this piece of music:



We played it behind our trailer and found that it fit well with our cuts and gave the trailer the right atmosphere.
We then downloaded the music and imported it to iMovie. We added it to our trailer after the party scene and blank screen that our protagonist breathes over.



The music is shown by the purple background.

We now do not have much left to do with our trailer before we can concentrate solely on the ancillary tasks. We just have to find some music for the party clip at the beginning and a 'creaking door' sound for the end and fine tune the footage.

Editing Our Footage

Blogged by Group

We spent the lesson uploading our footage to iMovie and cutting and editing this footage to create the basics of our trailer. Like the footage we had edited before, we used a 'Day into Night' filter to create a setting commonly used in successful horror films.
We played with the arrangement of the clips to create a fast pace that builds tension and suspense, for example breaking up the dialogue with short running scenes. We also altered the speed of a couple of clips as some of the running scenes were more effective at different speeds. One in particular was very effective in slow motion, which we placed towards the end of the trailer to intensify the feeling of suspense.

In order for our trailer to come together we also added in some transitions such as fades and dissolves to add continuity, although some of the straight cuts from scene to scene were quite effective and so we left them in. We also added the title, date and tagline in two separate shots, separated by a quick shot of the protagonist cowering back into the corner in terror. We felt this would work as it would hopefully leave a lasting impression on the viewer as when the title flashes up it could signal the end of the trailer, which is then cut to this dramatic scene which again leaves the viewer with unanswered questions.

Filming

Blogged by Naomi

Fortunately over the weekend we were able to film the rest of our footage, and so we have put our ancillary tasks on hold for the time being. Due to a lack of actors who were available at the same time we were unable to film the party scene we had originally planned, but we feel that we now have enough footage that we can cut the scene and still have an effective horror trailer at the end. We decided that we will hint towards a party at the very beginning of our trailer when the protagonist is drinking, we will put loud music and voices over the top to imply there are more people out of shot.

Full Poster Analysis: Hatchet

Blogged by Anya

As we have mentioned earlier, we want the advertisement for our film to be focused on the content rather than the actor(s). Because of this we have decided that the actor's name is unnecessary on the full poster we are designing.

The majority of film posters include actors names but there are some that have reviews included in the poster instead. We have chosen to do this.

A poster we looked at that did this was the poster for 'Buried' which used an image of the film surrounded by reviews. This is not how we want our poster to look but it was useful in looking at the type of reviews we should use and the way the comments are worded.



This is a poster for 'Hatchet'; it is very similar to how we envisage our final poster design. It has a large image from the film, and a large title. There is a review at the top of the poster and a tagline below the title. The poster also includes a website address. We will be using a similar layout for our own poster.

Full Poster Analysis: Vanishing On 7th Street

Blogged by Naomi



In a similar manner to 'Red State', Brad Anderson's 'Vanishing on 7th Street' was publicised through a string of posters distributed in the run up to the film's release date. However 'Red State' was advertised using a number of teaser posters, whereas 'Vanishing on 7th Street' was advertised using three full posters. Each poster consists of a gripping main image and an accompanying tag line which gives the audience a slight indication of the storyline. Together they tell the audience the basis of the storyline without giving the plot away.

The poster above is one of the three posters distributed for 'Vanishing on 7th Street'. Based on the colour scheme alone there is suspense created as the colour black can symbolise night-time, the time in which many horror films are set. This is contrasted with the off-white text and white/teal effect of the main image. This effect is similar to that of video recording at night, shown in the night scenes of 'Paranormal Activity'. It can also be linked with the posters of 'White Noise'. This effect helps to generate suspense and fear as the light really highlights the static shot of the girl's screams.

The tag line 'Fear lives in the dark' is written in a darker font at the top of the screen, directly linking to being physically in the dark. The tag line itself can easily create fear as it is a relation to the common fear of darkness and again probes the audience to ask questions.

The full poster is complete with the names of the actors appearing in the film, the film website and the film credits.

Teaser Poster: Final Draft

Blogged by Naomi



Above is the final draft of our teaser poster. I believe this is a successful teaser poster as like the teaser poster for Red State it creates questions in the audience's mind which are left unanswered until the release of the trailer or film itself:

- Who is caged?
- Why is she caged?
- Who caged her?
- Where is she?
- What will happen to her?
- Will she escape?

Again, like the teaser poster for Red State the text is coloured red. However in our poster it is a deeper red which can symbolize blood and could perhaps be a subtle hint towards the storyline. Also, as we said before, the colour highlights the red of her hand and contrasts with the cold, blue tone of the main image. The direct eye contact with the audience also helps to draw the audience in and connect them with the main character.

Date Font

Blogged by Group

The font that we used for the title on our poster is not programmed for numbers. This gave us a problem when trying to put the date onto our teaser poster.

We made a version with Roman numerals but we do not think that it looks right and believe it will look better with numbers. Also, the audience may be unfamiliar with roman numerals and so this information would be meaningless to them. Another problem that could be encountered is that because it doesn't state the date in numbers, the audience will not know the release date if they do not know roman numerals.



We have looked through different fonts on Microsoft Word to find one that will work well on our poster:



Another font we liked the look of was 'Times and Times Again'. We fount it on Word but unfortunately it would not work in the document so when we tested the fonts with our poster we looked at it on Photoshop instead.

The font we liked best was 'Times and Times Again'. It looked best with our title as it is not too fussy but also not too plain like 'Times New Roman' might have been. It also has a slight horror look and fits in with the font of the title really well.