There has to be a story to create a film...

After a lot of time sitting down as a group, researching the type of shots that are conventional within this genre, we have come up with, waht we think, a potientally breathe taking film trailer. The fast pace shots of which we have decided to include are shots that focus on the situation, characters, loaction and action. Hopefully this will grab the audiences attention and will make them want to watch more.

Need to keep on time...

Below is a photocopy of the production schedule of which my group and I have produced. We will keep to the schedule in terms of filming; creating the Ancillaries and edit the footage we captured to create a professional and effective movie trailer. We have discussed the dates and times so it fits in with our time schedule due to other commitments such as other A-Level subjects and part-time jobs.

What type of Locations?

Below are the location shots of which we will use for our pitch, and the type of locations of which we will set our trailer. These locations, which are below, are the locations of which we will film our shots to create a tense and professional movie trailer. We have used these location shots as these are these are the conventions of the a real trailer, providing the audience with a sense of isolation and loneliness, the empty locations, dark and dismal places, the juxta position of locations that are supposed to be full of people of which are not which also shows that civilisation has been destroyed.

We have characters?

As a group we have decided to set our minds on creating characters for the teaser trailer. Researching from the other professional movie trailers these are very specific characters. There is a main character that either is trying to establish the effects of the infection or is trying to cure the disease in order to save mankind. This character is often labelled as a leader or a hero. The other type of character that is established within the trailers is a very vulnerable character, a character that needs looking after and being taken care of, often is a child or an animal. The last type of character is a helper, someone that is very aware of the infection and teaches the main character of the situation. The helper often holds the responsibility of the group and passes that over to the main character.

Our task was to think of characters and the roles of which that will partake over the course of the teaser trailer. After a lot of discussion these are the characters we have an idea of using.

James Greenwood:

• The main character within the film
• The film centres on his struggle to come to terms with the apocalypse, and life beyond the apocalypse.
• James is a very strong willed character, a natural leader who naturally then becomes the leader of the survivor group
• Instantly attached to Amelia/Jake and feels a sense of responsibility towards keeping him/her safe.
• Develops a strong friendship with Jonah, who is the first survivor he encounters, but seems to have different opinions on different scenarios.
• James develops feelings for another member of the group, Anna. She is always on the forefront of James’ mind. Although this leads to ‘hard’ decisions for James regarding the infant character.
• He is the most physically able and is the best fighter in the group.

Jonah:

·         Another member of the group (The oldest member)

·         One of the more respected members of the group, his opinion is highly valued by all the members of the group

·         He is the groups ‘Brainiac’ he seems to have the most knowledge and this shows within computers, electronics and has a mechanical know-how

·         He seems to be more interested in survival more than anything else.

·         Develops feeling towards Katie

·         Initially feels that the child character is a burden on the group and will possibly get them killed.

·         Was a member of a survival group which was lead by a leading Dr. Dr R.P.Jones

Anna:

• Her actions and clumsiness frequently get the group into a lot of trouble between the group and the infected, and is often being saved by the group.
• A very attractive girl who grabs the attention of both male members of the group
• Develops a strong relationship with the child character, but initially doesn’t have the best of relationships with the child’s older sister, Katie.

Katie:

• The ‘Tomboy’ of the group, in comparison to Anna
• She is moderately attractive, but is constantly overlooked due to Anna being in the group.
• Her younger sister/brother is the ‘child’ character in the group. This brings a lot of relationship struggles within the group, due to Jonah’s attraction to her but also his feelings about the brother/sister being a burden on the group
• Is often tempted to leave the group but is aware of how damaging it might possibly be to her little brother/sister

Amelia/Jake

• Typical 8 year old boy/girl who like nothing more than just to play about and not really have a care in the world even with the apocalypse
• Is oblivious most of the time to the trouble the group regularly find themselves in
• Is very close to her/his sister although she is friendly with all the other members of the group, even Jonah who does not like him/her being in the group.

These are the characters we intend to use within our movie trailer as we feel it is appropriate to follow the codes and conventions used with the professional trailers of which we have researched. 

Apocalypse has a Synopsis?

Below is a short synopsis of which my group and I have had great discussion about and this is our final idea:

‘The film begins after a worldwide sickness which has infected all adults, turning them into zombie like creatures. The surviving children have formed a number of groups throughout London in order to better combat the threat posed by the adults and to increase their odds of survival.

A teenager, James Greenwood awakes to find this epidemic on going and struggles to cope with the imposing task of having to ‘find his own way’. James is initially unaware the sickness only infected the adults and tries to search for his parents and siblings of whom are presumed to be dead because of the epidemic.

Along the way he comes across a variety of different teenagers, four of whom, Anna, Katie, her younger sibling and Jonah, join him on his journey to form a group that works together to continue to survive day by day.’

The Pitch is fast approaching…

It is almost the time where my group and I have to present our ideas to our teachers by doing a pitch. We have to include all of our ideas from the synopsis to the types of characters. We have to provide storyboard, production schedule, location shots and draft work for our ancillary tasks. We have had a meeting to see if we are on track to present our work, it seems that we have some more things to complete but we know we will succeed and get given the go ahead to put our ideas on to screen.  

How do I create a professional Film Poster?

For our Ancillary task I have been tasked to create a film poster of which advertises Apocalypse. I have undergone some research which will enable me to produce a professional movie poster that will support my group and I teaser trailer.

I have looked at some existing film posters of which match our genre and analysed the codes and conventions of which I can incorporate into my poster.

Mirrors

This film poster for instance, you can clearly tell that this is a horror film poster as it is very dark and can only see the eyes of the character involved. This character is making eye contact with the target audience which helps drag them in to look more into the poster. Also it doesn’t let off much about the film, it has its main features such as the name of the film, the main star which stars in the film, the tagline, the date of release of which doesn’t specify the day only month and year, and the credits of which include the production company, director etc. I like the way in which the poster is dark and isn’t very revealing, and this could be a possible feature of which I include within my film poster.

I am Legend

  

This film poster doesn’t let off that much at all. We, as an audience, are established to the location and the main character. The name of the character is at the top of the poster in a serif font which stands out from the rest of the page. The title of the film lies at the bottom of the poster above the credits. The tagline also in a serif font is smaller than the title and the characters name which shows the importance of the other two elements. By this poster you can clearly see the sense of isolation and that the world has come to an end. You can feel a sense of fear and horror within the characters body language and the establishing shot of the emptiness location in the background.

Zombieland

The film poster establishes the four main characters that are involved within the film. The characters that are established are all holding weapons which suggests to the audience that they are battling for something, which is supported by the burning of the location which is in the background. The title of the film is very clear and bold to the audience as it is in a fiery orange font colour which also suggests a sense of war and battle. The way the characters suggests a little about the characters as in who are more dominant and who are less dominant. The way the title is aligned also makes it stand out. The date of release is in a red font colour which helps identify that for the audience.

I shall try to incorporate different elements within my movie poster as there are certain qualities that I feel can help advertise Apocalypse, help identify the genre of which it is in and help the audience be intrigued by the film and will make them want to watch it.  

There's other ways to advertise Apocalypse?

There are other ways to promote films other than a trailer, these can include on the radio, television, websites, posters, magazines and billboards. A task has just be published that we have to produce two Ancillary Tasks which is totally individual and includes creating two of the following:

• Create a poster
• Create a webpage
• Create a front cover for a film magazine

I have decided to create a poster and a front cover for a film magazine. I believe that I will strengthen my grade for this project as in the past this has been my strong point throughout my history studying Media Studies. For my GCSE, the project was to create two movie magazine of which I was able to achieve an A* in the particular project. Last year for the AS project, a music magazine had to be created including a front cover, contents page and double page spread, I was able to achieve an A for this part of the project. I think I have the knowledge and understanding for these advertising roles to put into creating these ancillary tasks. 

What do we choose?

In our first meeting as a group we decided to research into the genre and watch some movie trailers to get more of an understanding of what we were about to create. In our second meeting, of which this blog post is about, we have decided to think of a name for our film idea. We have also decided to think up a synopsis of the film, what characters and what sort of characters will be included and what type of locations.

For this meeting we have decided to concentrate on naming our film/trailer. There were a variety of different name ideas including:

• Apocalypse
• Nerve Agent Z
• Virus 999
• The End of the Road
• Survival
• World at War
• E.N.D 

As a group we decided to create a short-list of names of which stood out to us, the included Apocalypse, Nerve Agent Z and Virus 999. After a great amount of discussion during the meeting and the vision we had for our trailer, we concluded with a working title of Apocalypse. We labelled it as a ‘Working Title’ as we were uncertain as we hadn’t thought of a synopsis as of yet, and hoped that this would inspire us to draft up a astonishing idea for the final piece. 

Who will we aim our trailer at?

My group and I are certain that we would like to pursue with creating a teaser trailer involving a post apocalyptic universe of which would be involving zombies. Our next task was to generate a target audience for the teaser trailer/film. IMDB.com has a top ten film list for post apocalyptic films of which involves:

1.      A Boy and his Dog

2.      I Am Legend

3.      Armageddon

4.      28 Days Later

5.      Doomsday

6.      Equilibrium

7.      28 Weeks Later

8.      Judgement Day

9.      12 Monkeys

10.  The Road

I thought that it would be a good idea to find on average the age rating for this top 10 list of films and the one in which would be more popular, would then finalise our age rating for our film. The result of the average age rating was a 15. Also we have decided that we will be targeting the trailer at a male audience as this genre is more popular within the male audience.

This so happened that my group and I were thinking of creating the teaser trailer for this age group and audience as it seems that this genre is more popular within this age bracket. I undertook some of my own research and surveyed 20 people from each age group, 15-20, 21-30, 31-40 and 41+. Below are the results of my independent surveys:

What does Post Apocalyptic really mean?

“Apocalyptic fiction is a sub-genre of science fiction that is concerned with the end of human civilization due to a potentially existential catastrophe such as warfare, pandemic, extraterrestrial attack, impact event, cybernetic revolt, technological singularity, dysgenics, supernatural phenomena, divine judgement, change, resource, ecological collapse, or some other general disaster. Post-apocalyptic fiction is set in a world or civilization after such a disaster. The time frame may be immediately after the catastrophe, focusing on the travails or psychology of survivors, or considerably later, often including the theme that the existence of pre-catastrophe civilization has been forgotten. Post-apocalyptic stories often take place in an agrarian, non-technological future world, or a world where only scattered elements of technology remain. There is a considerable degree of blurring between this form of science fiction and dystopian fiction.

The genre gained popularity after World War II, when the possibility of global annihilation by nuclear weapons entered the public consciousness. However, recognizable apocalyptic novels have existed since the first quarter of the 19th century.” (Source: www.wikipedia.com)

How do you structure a teaser trailer?

This post will show the evaluation of the trailers of which our group watched in order to give us a general idea of the structure of different trailers to attract an audience to watch the film. Below I will provide access of the three main trailers we have used for our research followed with a synopsis, and then my own evaluation of the pieces.

Synopsis

‘Robert Neville is a scientist who was unable to stop the spread of the terrible virus that was incurable and man-made. Immune, Neville is now the last human survivor in what is left of New York City and perhaps the world. For three years, Neville has faithfully sent out daily radio messages, desperate to find any other survivors who might be out there. But he is not alone. Mutant victims of the plague -- The Infected -- lurk in the shadows... watching Neville's every move... waiting for him to make a fatal mistake. Perhaps mankind's last, best hope, Neville is driven by only one remaining mission: to find a way to reverse the effects of the virus using his own immune blood. But he knows he is outnumbered... and quickly running out of time. Written by Warner Bros. Pictures (Source: www.IMDB.com)

Evaluation

‘I am Legend’ starts of with a voice over ‘This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen’ which immediately tells the audience something has gone wrong. This then goes into a quick sequence of which we find out a little bit about humanity and shots of peoples attempts to try and flee the country. The audience then go to the same bridge in the sequence before, but the next morning which then leads into establishing the locations and the state of which the location is left in. Also at the same time, the trailer establishes the character, by a voice over and the character of which is preparing for the fight ahead. The trailer then is steady and is slowly building up with the heavy breathing from the character which helps build up tension for the audience. It then goes into very quick montage of the film, providing intensity and vision for the audience to understand the narrative to the film.

Synopsis

Animal activists invade a laboratory with the intention of releasing chimpanzees that are undergoing experimentation, infected by a virus -a virus that causes rage. The naive activists ignore the pleas of a scientist to keep the cages locked, with disastrous results. Twenty-eight days later, our protagonist, Jim, wakes up from a coma, alone, in an abandoned hospital. He begins to seek out anyone else to find London is deserted, apparently without a living soul. After finding a church, which had become inhabited by zombie like humans intent on his demise, he runs for his life. Selena and Mark rescue him from the horde and bring him up to date on the mass carnage and horror as all of London tore itself apart. This is a tale of survival and ultimately, heroics, with nice subtext about mankind's savage nature. (Source: www.IMDB.com)

Evaluation

The trailer starts of with shaky camerawork which will disorientate an audience as they are unable to see fully what is happening. There is some low key and quite dark lighting which helps add the horror feel to the trailer, which appeals to the audience as they enjoy the thrill of horrors and enjoy being scared as the trailer intends to scare an audience. The length of shot become much slower than they were at the start which help build tension as the pace then begins to increase. It also helps build a sense of panic and fear as the image the trailer is trying to show becomes very unclear and this creates an enigma as the audience to not have a clear vision to what is going on. The use of the character having a hospital patients clothing on, helps tell the audience that there is some sort of disease and this is what has caused dissertation to the city. The use of a creature far into the trailer is used to give the audience a quick fright as they are drawn into the trailer is very effective. The mention of the director is also a good thing as they are building upon a brand, meaning that its not just people that enjoy watching horror films, but it is people who enjoy Danny Boyle’s work that are also watching the film. The use of the sirens which were used during the war also helps show fright and horror, and then the use of an extreme close-up on the creature’s bloody eyes which is then overlaid by the title shows that the character is abnormal and the blood shows that the film is gory. 

Synopsis

28 Weeks Later picks up six months after the Rage Virus has decimated the city of London. The US Army has restored order and is repopulating the quarantined city, when a carrier of the Rage Virus enters London and unknowingly re-ignites the spread of the deadly infection and the nightmare begins... again. (Source: www.IMDB.com)

Evaluation

The trailer starts of by establishing the location of which the film will be set. The ways in which the narrative conflict/story has been shown in the trailer is by the way it shows the audience, members of the army with gas masks on, are cleaning the streets of bacterial substances that could kill man kind, throwing things out of houses in to bags with warning signs on, and messages on roofs of houses made by the uninfected specifying ‘I AM HERE’. This helps establish the narrative by a very unique voice over made by a female officer explaining to the uninfected what is happening and what is going to happen. The audience are then introduced to various characters by showing two young children, one boy and one girl, on a train and meeting their father at the train station. The trailer then focuses on them and there struggle for survival. The trailer gives the audience a very focused idea of the theme of the film, the two young children are reunited with the father and taken to a safe location. Something within the compound then goes wrong and the two children and father are lead by the army man at the beginning of the trailer and running from the infected and running for survival. If the trailer is divided into sections they have been arranged in to a specific order to provide tension for the audience. The first section is establishing the locations of which the film will be set. The second section is establishing the infection and what they are doing to stop the infection. The third section is establishing characters and their story. The fourth section is action (their fight for survival).

All three trailers have a common structure to them, they all establish the locations first, they then tell the audience what has happened, then following establishing the characters. It then builds up with fast camera shots that help build tension for the audience and provides how they are battling for survival. I am Legend, however, is different to the 28 days trilogy, as it is one man and his dog, the trilogy includes a group of people, however, there is always a character that understands the depth of the situation they are in, and there is a venerable character. This will be taken into consideration for our teaser trailer when it comes to discussing the synopsis and characters.   

What is a teaser trailer?

A teaser trailer tells you some basic information about the film, which will:

• Make you aware that the film will be opening in the future
• Make you aware of who is in the film
• Make you aware of the genre of the film
• Give you an idea of the story of the film
• The teaser trailer gives you ideas and also awareness about the film

This is then followed up by a Theatrical Trailer as the release date of the film is fast approaching. This will then aware the audience when the film will open, what type of film it is, who is in the film and what other films you have heard or seen these characters in.

The theatrical trailer then gives the audience ideas in the ways a narrative conflict is shown and by the ways in which certain locations and characters are introduced. It can also give some ideas about the themes of the film which will give the audience something to look forward to.

Within the next blog I will analyse some trailers and how they are divided into different sections, how these sections tell the audience about the film and why have the trailers arranged them in a certain order. I will also give a brief analyse of how the characters are represented within the trailers. 

The Start of a long process

This blog has been created to show the process of the advanced portfolio task of which has to be completed for the A2 part of the Media course. This blog will demonstrate the progression and the different stages undertook in the creation of our project. The members of the group that I have been put together with for the advanced production are Alex Mwanza and Callum Augustin. We believe we can strive forward to produce something of which is an outstanding piece of work.

Last year we all knew that we was going to create either a music video or a teaser trailer as part of our portfolio, so my plan was to go away during the summer holidays and think up a few ideas. I was positive I wanted to create a teaser trailer and thought up a few ideas that I could share with the rest of my group.

As a group, we have collectively have chosen to create a teaser trailer. We believe that our skills and personal qualities would be far valuable to us and would be able to put our knowledge of films into one of our own.

In our first lesson, we put pen to paper and thought of which genre of films we watch and enjoyed to watch, as this could potentially rub off onto our production. However we then thought of genre’s that would we would realistically able to create and would be a high-quality and professional teaser trailer.

Here are some of the following genres we came up with:

• Action Adventure
• Horror/Thriller
• Comedy

After more brainstorming and in depth discussion, the three of us came to a decision to create a Post-Apocalyptic Horror/Thriller, of which was one of my ideas and funny enough one of Callum’s. This was a very positive sign as we could put two and two together and have a greatly promising concept to work with in the next few weeks.  We then moved onto the computers to watch professional high budgeted movie trailers, such as I am Legend. It then came to our attention that we won’t be able to create something as big as I am Legend and Zombieland, but we can still incorporate some of the ideas into our trailer. We then began to look at low-budgeted film trailers of which were created by British film companies such as the 28 days later trilogy, Deadman’s Shoes and Trainspotting.  

By the end of the lesson, we then had a good idea of the concept of what to incorporate into the trailer, how to establish characters and settings, and the main structure of a trailer. This enabled us to plan a concept for our trailer and jot down a few ideas that would interest an audience (of which we will decide on later in the process).