FIlm Poster Research- The Ring

This is the film poster for the horror film, 'The Ring'. I really like this poster because it represents the film very accurately. The main image is of a TV screen, showing a well in the middle of a wooded area. The main title 'the Ring' works very well because the letters are filled in with the main character in the film screaming in fear. This gives us a clear sign that the film is a horror. The catchline 'Before You Die, You See', makes the film a lot of scarier. This is because it makes the viewers think that afte they watch the film, they die. Just like in the actual film, after a person sees the 'Evil' Videotape.

I have watched the trailer for the upcoming film, 'War Horse', directed by Steven Spielberg. The movie is about a boy who joins the army during WW1 after his horse, Joey, is sold to the cavalry for the fighting in France. The movie looks very high budget, lot's of special effects are used the set looks very expensive to create. In the trailer, the first scene is the horse running through a live battlefield, dodging explosions and machine gun fire. This gives us a clear view of what the film is about.
The film poster is very simple but also very effective. The main image creates a sense of partnership and friendship.
There is a slogan on the top of the poster which says "Separated by war, Tested by Battle, Bound by friendship". This is a very powerful catchline which anchors the themes portrayed in the film. The colours in the images work very well to create a warm feel, as well as represent the horrific events of the war.


http://www.traileraddict.com/trailer/war-horse/trailer

I think that there is a direct link between the film trailer and the Film poster. These are both above the line forms of advertising. The film producers pay a lot of money for these to be produced. Film posters can be displayed in a lot of places, which is why they are so effective. The magazines however, are a bit different. They are below the line advertising. The magazine company needs material to write about, and the Film producers want to advertise. So the two help each other out. The magazines usually write about a film review after the film has been realesed. But sometimes they talk about the film before it is realesed, mostly interviewing the stars in the films, or the directors, at the film premiere. The magazines aren't as effective as the poster and trailr when it comes to advertising, but they are free for the producers.

Film Poster Research

Movie posters are a visual form of advertising films. They come in all sizes and advertise every genre of film. Up to the 1990's, Film Posters were illustrated, but now however, they have digitally created using high quality photographs of the main actors. Film Posters usualy have the same layout, they include a large piece of text, which is the title. This is usually large and bold. Posters also contain taglines, which state a short line either from the film, or about the film. the same images used in posters are also displayed on the DVD covers and other merchandise. This is usually the iconic photo of the film.

I will be looking at horror film poster, because that is the genre of my trailer. the first poster I will be looking at is Scream 4. It is a simple poster, with big bold letters and colours. The mask in the middle of the photo transforms into a sharp knife, which works well in the sense that the person wearing this mask is the one who murders the chaacters in the original film. The text at the top is the tag line, which reads 'New Decade, New Rules'. I think that this film poster works very well but for anyone who has not seen the trilogy before it will be dificult for them to understand the poster, especially the knife part of the photo.

Magazine Front Cover - Research.

As well as producing a Film Trailer, part of the coursework involves also creating a Film magazine front cover. Firstly, I will do some research on film magazines such as Empire, which is very popular worldwide. I will look at the codes and conventions used in order to create a good front cover which is both eye-catching and looks proffesional.

Empire Magazine

Empire is a monthly film magazine published by Bauer Media. It's circulation was around 194,000 in 2009, and just like all magazines, it makes money mostly by advertising. As it's a film magazine, it advertises films, so it makes a lot of money that way. The magaine contains films reviews, interviews with the directors and stars and behind the scenes stories.

I will be making only a front cover of a film magazine, unlike my previous works where I created a double page spread and contents page as well as a front cover. Empire magazine's front covers are always unique in every issue, depending on the main feature film they are writing about. This front covr of Empire is about the hit film "Avatar". The main feature title in the magazine shows the name of the film, with the director's name above it.This catches the readers attention and makes them want to read more.

Total Film is a British Film magazine produced every month. It was established in 1997 and informs readers about upcoming films, reviews, interviews and much more. The magazine is published by Future Publishing (PLC). I like the front cover in this magazine as it shows a big photo of the two main characters in an upcoming film. This really attracts the readers eye. The colour scheme of the front cover works very well with the what the girl behind Daniel Craig. From this we can tell that this film has a gothic taste to it. In every front cover I see, there is always words like 'Amazing' or 'the best..'. These sort of words can always convince the reader that they are reading the bet magazine of it's kind. 

All magazines have forms and conventions. These are techniques used to attract the audience and make the magazine interesting to read. The most obvious form and convention is the Masthead. This is the main title of the magazine, obviously this is important so that the reader knows what the magazine is. 

Then the other forms and conventions come as follows;
The Main cover Line is the headline of the magazine, this is similar to a newspaper, the most important story or article is displayed partially on the front page to attract the audience's attention. 
The Main cover lines is backed up by a photo of the main article. This photo could be of a band or particular artist, or any other thing depending on the genre of the magazine. 
Puffs are used to boost the magazine's status, things like "the greatest magazine ever" are often said to make the reader want to buy the magazine. 
Plugs are used to hook the audience and catch their attention. This could be a Competition Notice on the front cover or a Special Offer. "FREE Music CD Inside!". This makes the reader or audience want to read on to find out what it is. 
Strapline is a secondary headline, usually under the main headline, to further explain what the main article or story is about. This Anchors the meaning of the headline.

Cover Price- This isn't really something that is used to catch the audiences attention, but to show the price of the magazine. However, it does have to be clear otherwise the audience may not see it and buy the magazine for a diffrent price. 

Bar Code- the bar code is also next to the Cover Price, which is also accompanied by theissue number. The issue number tells the audience what the magazines number it is. For example, monthly magazine running for 24 months would be Issue 24.

Karl Marx and the Representation of the Working Class

Proletariat - People working, doing labor in order to earn money. A fine example of Proletariat in Britain is the coalworkers in 1935, who spent 6 hours per day down in the mines doing dirty, manual work. The Proletariat is the main working class in the UK.
Bourgeosie - People making profits from other's labor. These people are usually large bussiness owners or factories owners.

Film Distribution

Once a film has been produced, the next stage of the timeline is the distribution. Distribution means the selling of the finished product to the cinemas and film company's. Marketing is a big part of the distribution process because it involves the advertising of the finished film. Without advertising, there isn't going to be a big enough audience, which means the film will lose money.

Marketing


Printed Advertising - Poster Campaigns, Billboards, Bus stops, buses, Tube stations, Magazines

TV commercials - costs a lot of money

Cinema trailers

Youtube Trailers/ Official Movie website

ALL of the above are examples of above the line advertising. This means that they are the types of advertising which has to be paid for.

Below the line advertising is the opposite, it is a free form of advertising made possible by recent changes in technology.

The 'Share' function available on ALL Youtube videos

For example, the introduction of social networks in the recent years has had a huge impact on the distribution of films. Let's say someone watches a film trailer on youtube and they like it, so they decided to 'share' the video on their facebook profile, this then becomes available to everyone else. This way of advertising is free because the film producer does not need to pay, instead, the audience advertises the film through facebook. Another way social networking can advertise films for free is through facebook pages. Facebook pages can be created absolutely free and can help to advertise the film.

Stars being photographed by the media

Empire (Film magazine)

Film premiers can attract a lot of media coverage. A lot of media companies, especially those based in Films will often visit premiers and photograph the stars and the film makers. Magazine companies such as Empire will get photographers to travel to the premiers. This is free advertising for the film company because they are not paying for any of it, instead, the other media company are advertising the film in their magazines or tv shows.


The same goes with Film reviews in magazines and talk shows. There is a Symbiotic relationship between film magazines and the actual films themselves. This means that they both benefit the fact that the magazine covering the film, as the magazine needs material, and the film needs to advertise. Obviously if the film has a good review, readers will want to go and watch the film.

Word of mouth advertising

This sort of advertising is usually what gets around the quickest. It is simply advertising through people communicating. Simple people talking to each other about a recent film trailer they saw can lead to other people finding out about it. Someone who has seen a film trailer which they liked can recommend it to a friend. This send works like a chain letter and it gets around quickly.

Unique Selling Proposition
"Scariest Film of the year"
"Funniest Comedy since..."

The Theory of Trailers

What is a marketing campaign and why is it needed?
The marketing campaign plays a big role in advertising an upcoming film to it's target audiences. The companies who loan the film to cinemas to show for a period of time are called the distributors.

Film producers pay a Sales Agent to sell the film to a distributor, who then sells to a cinema. Its quite simple when you think about it. It is said that 25% of a film's total budget goes towards marketing, which is a huge amount when you think about it, given that the film is massively expensive to produce.
Before a trailer is made however, a test screening of the film is shown to an audience of mixed social, race and gender groups. These people watch the test screening and vote for which bits are best to pick out and go on the film trailer. Also, if the audience do not enjoy the film ending, they can give ideas how to change it, so the producer can then quickly film a new scene. The older scene is then put as an alternative ending inside the film's DVD package.

It is important for a trailer to show the genre of the film because the audience need to know if they are going to see the film depending on what genre they enjoy watching. Film trailers need to show evidence of genre which we, as the audience, can decode as we watch. Things like the film Title can give away the genre. Acting, Props, Music, Location and Script can also show the genre.

When is the film trailer produced, in terms of the production timeline?
Most trailers are produced at the same time as the film is being cut and edited.

Script Writing

Before we start filming our trailer, we need to write up a script. We can't just start filming as we go along, we need a plan so we know exactly what we are doing and what each character needs to say. Things in the script include location, character voices and lines to say, camera movement.

On the right is an example of a script I downloaded of the internet. The script describes the scenes and the mise en scene.

Me and my group have already started writing our script. We are writing a short script for each scene. That way we can script a scene and write a storyboard for it so we have it planned straight away. 

Conventions in Film Trailers

Titles
Music
Voices form characters
Diegetic Sound
Captions
Revews- start ratings and quotes
Production Companies
Famous Actors
Director's previous work
Genre
Non-Linear
Voice over

Production Case Studies

I will be talking about 2 Film Production case studies, talking a bit about the films, their budget, profit made and why I think the film was produced.


The first film I would like to talk about is Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later. I will talk a bit about the film and included a link to the movie trailer.




Genre: Horror, Sci-fi, Thriller
Directed by Danny Boyle
Written by Alex Garland
Budget (cost to make) £5,000,000
The film is about a highly contagious 'rage' virus which spreads across the United Kingdom rapidly and devastates country. The story follows the characters Jim, Selena, Mark, Frank and his daughter Hannah as they search for safety. However, throughout their path to 'safety', they have many encounters with the 'Infected'.
The opening scene I think is the most powerful part of the film. It shows Jim, one of the main characters, waking up from a coma 28 days later after the initial start of the virus spread, in a deserted hospital in central London. He wanders around on his own, confused, wondering what is happening. Then he walks through the streets of central London, across the famous London bridge and Big Ben. The streets are littered and completely deserted. Everything is dead silent.

The film was a huge success in the UK because it was so well made. however, it wasn't just the fantastic camera work and acting that made the film worth watching, it was the fact that it was filmed on location. The shots of the deserted London streets really shocked the audiences and created a sense of fear amongst them. Just imagine yourself walking through the lonely streets of London just like Jim did in the opening scenes. When people watched the film, they see the locations it is filmed in and they think to themselves, "Hey, I've been there".
Personally when I watched the film, I experience a cold chill down my spine various times throughout the film. I live in the UK myself, so when I watched the film I just imagined "what if this really happened?"
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The Second film I want to talk about is Saving Private Ryan. The film was released in July 1998 and the movie follows the story of a group of soldiers in WW2 Europe on a mission to rescue Pvt. Ryan, the last remaining son of a mother of 4 sons who all died in the invasion of Normandy in June 1944.

Director: Steven Spielberg
Written by: Robert Rodat
Main Cast: Matt Damon, Tom Hanks
Genre: War, Drama
Budget: $70,000,000

The movie starts with a view of a cemetery in America. We then see Pvt. Ryan as an old man, walking with his family who are walking a few metres behind him. He arrives at an unknown grave in the war cemetery and he burts into tears of sadness. The movie then flips back to June 1944 and we see the main protagonist played by Tom Hanks. We see the invasion of normandy, thousands of soldiers invading the beaches of German occupied France in small boats. The invasion scene lasts a long 20 minutes, with a lot of blood and gore, a lot of war scenes such as ultra realistic explosions and mass killing.

The film was a huge success when it came and today is a modern classic. I think the movie was such a success because of it's realism and accuracy to the real life events that happened in June 6th, 1944. The camera work directed by Steven Spielberg is fantastic, using the hand-held technique to really put the audience into the action. The film shows exactly what the war was like, the bloody scenes of gore and devastation.

Film Production

1) Idea- A Writer comes up with an idea for a film, but it could also be a Producer or a Director coming up with the idea.

2) Development Finance- The writer or person with the idea then goes to a group of film investors and pitches their idea to them. If the people like it, they will give the writer some development money to further develop their idea.

3) Script Development- A script is then made for the film, and a sales treatment which will be used to sell the film to investors.

4) Packaging Moment- Merchandise for the film is made, in order to make some money before the film is produced and released. The genre of the film is also decided, in order to determine the audience for the film. A storyboard is also created with the cast listing.

5) Financing- Investors. Pre-sales. Insurance. Completion Bond- insurance in case the film doesn't get finished, so the producers don't lose all their money.

6) Storyboarding, Casting, Equipment, Special Effects, Set Design.

7) The Shoot

8) Post Production- working on editing the film, sound editing rough cut ect..