2. In what ways does your media
product use, develop or
challenge forms and
conventions of real media
products?
3. Film Poster
I feel that our poster follows the conventions A slogan or motto is often placed on
of real media products. Like many movie the front of a poster, and so we made
posters, ours has the title in the font that is sure that we incorporated a similar
associated with the film and the film trailer. idea into our own products. Looking
“Seized” suggests taken without consent, and at other movie posters, the slogan is
so links in with the genre of our always in a grey/white font so it does
trailer, which was thriller. We chose a font not distract from everything
that looked jagged because we felt it added else, which is why we made ours
an eery feel to our products. Other movie white.
posters also feature a font that links with the The main image of the abductor fills
film. For example, “Taken” suggests that the most of the page as it is one of the
film will be focused around the main things we would want the audience to
character searching for something that has focus on the most. As you can see, the
been taken from him. The font in which image for the “Taken” poster also
“Source Code” is written in looks like it could takes up most of the page. Our image
actually be used for a code. lets the audience know that this
particular person plays a big part in
At the bottom of the poster, there are a the storyline of our film.
few lines of text that explain who was
involved in the making of the film and On both the “Taken” and the “Source
copyright information. We used the same Code” poster you can see similar
information from the trailer and placed it features. Overall, all of these features
at the bottom, highlighting some parts of show how our film poster follows the
the text like we had seen on other posters. conventions of real media products.
4. Magazine Cover
• When making the magazine cover, “Empire” was the
magazine we used to get most of our ideas from. We
included a coloured circle offering free posters to
the reader, as well as including the name of the film
in the text associated with it.
• The slogan of the film is also included on the front
cover, which is a technique also used on other
covers.
• Many of the titles of the films have special effects on
them that somehow link to the image and the film.
For example, the second “Empire” cover features the
title and “Thor” in the same font and colour. The
cover also mentions articles within and the barcode
in the bottom right corner.
• The magazine title is in a block/bold print, and
above it is a slogan that says it is “magazine of the
year”, which is also featured on other magazines.
Our magazine cover follows many of the forms and
conventions used on real magazine covers, and so I
feel confident with the finished product.
5. Film Trailer
The ones we made
At the beginning of every trailer is a green card that
mentions what audience the movie is available
for, what websites the audience can visit to find out
certain information about film companies/film
ratings, and who authorised the rating for the film.
Above is an image of an actual green card, and on the
right side you can see the ones we made. We decided to
create our own version to put at the beginning of our
film trailer to make it appear more authentic.
6. • At the beginning of the trailer there is Establishing shot
an establishing shot that identifies the
setting for the audience, which is used
in every trailer and film to establish
where the movie is taking place. Our
establishing shot showed that the house
in the background that ‘Lily’ is seen
walking away from during the night, is Close up shot
significant within the movie.
• We also used close ups throughout the
thriller trailer, as films in the thriller
and horror genre feature close ups and
extreme close ups throughout. An
example would be when we give a close
up of ‘Lily’ as she walks home in the
dark, but we only show her eyes as they
dart around.
• Another shot we tried to include was
some sort of over the shoulder shot, but
instead we felt a shot from behind the
bushes that focused on their backs
would work better. We wanted to give
the effect of someone, possibly the
abductor, watching them from afar as
they spoke.
7. Text in
the
trailer
• The text throughout our entire trailer
has some sort of link. The slogan, “a
modern cat and mouse game” is
used on all three of our products, as it
is describes our film to the target
audience.
• We used the same font – Weathered
SF – for all of the text in the trailer, as
well as using it on the magazine • At the end of the trailer we placed the date
cover and poster when mentioning the film was released, a website where the
the films name. audience can find out more about the
• A glowing effect was added to the film, as well as copyright information that
text, “a modern cat and mouse game” identifies who helped in the making of the
and “seized” when the words popped film.
up on the screen, as we felt it gave an • We didn’t include a lot of text throughout
eery feel to the movie. In similar the film trailer, as we have seen in other
trailers we have seen effects added to thriller film trailers, that there are only
short sentences or even just words that
text, like fades for example, to ensure help to build on the tension and
the words make more of an impact. suspense, rather than taking away from it.
8. • During our film trailer, there is a scene where we switch
between clips of ‘Lily’ tied up in the closet, to the abductor
walking up the stairs. We got inspiration for that particular
part of the trailer after watching Nosferatu. There is a scene
where Nosferatu’s silhouette/shadow can be seen on the
wall as he walks up the stairs. Taking inspiration from old
and new films in the same genre is seen in various
films, especially in the horror and thriller genre, as there are
certain features that every thriller/horror trailer tries to
include. For example, in the Scream movies, the murderer’s
face is never revealed, as it is hidden behind the mask they
always wear. We also chose not to reveal the identity of the
abductor as we felt it would remove the scary element of the
