Friday 4 April 2014

Theatrical Trailer | Magazine Front Cover | Theatrical Poster




Evaluation: Music & Sound

One aspect of our trailer that we are particularly proud of is our use of music. The music was composed by James Richardson especially for our film, and we worked closely with him to create just the sound that we wanted. The cello in the soundtrack that takes the melody for much of the duration of the track was played by myself and layered on top of the other layers of music. We feel that the music complimented the film very well, as it evoked by the emotional and physical intensity of the film. There are four main sections to the music - the quiet opening, the intense build up, the mini climax, the large climax, and the calm ending.

The quiet opening sets the scene and establishes the film. It works well with the soothing landscape shots and the silhouettes. This part is played by solo piano and reflects the feelings of loneliness that Lucas Thorne feels at the beginning of the trailer. There is a feeling of calm and equilibrium, which puts the audience into a false sense of security. It works well with the narration over the top - the soothing music mingles with the soft poetry to create a truly epic, yet low key opening. It is very clear from the music that it is the equilibrium and the world is how it's been for a while. However at the same time the narration hints at a darker side to the opening, foreshadowing the horrors that are to come. Some of the visuals also show this, such as the silhouetted shot of someone holding a gun and the shot of Lucas Thorne holding a gun.

The next section of the music builds up to the middle part of the trailer. There is combination of sounds mixed together to create a sort of horror slide that built up the intensity of the scene. This sudden change in tone in the music indicated clearly that something has changed and gone wrong. The audience can clearly see that this section is the breaking of the equilibrium (as noted by Todorov), as the music is harsh and grating. The sudden change also reflects the sudden change in the style of the visuals - from long still landscape shots to uncomfortable jump cuts and Dutch tilts. The sound of the slide was created mostly using a violin, but the piano also supported it. We feel that this was a very successful part of our trailer, as the music and visuals worked in tandem to create the feeling that something has gone wrong.

The following section  begins the main part of the trailer, and establishes the rough outline of the plot. The music in this part is mainly led by the cello; with three cello parts intermingling to create a contrapuntal texture. This is reflective of the intermingling plot lines, where there are several characters all with their separate storylines. This climaxes 1:14, where the storylines of the hero and the villain finally collide, and to match this all the cello parts finally come together and play the same chord rather than their separate parts. This part was also successful, as it didn't build up too much, and left room for the music to build more in the next section.

The penultimate section has the most epic music. It uses the full orchestra (albeit synthesised) to emphasise to the audience that it is coming towards the climax of the trailer. There is less dialogue in this part, as the action just speaks for itself. There is the villain's dialogue at the beginning of the section to establish his character, but after this the only dialogue occurs in one-liners or, at the end, one-worders. The music really drives this final section of the trailer, and it is largely due to the music that this section is so intense and epic.

The final section reestablishes the calm and soothing theme heard at the beginning. This hints at a reinstatement of the equilibrium, but contrasts with the visuals which seems to imply that all hope is lost. This contrast creates an enigma, and leaves the audience wondering what is going to happen - whether the hero will be successful or not. The music is key in this section, as it establishes just the mood that we want to evoke at the end of the trailer, and leaves the audience intrigued to find out more about the film.

In conclusion I think that our use of music and sound was very successful in supporting the visuals of the trailer, and it was one of the key features of the trailer that made it successful. Without the music, the trailer would have lacked pace and emotion, leaving it just a random selection of action shots. If we were to do it again, it would be nice to get a full orchestra instead of synthesised instruments, but this was impractical for us and it sounded amazing nonetheless. James Richardson's royalty free music site can be found at the link below:
http://kingjamesroyaltyfreemusic.blogspot.co.uk

Evalution Activity 2: Director's Commentary

Sync this audio track to the trailer to hear how various genre and narrative theories can be applied to our trailer!


Evaluation: Establishing the Enigma Code

Media theorist Roland Barthes devised a the theory of the enigma code, in which he claimed that the purpose of the author of a media text is to keep the audience guessing through establishing enigmas for the audience to work out. These are conventionally revealed in the final scene of the film. This is a useful tool for a trailer, as establishing enigma codes makes the audience want to find out the answers to the enigmas and go and see the film. In our trailer we have made use of this.

The trailer begins with many enigmas, with no characters being fully shown and the narration leaving the plot line fairly open ended. Instead of revealing characters' faces we show silhouettes and limbs. It is not until right at the end of the opening sequence that the lead protagonist is finally shown, and when he is he is loading a gun, creating another enigma about the reasons for having a gun. Even when he is shown, half of his face is shrouded in shadow, so the audience doesn't see him fully, making him seem mysterious. The narration supports this mystery through the recital of a very ambiguous poem that establishes themes rather than plot points. This is a slightly unconventional start to a trailer, so the audience is drawn in by something a bit different whilst at the end the conventions of an action film are adhered to, to make the audience feel more comfortable. This adheres to Neale's theory of genre, in which he argues that pleasure is derived from 'repetition and difference'. The narration also has some relevance to the film, as it is a poem taken from Percy Shelly's 'Prometheus Unbound', which has a similar title and very similar themes. This is the sort of thing that would excited audiences and could be the start of a viral marketing campaign. Through using this ambiguous poem we interest a wide audience and create an enigma code.

Enigmas are also established later on in the trailer, such as through the action sequences. The audience is left wondering how the characters escape from the situations which they find themselves in. One example of this is at 1:44 when four men in balaclavas advance on Agent Davidson. This is obviously a dangerous and almost hopeless situation, making the audience wonder how he is going to escape. A similar enigma is established at 1:14 when Thorne is pointing a gun at the villain as if he is about to shoot. The audience would be aware that the film can't end there as the trailer wouldn't give that much away, so it creates the enigma about how he is going to escape from that situation. This is obviously established as an enigma, as the music builds up to the moment, making it seem important. Another enigma is at 1:36 where Thorne is seen holding onto Rick as if he's injured. This makes the audience wonder what has happened to Rick and if he's in danger. The trailer also ends on an enigma, with Thorne crawling along injured and then shooting. Questions are raised as to whether he was successful in his shot and who he was shooting. By establishing all these enigmas the audience has a plethora of questions that they want answers to, and they realise that the only way they're going to get the answers is by going to see the film.

Overall we have used enigma codes a great deal in our trailer to pull in a wider audience who want to know answers to the questions we have raised. This is a key part of creating trailers, as if we answer all the questions in the trailer and give too much away then the audience wouldn't have any reason to watch the film. I think this is one of the areas in which we have been particularly successful, as we haven't given very much away at all, and there are even gaps in the general premise of the film which the audience are left wondering about. 

Thursday 3 April 2014

Evaluation Activity 2: Our Marketing Campaign

Our poster, magazine front cover and trailer all worked well together to create a consistent and recognisable advertisement campaign. Each one had a slight twist that allowed the viewer to see the film from a different angle, yet they all had consistent features, giving the audience more reasons to want to see the film.

The most obvious way that the campaign linked together was through the establishment that it's an action genre. Each of the pieces of the campaign had guns in, which is a clear indicator of the genre. It was most difficult to make the magazine front cover look like an action film, as the 'Hollywood Reporter' design doesn't show a frame from the film, but instead the actors behind the film. To counter this, we made the actors hold guns and balaclavas and set the photoshoot in a room that is visible in the trailer. This all pointed towards the action genre, and linked the film in with the trailer and poster more. It was also linked by giving prevalence to certain characters; in all three adverts, Lucas Thorne is the biggest/highest/given the most prevalence, followed by Rothen (the villain, played by James Richardson) and finally Zubasu. It is clear throughout the campaign that my character is the main character and we made this even clearer by releasing a special 'character poster' of Thorne, and not releasing a poster of any other characters. By making this clear the audience is able to get to know the lead protagonist more and connect with them, rather than just view them from a distance. At the same time, we focussed a fair amount of the campaign on James Richardson's character Rothen, as the film has a large emphasis on the villain as well as the hero. This is following Claude Levi-Strauss' theory of binary oppositional forces; that stories focus on the conflict between opposite forces, in this case good and evil. To make this conflict clear, our advertisement campaign had a large focus on the villain as well as the hero, and we even released a second magazine front cover with an exclusive interview with the actor playing him. The trailer also supports this theory, as the first half of the trailer has a heavy focus on Thorne, whilst the second half focuses on the villain. Each one has a lengthy speaking role at the beginning of their section, establishing them as the two conflicting forces. In the same way, our poster shows both the lead protagonist and the lead antagonists in similar poses, showing how whilst they're very different, the very nature of their opposites makes them similar. It follows the line in the trailer when the villain says 'we're not so very different you and I, we're both destined for the same damnation, only I'm willing to let the world burn along the way.'

Another way that our advertising campaign works together successfully is through showing the film in different lights. This is particularly prominent in the differences between the poster and trailer and the magazine front cover. The poster and trailer very much focus on the film and the storyline, whereas the magazine front cover's focus is more on the technical, behind-the-scenes side. This allows the audience to get to know the film on multiple levels, from behind and in front of the camera. It makes the audience feel more involved, as if they were part of the process themselves. The poster offers a slightly different perspective than the trailer, as it has reviews from magazines and newspapers at the side, to show its positive critical reception. Neither the magazine front cover or the trailer show this, so it again gives the audience a different reason to watch it - that it is critically acclaimed. This also appeals one of the uses in the Uses and Gratifications Theory by Blumler and Katz (1970), as one of the reasons that the audience might watch it is to talk about it. This links in with our magazine front cover, where the reader can find out more about the film. With these two together, the audience might watch the film to talk about it with friends, both as a critically acclaimed film and a technically interesting film. The magazine front cover also appeals to the gratification of being informed; it gives interesting information on the film that wouldn't be given in the poster and trailer. The trailer on the other hand appeals to the other of the uses and gratifications; it's action packed nature fulfils escapism and entertainment and watching the characters makes them easier to relate to. Through our campaign, we are able to exploit all of the factors in the Uses and Gratifications Theory to create a thoroughly well rounded and appealing film campaign.

The most obvious way in which our campaign links together is through the title of the film. In all three texts the title is very big and bold and the most obvious piece of text (apart from 'The Hollywood Reporter' on the magazine front cover). This is the way in which the audience is ultimately going to be able to identify that they're from the same advertising campaign. On the magazine front cover, the viewer may recognise the actors and the feel of the film, but the text is obvious so that they can confirm their thoughts. In the poster it is also very obvious, so the audience first sees the exciting action in the top half of the poster and then scans down to see which film it is. In the trailer the title is put at the end and is very obvious as it takes up the whole screen. This is a convention of film trailers, as if it were to be put at the beginning then people might lose interest in the trailer before watching the entire piece and then deciding on it. Throughout the campaign the title is reinforced and the brand of the film is made very clear. There are many posters which don't show the film's title and assume the audience know what it is, however this could easily lead to confusion, so our campaign avoids this.

The campaign is also successful as it doesn't give too much of the plot line away. All three parts of the campaign avoid using cliche tag lines, as this would make it seem less 'high brow' and make it seem even more mysterious. The poster in particular leaves many enigmas, something which theorist Barthes considers vital, with the big eyes in the background looking directly at the audience. The viewer may wonder whose eyes they are and why they are shrouded in darkness. The magazine front cover creates enigmas in a different way, as it reveals very little about the plot line at all, just revealing the genre of the film to appeal to the target audience. By doing the magazine front cover as The Hollywood Reporter instead of Empire or Total Film, we have revealed ever less about our storyline, as The Hollywood Reporter concentrates less on plot line and more on the celebrities. The trailer probably leaves the most enigmas, as the plot line is never explicitly explained. The dialogue in the trailer is very vague, with lines such as 'you're not the only one with a stake in this world' avoiding what the 'stake' is. The poem read at the beginning of the trailer begins it with an enigma. The audience is left wondering what the poem has to do with the film, and why it was read out. The poem itself is very unspecific and put out of context (as it is) it could mean almost anything. This makes the audience want to see the film to discover what it means and why it was used at the trailer. However it does also establish some of the key themes of the film, so that they get some idea of what the film it about. The opening is full of enigmas, and the use of lots of silhouettes helps to establish many more riddles.

Overall each part of the campaign works both individually and together to create a rounded campaign that appeals to a wide audience. There are many enigmas established and we have used many theories to help boost the impact of our campaign. Whilst the different parts of our campaign use very different techniques, they are clearly linked together, and make a full cohesive marketing campaign for our film.

Evaluation Activity 3: Audience Feedback 2



 This is the second audience feedback session that we hosted - asking a sample audience of our key demographic to view our trailer and offer their opinons. One of the first points they made was that it looked very much like a Hollywood blockbuster and felt very professional and high budget. This was exactly what we were aiming for, so was clearly a successful part of our production. Another of the audience members commented that it was very 'clean cut' and 'to the point', meaning that we revealed enough of the film to intrigue the audience, but not too much to give away the storyline. We feel that we especially achieved this in the opening with the poem taken from Percy Shelley's 'Prometheus Unbound', which hints at the storyline rather than explains it. The dialogue throughout helped create this enigma code with lines such as 'you're not the only one left with a  stake in this world'; the line doesn't explicitly say what the 'stake' is, but it's clear that it's something big. The same audience member also mentioned that he found many of the shots interesting.

However, it was also remarked by one viewer that they felt the final shot didn't match the music very successfully. They felt that with the slow music at the end, a shot of someone shooting a gun was somewhat inappropriate and they felt it should be a slow reflective moment, with perhaps someone injured or dying. We countered this by saying that the character was, in fact, injured as they crawled along, and the rest of the trailer had had many emotional moments, so the last moment should finish in a more exciting fashion. The other audience members also disagreed with this particular viewer, approving of the subtlety of it and the juxtaposition of music and visuals, so it appears that his is the minority view.

One part of our production that received especial praise was our use of many locations. The viewers were felt that the use of multiple locations in multiple countries gave the film a feeling of 'space', and made it seem like more of a global phenomenon. It was compared to films such as 'Skyfall' in this aspect. We were also very happy with our use of locations, as we had enough so that the film didn't have to keep cutting back to the same scenes, but was able to use a wide variety.

A slight criticism that was noted was that it was sometimes hard to distinguish between the different characters doing the voice over. This is probably because Philip did the voices for two of the characters, none of whom were his own. However, we feel that perhaps this confusion comes from the fact that our sample audience knew what each of the characters were supposed to sound like, so found it difficult to give them Philip's voice. A more artistic reason for the similarities in the voices is that we did it to blur the boundaries between good and evil.

The sole female character in our film, Eleanor, also came under discussion. The audience questioned why she was always seen running, however we felt that this point was rather invalid, as she's only in two shots, only one of which she's running in. To add to this, the one where she's running you don't see her face. However they also asked what role she had in the film and we responded that she was there to conform to the Male Gaze Theory to address a male audience and she also worked as the 'princess' character as described by Vladimir Propp. We also feel there is something of a 'female gaze' aspect to our film, as women would be attracted to our film because of the manly feats that the male characters in the film undertake.

As aforementioned, the audience praised the wide variety of shots used in our film.We were questioned about how we made more characters more prevalent. Some of the characters in the film, such as Thorne, appear many times in the trailer, to establish them as the lead character. However other characters such as Zubasu only appear for split seconds at a time to create an enigma code and make them appear mysterious. At the beginning of the trailer the audience is only shown silhouettes and random body parts, without showing anyone's faces. This creates an enigma code, and makes the audience want to watch on to find out who the characters are. They are finally shown Lucas Thorne, firmly cementing him as the lead protagonist of the film. Later in the feedback session, one of the viewers commented how they wanted to know more about the characters.

Overall the feedback session was very interesting and we learnt a lot from it. We realised more about our trailer than we thought was actually there and it helped us to think through our ideas and why we did some things.

Tuesday 1 April 2014

Evaluation feedback

You have made a good start on your evaluation, with task one completed and four begun. You have applied theories of audience, and considered how your trailer conforms to or subverts generic conventions.

Targets:
Evaluation task 3 - re-upload the audience feedback for your finished trailer - you should sum up what you have learned (positive and areas to develop) in your analysis
Evaluation task 2 - record a voice over/interview style footage where you discuss how the three tasks combine effectively to create a marketing campaign
Evaluation task 4 - what about the software you used to create your poster/magazine cover? Blogger to record your work? YouTube to view other trailers etc? Make sure all of this is discussed.
Remember to also upload any written responses you complete for exam preparation to add to your evaluation