Evaluation: Analysis of poster and magazine

Evaluation

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
In the planning stages of our project, we specified what codes and conventions we wanted to use and what we wanted to experiment with to make our product unique. During this process we identified particular elements of a teaser trailer, of posters and magazines, that we felt are essential to keep them realistic and to convey the genre. To add to this we continued our research in more detail by comparing products of the same genre to ours (e.g. Inception and Buried) and looked for differences. This gave us inspiration to challenge particular elements that could be altered and didn’t need to be specific.

Codes and conventions we used:

• Ø The length of a ‘teaser’ trailer is specific. We researched into time length and found that all teasers were on average around 40 seconds long, therefore we aimed our product to be this length.
  


• Ø At different stages of an advertising campaign, trailers may not have all information. Later trailers will contain actor’s names and directors in addition to the title and release date. We decided to keep our trailer simple with not a lot of detail, therefore only included the tile of the film and the release date. We did this to maintain some mystery around the film and create anticipation.



• Ø At the beginning on any trailer, there is an approval by the Motion Picture Association of America. In order to make our trailer more realistic we felt it would be good to incorporate one at the beginning. To make sure that we are using the correct on to coincide with the rating of the trailer, we researched into other trailers of the same genre and similar content and looked at the one that they used. We paid close attention to Inception as this is similar to our product.

Codes and conventions we developed:

• Ø After putting together the footage we had collected, we found that the trailer was missing something. We felt that it needed more information to create more excitement around the narrative. Therefore we added extra footage to enhance our first draft. This developed the teasers structure as we created flashbacks to encourage a more intense atmosphere.


• Ø The jump cuts made the trailer more interesting and eliminated the flatness.
  

Codes and conventions we challenged:

• Ø A main convention that we changed was the use of less text. We only included the title of the movie and the release date. We did this purposely to keep the trailer a ‘teaser’. We didn’t want to reveal too much information about the story and who was in it. We wanted to maintain some mystery around the movie.

Evaluation

How effective is the combination of your main and ancillary texts?

The use of cross-media advertising is essential in making a product more successful. The aim is to sell the film to your intended audience, so by targeting those from all angles will make the whole process more effective.

• Ø To make the use of cross-media advertising successful, we made sure that we continued a theme throughout all three of our products. One thing that was specific was the colour scheme, we used a lot of greys, silvers and blues throughout. We decided upon these colours as we felt they best conveyed the genre. I researched into the cross-media advertising for Inception and they used a similar colour scheme. I noticed that these colours were used throughout. By using continual colours it makes the product more recognisable and effective.
  
• Ø Another aspect was to use a similar image, this is successful as it will make the product more remembered. For our advertising that will work alongside the teaser trailer, we used the image of our main character. Although at different angles and a range of camera shots we used the same suit and gun with a similar pose.

Evaluation

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

• Ø To evaluate how successful our products were and how well they worked well together, we conducted some audience feedback. We decided to upload our trailer onto Facebook and to arrange focus groups to see what people thought. To continue with the audience research that we did before we made our product, we collected feedback from our target audience (this being males, aged between 15-25).
• Ø We also arranged a focus group to gain first hand feedback from our target audience. This is integral to our evaluation as we can hear if our poster works and if it is successful in selling the film.

• From the feedback we recieved, I learnt that our products were very successful in what we wanted to convey such as the genre of the film and the effects that we wanted to enforce on teh audience. However, there were some aspects of the trailer and ancillary products that may have benifited with improvements. Overall, I felt that we were very successful and the products as a whole, created a very realistic and effective cross-media advertising campaign.
• Audience feedback is very important in order to determine how successful our trailer was. We rely on the audience feedback to identify what aspects need change and what elements worked well. From our feedback I believe we have benifitted greatly in understanding the imporatnce of audience comments and how this effects your product.

Evaluation

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

The main technology that we used throughout the whole process was the use of our blogs. These were integral to the whole process because it meant that the whole group could have access to each others blogs to share information. It also meant that we could keep all our work together in one place, making it easier to refer back to information from research and evaluation tasks. It also meant that we could present our work on a new media technology. The process also helped me develop my skills on using blogs, I have become more confident with using my blog.

Research and Planning:

Ø For this process we use a range of new technologies in order to provide a wide range of data. Particular ones that we used were, Facebook and Survey Monkey for uploading questionnaires. I found these successful as they reached to a wide range of people and although we were pessimistic about whether they would be useful, we did gain some very interesting and useful answers and comments.

Ø We arranged a focus group with our target audience. This provided us with specific answers and this was also integral to our research as we gained direct information from our target audience. We assessed this information carefully and used it as much as we could on our products.

Ø To research our target age group we handed out a Psychographic and Demographic questionnaire to research what 15-25 year olds do, how much they spend but most importantly want they want or expect from advertising. This gave us a useful insight into what aspects we need to include in our product to make it all the more successful.

Ø The Sony A1E was good to use as it had many useful qualities. It was easy for us to access and because of being small and lightweight it was simple for us to master. Although we filmed in 4:3 instead of Widescreen (which is what we were meant to shoot in) we had some great footage.

Ø Using Final Cut pro for the editing process went well and although at first all the features were intimidating, as a group we managed to work out most of the aspects. We made good use of most of the features and used them to their full potential. This included such things as; sound effects, text features, transitions and the freedom to edit any parts that we desire.

Construction:
In order for us to make our product look as professional as possible, we used the best technology we could. This included; the Sony A1Ecamera we used for filming, Final Cut pro for editing and Photoshop for our ancillary products.

Using Final Cut pro for the editing process went well and although at first all the features were intimidating, as a group we managed to work out most of the aspects. We made good use of most of the features and used them to their full potential. This included such things as; sound effects, text features, transitions and the freedom to edit any parts that we desire.

Photoshop was excellent to use for our ancillary products as it provides us with lots of tools in order to alter and enhance specific elements of our poster and magazine cover. Photoshop is used professionally in the publishing industry, therefore had promise in providing us with good quality effects. We worked hard to make the poster and magazine cover look as professional as possible and I think we made a successful attempt. I think the outcome of these products was greatly helped by the use of Photoshop.

Evaluation:

To provide a good evaluation of our products, we conducted in some audience feedback to see how effective our products are in selling the film.

Ø We uploaded our trailer onto Facebook and requested comments from friends. We made the trailer available for anyone to watch and add comments but we paid close attention to our target audience and what they thought.

Final Magazine Cover

This is our final magazine cover. We all created separate covers and then came back together to compare the magazines. Through analysis that we conducted as a group, we decided that this one would be most suitable as it fitted our genre the best.

EDLs

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Final Hunt Poster

This is our final Hunt poster.

From analysis of the posters we did beforehand, we knew specifically what we wanted to include, making the poster more successful. With comparison with the other poster, we made some changes that we felt the poster needed to be more successful.

Things we changed:

Ø The font to suit the genre better.

Ø We added the names of the actors to make the poster look more professional.

Ø With consideration to the hierarchy of text, we made sure that we made the most important parts more prominent for the audience. This includes:

· The title of the movie

· The release date

· The tag line for the movie

We felt these were the most important to emphasise as we want our target audience to remember our film. The title, release date and tagline are all integral to succeeding in selling the movie.

Before we had a secure decision on the final poster, we experimented with what we would include and exclude. This is an example of the final poster but with the exclusion of the names of the actors and with a different style of font.

Mock-up magazine cover

This is another example of a mock-up magazine cover. We had secure ideas on what we wanted to include. These were:

Ø The title of the magazine to be in this format

Ø To have banners at both the top and bottom

Ø To have the colour scheme of greys, blacks and reds

Having these secure initial ideas meant that we could work better to achieve our planned idea.

As part of the process of creating our final ancillary product, we designed mock-up magazine covers to experiment with conventions of a magazine. This is a basic outline of a magazine that I created. In doing this, I leaned that the composition of all of the elements of the magazine are important. Also that there are some codes and conventions of a magazine cover that you cannot challenge and that close attention to detail is essential. On this example I have also used the title of our magazine. We decided on 'Lights, Camera, Action' because we felt it was catchy and very relevant to films and the whole production process therefore would be appropriate for our magazine and the market that we are aiming at.

Mock-up film poster

As part of the process of making our poster, we decided to experiment with different styles and techniques. We explored different colours, effects and font text in Photoshop to see what we think would work best and fit our genre of film. This is a mock-up that we created, using initial ideas. Some aspects of the poster such as; the date, title and the tag line, are all parts that we will use on the final product.

Summary of the filming process

Pre shoot, the team did encounter some difficulties including location and actors. However, we managed to obtain permission and have actors organised in time for our proposed date for filming. Although we had some doubts about the success of the trailer due to these setbacks, we all worked really hard and the trailer came together as planned.

Filming on location:

- Due to financial restrictions, unfortunately Connor was not able to attend this shoot.

- Hayley, Georgia and I arrived on time and began setting up. We were good with time management using our call sheet as a guide.

- At the beginning we did have some difficulty with the balance of the camera. We found the spirit level bubbles difficult to centre, but after some attempts we managed to level the shot correctly.

- The rest of the filming went generally very well. Although due to the weather being very cold, we did try to work quicker. In particular, the scene in which Georgia was required to lie on the ground.

When looking back on our footage and creating a ‘rough’ trailer outline, we decided that the trailer was missing narrative information and needed something extra to make it more interesting and informative. Therefore as a group we decided to film extra parts for the trailer.

Filming extra scenes:

- Thankfully the whole group was able to attend this shoot.

- Due to this being short notice and responsibility for other commitments, we used a different actor to play our protagonist. Patrick was very adaptable to the role and we produced some excellent scenes to add to the trailer.

- Additional scenes included our female character getting ready to go out. Georgia played this character again.

With the addition of these two scenes, the trailer was improved greatly. The whole shooting process and experience was great to do and with our organisational skills, ran smoothly.