Final Trailer - Straits

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

It is important when creating any media piece to use media technologies to their full potential in order to make sure the final product is the best it can be. There are many different platforms readily available on both the internet and Apple Mac software including; YouTube, SurveyMonkey.com, DaFont.com, Wix.com, Final Cut Pro and Photoshop. This is something which- as a group- we utilised throughout the process of making our teaser trailer. By categorising the stages in three sections: research and planning (analysis and deconstruction of existing products), construction (filming, editing), and evaluation (audience feedback)- we were able to strategically use the technology available to us to create a successful outcome.


Research and Planning

The first thing to consider when planning our piece was carrying out a thorough investigation into the conventions of narrative within the genre we had chosen. This would allow us to have an insightful understanding as to what we needed to include to meet the standard of trailer we were aiming for. To do so we used YouTube as a main media platform in which to watch existing urban drama teaser trailers, and music videos and then deconstructed different elements of these (click here to see deconstruction). From doing this we were able to construct a storyboard which gave us a clear plan for filming and the post production stages.

After doing an explicit investigation into many aspects of the existing urban drama genre we began to plan more specific parts of our trailer. We obtained primary research through the use of website Survey Monkey, allowing us to ask the general public questions which would help us make vital decisions during the planning stage. For example, we produced a survey which asked various questions relating back to the title of our piece. As this image suggests, this process had a significant effect on our decisions, as we took the results into consideration and named our teaser trailer 'Straits'. We promoted our survey on social media platforms including Facebook and Twitter. Aiming the surveys at 15+ year olds meant we were able to get opinions from actual members of our target audience. (click here for survey results)



Furthermore, we looked into new post-production media technologies which are used in production of film websites and posters. This gave us ideas on what we could do to suit a modern day audience and conform to conventions, using the technologies available to the best of our ability. Google Images allowed us to browse through multiple images of existing film posters and analyse these in depth before beginning the process of creating our own. (click here to see poster deconstruction)

Construction

The media platform in which we created our piece  on was Final Cut Pro, software which proved useful and effective in many ways during the post-production stages. Once we had cropped and ordered our footage we were able to manipulate it in certain ways to appeal to trailer conventions and our target audience. This included adding black and white filters, effects including 'intro flashes', reversing, and increasing the speed of shots. These were all effects which had been inspired by conventions found in our research stage. One of the most useful technologies that was available on Final Cut Pro was the stabilising tool; it was this that allowed for the smooth and professional tracking shot of the underpass which appears at many points in our teaser trailer.

Final Cut Pro also proved useful when applying the sound to our trailer. We were able to create multiple layers in order to smoothly mix the two songs we had chosen and taken from un-copyrighted distributors on YouTube. Furthermore, we could create sound bridges in which to include diegetic sounds of the characters speaking which was something we found was often seen in the urban drama genre.


Typography played an important part in our teaser trailer. As we learnt from AS, it can help define a genre and develop the professional quality of a piece. In the process of creating a unique typography for our end titles we found a suitable font on online service DaFont. We downloaded this font and then manipulated it to have the blue and red 3D effect using Photoshop. (click here for typography editing) These media technologies were also used in the construction of our film poster.

We used the internet to search and analyse many existing film websites, giving us an insight into what was generally included within these. We used the website creating service Wix, to design and construct our film website which would be a distributor of our trailer. This media technology made the task fairly easy and allowed us to achieve a professional looking film website. (click here to see website production)

Evaluation

After posting our first draft onto YouTube, we arranged a focus group in which we showed a number of people the trailer and asked for constructive feedback. We also used this media platform as a way of self- evaluating; comparing our product to existing professional trailers and other A2 media pieces. From this we found that a number of things required a certain level of improvement. The general consensus that we got from this was that we needed to improve the tension and build up the pace slower  and to fade out the music more subtly at the end.

We took all the comments into consideration and used Final Cut Pro to improve on all the areas that had been raised. We then reposted our trailer onto YouTube and received comments which met the level that we had hoped for.

We revisited our first draft video on YouTube and compared it to our final piece and from doing this were able to check that we had included all of the necessary improvements suggested in our audience feedback.
(click here to see full comparison)

(click here for improvement)

Website Production

Before creating our own website, a lot of research needed to be carried in order to grasp the conventions of film websites so as to adopt them in the creation of ours. The main conventions that we found in film websites were:

• Teaser Trailer set to play automatically as soon as you enter the website.
• Title on top right or centre using same typography as in trailer. 
• Background suggestive of narrative- often featuring location or protagonist.
• Simple yet consistent colour scheme conforming to genre. 
• 4-8 links to other pages on website (e.g. gallery, cast, book tickets) 
• Links to twitter, facebook etc.
• Reviews/ ratings of the film.

 By looking at the website for 2015 film Run All Night the conventions are seen and we were able to decide how best to apply these to our website. when going onto this website the screen automatically plays the trailer, after which the background displaying the title and other information appears allowing you to navigate around the other pages on the site. 

The design of this website uses a basic black, blue and yellow colour scheme hinting at the genre of action. This runs parallel with the background which involves the modern day setting and introduces the protagonist and other members of the cast. 

We used Wix to create our website, and chose the 'Film Site' template as our basic starting point.

The first stage involved choosing an appropriate background for our site, which portrayed the genre and setting of the trailer. For this we photoshopped a picture of our protagonist into the foreground of an establishing shot of London taken from our trailer. Upon customising the background we chose to have the image fill the whole screen and scroll down with the page, giving a professional feel to the website.


We chose what links to other pages to have after comparing lots of existing film websites to see which occurred most often. We chose to have pages linking to home, about, gallery, contact and book tickets. By placing these at the top in a subtle font size and colour, the website appears professional and conforms to the genre.

The most important part of the film website is the trailer, allowing the audience an insight into genre and narrative. We made the trailer a focal point of the page, making sure it was the first thing the audience saw. We chose the option to make it play automatically in order to immediately attract the viewer's attention- a convention we saw was extremely common in existing film websites.

Many film websites used reviews from national sources, such as newspapers, as a main way of promoting their film. In many cases, these often involved star ratings- something we wanted to imitate in our website production. To create this effect, I found a plain black star image with a transparent background on google and imported this as an image onto the website. I then chose an appropriate size for the star and duplicated it many times. Obviously it was key to put high ratings (we chose to do 5 star and 4 star), and also short quotes which would make a strong impact. We included the quote from 'The Sunday Times' which appears at the beginning of our trailer so as to display continuity. Again, we stuck to the black, white and grey colour scheme that appears throughout the website so as to conform to the aesthetic appeal of the page.

Below is an image of the final production of our website. Whilst the layout is fairly simple, this gives a professional effect. The genre becomes immediately clear through the background image, colour scheme and reviews. As you can see, the typography of the title is the same as used in the trailer, showing continuity and acting as a trademark to our piece.

 

Finally, we reviewed the layout of the website as it would appear on a mobile phone, making sure that the placement of the features would work in a portrait view as well as in landscape.

 

Evaluation- First Draft vs. Final Piece

As you can see from comparing the first draft of our trailer to the final piece, a lot of things were changed in order to further enhance the effect and impact that the trailer had. The main differences between the two include:

•  An increase in the typography size- we particularly wanted the review to stand out more as it is the first shot and therefore plays a key part in enticing an audience.
• In terms of the rest of the typography that appears throughout the trailer, rather than using the plain black background as seen in the first draft, we used the reoccurring shot of the underpass as a background for this. This gave a much more professional sense to the overall piece.
• We changed the initial shot of our protagonist as we felt this better matched our narrative aim. The shot used in the first draft makes him appear worried whereas we wanted him to appear fairly calm at the beginning in order to conform to Todorov's theory of equilibrium.
• We added more post- production elements to our final piece as we noticed that the first draft was lacking in this. The main thing that this included was the use of the black and white filter in certain shots- a convention we found was common in existing urban drama trailers.
• We also filmed new shots in which to include such as the violence shots. This was the main thing that we felt was missing from our first draft- stopping us from excelling into the typical urban drama conventions. Obviously we did not have access to stunt doubles and therefore had to think cleverly about how we filmed fight scenes whilst making them look realistic.
• We removed unnecessary shots that appeared in our first draft, such as the ones of the protagonist running up the stairs and the group of girls smoking. Not only did these not add anything to our trailer but they appeared unprofessional and amateur at points. By doing this we allowed ourselves more time for more effective shots.
• We improved the appearance of the drug lord by using a sound bridge to merge his voice with other shots. This made him appear a lot more intimidating, adding the element of mystery that the trailer required.
• We increased the pace more steadily by making the shots gradually get faster and more action intensive. The end of the final piece particularly contrasts with the first draft as there is a lot more action shots (such as the protagonist jumping over the gate) which added to the excitement of the trailer.
• The black and white shot of the protagonist with a black eye and blood dripping helps to enhance the clarity of the genre and conform to the narrative that we were aiming towards. Used in conjunction with the shot of him on the floor with a bat and a pool of blood, the audience can see the violent theme that runs within the narrative and is enticed by the sense of danger.
• The difference between the first draft and trailer was the fact the title at fist appears over the final shot of the protagonist before reverting onto a black background. This forms a smoother link between the trailer and the ending, giving a much more professional look to the piece.

Shooting script: Day 6

12:30 pm: arrive at car park location
12:45 pm: get shots running through car park
01:00 pm: get shots of car park ceiling whilst moving

BREAK

04:00 pm: meet at second location, empty basketball court
04:15 pm: costume change into tracksuits
04:25 pm: shots of Ben fighting
04:35 pm: shots of Ben climbing fences and gates
04:45 pm: filming day ends

Evaluation:

• The fighting scenes were shot on school premises. We tried to make this as unnoticeable as possible. 
• Difficult to keep the camera steady whilst filming the tracking shot of the car park ceiling. We will attempt to stabilise this shot in the editing stages on the software Final Cut Pro.  

Shooting script: Day 5

06:00 pm: actor arrives (Kevin)
06:10 pm: costume change into suit and eccentric tie
06:15 pm: props gathered
06:15 pm: shoot optional speaking shots with Kevin outside
06:30 pm: shots of Kevin speaking inside, using various angles and rooms.
07:00 pm: Holly arrives
07:15 pm: costume changes
07:20 pm: shots of Holly drinking alcohol and doing 'balloons'
07:50 pm: filming day ends

Evaluation:

• We do not possess a proper microphone used for filming so we had to make do with the in-built microphone of the camera. This limited the quality of shots filmed with diegetic sound such as actor (Kevin) speaking. 

Shooting script: Day 4

05:30 pm: arrive at filming location inside house
05:45 pm: gather props such as roll of money
05:50 pm: film shots with Ben giving mother character money
06:00 pm: test night street lighting
06:15 pm: get shots of Ben in street
06:35 pm: filming day ends

Evaluation:

• Very low levels of light outside made it hard to film without needing a light source. We got around this by using a low street light to light up Ben's face properly. 
• We were unable to produce a roll of money big enough so we had to make do with as much as we had.

Shooting script: Day 3

04:00 pm: locational shots such as Ferris wheel
04:30 pm: locational shots of Canary wharf and city
05:00 pm: get skateboard and film forward-tracking Greenwich underpass shot
06:00 pm: get multiple skateboard shots of Greenwich underpass
06:15 pm: filming day finishes

Evaluation:

• Greenwich underpsas forward-tracking shot was more successful than anticipated although it proved difficult to keep the shot steady- we will attempt to stabilise the shot in Final Cut Pro during the editing stages. 

Shooting script: Day 2

BUS JOURNEY TO FIRST LOCATION
01:00 pm: arrive at underpass location
01:15 pm: actors arrive (Ben and Justas)
01:20 pm: set up props such as placebo joint and test lighting for best shots
01:30 pm: take range of shots of boys smoking
01:50 pm: drug deal over underpass shot
02:00 pm: shots of Ben smoking alone
03:15 pm: filming day ends

Evaluation:

• Filming a range of shots were effective and gave us options and choice whilst editing our teaser trailer.
• Overcast weather was not ideal and not what we had hoped for.

Shooting script: Day 1

10:00 am: set up shed into drug den setting mise en scene including open cans of beer, bottles, cigarettes, baggies etc

11:00 am: get props sorted such as faux cocaine
11:30 am: Ben arrives
11:40 am: Ben changes into costume
11:50 am: shots of Ben preparing drugs from a variety of angles.

BUS JOURNEY TO SECOND LOCATION

01:30 pm: Buy cigarettes and prepare costume
02:00 pm: Meet Monique, Rebecca and Holly at the skate park, with camera and tripod.
02:30 pm: get a variety of shots of them smoking in front of the graffiti skate ramp

BUS JOURNEY TO THIRD LOCATION

03:30 pm: shots of girl putting lighter to spoon and foil
04:00 pm: filming day ends

Evaluation:

• Struggled slightly in the logistics of the correct actor(s) being ready to film when scheduled.
• Props (fake drugs) worked well- looked realistic and actors were able to use them authentically.

Typography Editing- Photoshop

After deciding on the title and typography we began editing it on photoshop for the image in our trailer. 

We wanted all the letters in the word to conjoin and therefore needed to fill in the gap between the 'i' and the 't'. I zoomed in and used the brush tool  to fill in this space neatly in white. 

We noticed that most urban drama titles use a black background and mainly white text to display their title, which we decided to conform to in our trailer. 

 To add a modern element to our piece we wanted to add the recognised 3D effect to our title and the same text in red and blue individually behind original white text. 

 We played around with different effects on the title adding this such as a grainy look but after comparing different filters we decided to leave it plain white, red and blue to give it the stand out effect we desire for the title. 

Title Development

After doing extensive research into typical urban drama film titles we found that the can use a variety of techniques to have an affect on the audience. I have decided to create a survey asking the public a series of questions on what the title should include/be. The key questions that i plan to ask will include:

1) should the title have an obvious link to the storyline?
2) should it be play on words?
3) which drug related title is your favourite?
4) which non-drug related one is your favourite?
5) which one is your overall favourite and why?

I did some research onto drug related terms that might make an affective title for our piece and particularly liked the five:

Comedown
Intoxicant
Joint
Roach
Re-up

I also wanted to look into using some non-drug related words as a title and found that these sounded very appropriate for our trailer:

Destitution
Privation
Depletion
Straits
Exiguity


Results:

From the results it was clear that we should not directly link the title to the narrative but however, should involve a play on words more loosely linked with the genre. 'Comedown' and 'Straits' were by far the most popular choices of title so I weighed up the pros and cons of both. With consideration to these and looking at the results for the final question, i decided that Straits would be the best title for our piece. Not only does it represent the 'dire straits' the protagonist is facing but also is a play on words to the 'straight' lines of cocaine that will feature in the trailer. 

Film Reviews and Ratings

After completely research into existing film posters, its clear to see how including a review, quote or rating can be an effective way to attract the target audience. We have decided this is something we are looking to include in our film poster, so therefore it is necessary to decide on an appropriate way of doing so. Below are images taken from a number of posters that have used a variety of ways to attract the audience through an external quote or opinion.

These three quotes are taken from the poster for The Raid 2, an action film. This particular poster features several ratings and quotes from a variety of sources. By using the bright yellow, bold, sans-serif typography (all in capital letters) contrasting with the dark background image, the reviews stand out immediately and draw attention from the reader.
In terms of the content of the quotes, the length and lexical devices varied. The first quote "Jaw-dropping", uses the well known idiom to relate to the audience thus making them trust the review. The second review also uses a short quote to impact the audience. By saying "An action masterpiece", the film is placed on a pedestal and is giving the impression that it is better than other action films. The third quote, "Masterfully tense... a monumental experience" uses a lot more wording than the others in the poster however is still very effective. By calling the film an 'experience', it tells the audience that they will not only be watching a film but be taken on a journey.

This quote is from the poster for Minority Reports. It uses synthetic personalisation with the word 'your', directly addressing the audience encouraging them as individuals to watch the film. The five-star rating is displayed in a different colour, making this stand out even more.
"One of the greatest movies ever made", is a very bold statement and could be easily challenged but cleverly entices the audience to see it for themselves.

Quite often posters mention awards and nominations in order to attract an audience. They are often well established and therefore work well to promote the film.  

The Gravity poster uses the technique of having a lot of reviews randomly placed, disorientating the audience thus conforming to the genre. It also features play on words, putting all the space related terms in a bold font. As you can see, in this particular poster, the reviews make up the basis of the attraction rather than the background image. This is a more modern approach to advertisement and promotion of films, stepping away from the stereotypical visual appeal posters usually adopt.

New Casting Profiles

We faced a lot of problems with our original actors and therefore to keep continuity decide to start again and re-film many parts with a completely new cast. We ended up using six actors in the final piece, each playing an important role in the trailer. In terms of the characters in reference to theory of narrative, many conform to Propp's theory on 'spheres of action' and adopt one of his seven different character types.


Name: Ben Wallace
Character: Protagonist, the 'hero'










Name: Kevin Dowling
Character: Antagonist, the 'villain'









Name: Jill Avery
Character: Mother of protagonist, the 'dispatcher'

Name: Justas Zabotka
Character: Friend of protagonist, the 'helper'





Name: Holly MacDougall
Character: Drug buyer, possible 'donor' or 'false hero'






Name: Ella Dowling
Character: Drug buyer, possible 'donor' or 'false hero'

Ill Manors- Mise en Scene

• Opens with an establishing shot of skyline of rough estate in London. Cloudy grey weather and smoke connotes the dismal and dark lives of those living in the run down urban areas.
• Scaffolding around building is visually unattractive showing the gritty realism of urban London estates.
• People smoking, stereotypical of this class of people, perhaps forced to turn to smoking, alcohol, drugs?
• Masks covering majority of face and hoods worn up- intimidating, suggesting they are hiding from someone.
• Natural lighting enhances realism.
• Low key lighting in the car park, shadowing faces.
• Images of politicians- attacking upper class individuals, blaming them.
• Red flickering light seen before actual flames, indicating the simmering fire.
• Dog chews and excretes David Cameron, explicitly offensive.  
• Young children featured, showing how there is no escape- born into a corrupt society.
• Punch camera- threatening behaviour.
• Newspaper images, displaying the negative portrayal of youths in the media.
• Real footage from London riots.
• Riot police charging towards youths- war within society.
• Fighter dogs.
• Filming on camera phones laughing.
• Police and politicians punching members of the public.
• Smashing/ burning police cars- rebelling against the system.
• Multiple shots of fights, violent behaviour.
• Middle finger being held up, cursing government.
• Old woman being pushed in wheelchair vs. cartoon image of old woman being attacked. Reality vs. media portrayal.
• Stealing/ theft.
• Reference to gang culture.
• Throwing bricks through glass.
• Chaotic/ busy streets.

Diegetic and Non-diegetic Sound

As opposed to our AS piece which was a film opening, trailers more commonly use diegetic sound throughout- something that is much harder to produce and make sound effective and professional. We definitely want to include some sort of speech in our trailer, not only to conform to trailer convention, but to challenge our production and technological skills. There is generally two options in which we could involve speech; on screen coming directly from the protagonist, or off-screen. Something that we are particularly interested in trying is using a sound bridge to make off-screen speech flow smoothly into on-screen. Subverting typical urban drama stereotypes, we are considering having the villain of the narrative speaking rather than the main protagonist. By doing so, we feel that we can create a massive impact on the audience by building tension through this medium.

In terms of non-diegetic sound we aim to use in our trailer, we plan to use a fast paced rap piece as the main body of it in order to conform to urban drama genre conventions. Obviously we will need to a lot of research in order to find a professional sounding piece which is not copyrighted. In conjunction with the typical rap music, we also want to incorporate some form of slowly melodic music at the beginning. Conforming to Todorov's theory of narrative, we want to begin our piece with softer music and establishing shots to suggest a sense of equilibrium. We hope to then gradually fade in the more urban fast paced music running parallel with the increased pace of shots- helping to build tension and excitement.

Ill Manors Trailer Deconstruction

The trailer for Ill Manors opens with this political statement by Plan B. By using this, the trailer immediately gets the audience thinking and therefore making them look at the trailer in a different light. This works as a very powerful introduction and is certainly something we can consider for our trailer.



Reviews are a key thing we have found are involved in trailers- particularly of the urban drama genre. They often include a short and powerful comment, such as "a film for our times" or "brilliant... brutal... powerful"- and are usually from well-known sources (either individuals or corporations) thus appearing reliable to the audience.



The Ill Manors trailer focuses a lot on the film's tag line, "Every action has a reaction, but what influences the choice you make". This particular statement uses a number of devices to impact the audience. The first part is a declarative statement and thus is worded in a way that sound like fact. The second part, on the other hand, is interrogative and uses synthetic personalisation to directly address the audience which the word 'you'. It provokes the viewer to respond and therefore is a good technique into encouraging people to watch the film.
The way that the tag line is presented is very manipulative, as by split it up into separate parts, the audience is forced to carry on watching to make sense of it. Each part appears over an image which strongly shows the urban drama genre. By using a mixture of both beautiful skylines and gritty street close ups, the trailer is much more dynamic and appeals to a wider variety of people.

The final typography which displays the title Ill Manors is fairly simple but has a huge impact on the ending of the trailer. The white font on black background means it is clear and draw the attention to the title itself rather than distracting with aesthetic aspects. This is a common convention of the urban drama genre as they rarely focus on the visual appeal but rather  look at the narrative and attempt to convey a message.
                                                                                       

Initial storyboard

This is the initial storyboard for our teaser trailer.

The Wire- Drug Dealer Shots

The wire is an American crime drama series set in the city of Baltimore. The most key focus of the series looks into the illegal drug trade and therefore is useful for us to take inspiration from when filming drug deals for our trailer. The location of the shots and the specific types of camera angles plays an important role in cleverly showing the drug deals. 

This shot uses a close up of the two characters hands to clearly show the theme of drug dealing. By simply shoeing the exchange of money, the drug deal is not explicit shown but is cleverly implied. As we are doing a teaser trailer it will be important for us to quickly and simply hit at the drug dealing aspect of the narrative. 

This is a typical drug dealing scene; with a mid-shot being used to show a car window dealing. The low key lighting makes this appear to be at night and therefore adds to the illegal and criminal theme, running parallel with the dark connotations of drug dealing. This would be easy for us to recreate as a shot in our trailer.

This high angle over the shoulder shot gives the scene more of a diversity. The gang being in the background could indicate some sort of violence or illegal drug dealing activity going on. the over the shoulder shot of somebody taking a photo adds the element of them being stalked or under the eye of the police (surveillance). This allows the audience to see the narrative from a different perspective, challenging their opinions and attitudes.

Poster ideas- Photoshop Double Exposure

For the poster for our film we are going to experiment with using the double exposure effect on photoshop in order to involve an image of the protagonist and the urban location in order to clearly show the genre of our trailer. I have started to investigate how this process works and created some test images. I found pictures on Google images to experiment with, trying to link closely with the narrative of our trailer. 

I chose this photo of an urban London skyline as it appears busy and represents the dark, gritty theme of our trailer well. I hoped to merge this picture with the image of the male model.

 
After uploading both of my chosen images into a new photoshop document I moved both of them into one layer. I then used to opacity tool to make the image of the skyline more transparent. Around 50% opacity gave the best effect for this. 

This is how the image appeared after this transparency process. Whilst this still has an effective look, i wanted to make the skyline image appear only over the model, leaving the background white. I also thought it would be effective to slightly lighten the image that layers over the shadow in order to add another dimension to the final outcome.

To achieve my desired effect, I had to manipulate the colours on the first layer, specifically focusing on the background. I lightened the picture of the skyline so as to make the image less harsh over both the background and picture of the male. However, this still did not completely clear the background of the skyline so I therefore had to play around with the colour and intensity levels of the white background to get the image to completely disappear in these parts.

The next stage in the construction of the image was sharpening it as by previous stages had meant it had lost it's visual impact. Finally, I changed the intensity of highlights and shadows darkening some area in order to further conform to the conventions of urban drama.

I feel that the final outcome is a very effective a professional one. We could definitely consider using this in the construction of our actual poster.