Film poster practise

Film poster practise

Due to me having a limited knowledge and experience on Photoshop, our teacher set us a task to try and merge two different pictures together in order t make it look like a film poster. this came in useful for me as i was able to use the basic skills i need to create a film poster so that we could possibly use it it for our main poster to advertise our film. Below are the two images that i had to merge into one in order to create a film poster with so it looked part of a horror film.

Firstly i cropped the world out and then placed it on a solid black background and then I changed the hue and saturation of the world in order to make it look dark and mysterious.When i had done this i cropped two of the zombie hands onto the world image and then moved them to either side so that it looked like the hands were holding the world. After i had done this i had to change the opacity of the hands so that they blended in with the world. By doing this exercise I have become more experienced with using Photoshop so that I could be confident in creating a film poster for our film so that we could possibly use it for the final poster. The photo below is my finished practise film poster:

Character profile - Tom

Name : Tom Barrow

Age : 17

Occupation : Student and friend of Jamie

Personality : Normal teenager just wants to hang around with friends, very friendly and outgoing personality.

Role in the film : Tom invites Jamie around to his house, they watch TV and Tom later decides to get up and ask Jamie if he wants a drink. Soon to find out that Jamie has gone missing from the living room in the house.

Ideas that we tested for the poster

An idea we tested

To our film poster we wanted to test some ideas, this idea was tempting to keep as it made the image look shiny, but we felt that this wasn't representing the darkness and true sinister feeling of our film. 

Film Poster for group decision

Film poser idea
I produced this film poster on my own and we have all agreed that it is one of the best we have produced in the group.

I think that we will use this one as our final group poster as it looks professional and makes our movie look sinister and mysterious.

Black was the main colour we focused on as it is a deep and never ending colour which represents the scary side of Lights out.

Viral ad research- Carrie

Carrie Viral Ad

For the film Carrie, they created a viral ad to show to the public in order to promote the film. The set up a prank/joke in a coffee shop in which the lead actor in the film would lead the prank. They filled the coffee shop with actors and stuntmen so that they could prank incoming customers when they entered the coffee shop. They set up a fake wall in which a stunt man would be attached to and then when the actor from the film went towards him they would go up the wall to recreate her super powers that she has in the film. They also remote controlled the chairs and tables so that they would move and look like she did it.

The purpose of this viral ad was to show and promote the film before it came out. They wanted to make the audience and the general public aware of the film and people to pass the word on about this viral ad through word of mouth and also the internet and social media/networking. If this is popular with the general public the company that makes the film may get sponsorship money for a third party company to advertise before the start of the viral ad. Through likes and shares on social media like Facebook a viral ad may become a viral hit in one single day. due to the large amount of people on social networking the potential to grow a viral ad is amazing.

Changes to the film

Changes to our film 

We have made several changes to our film which are very important to our story line, we are very happy with the changes. We have made changes the the script and to the storyline. the end of the story we have changed and we have

Character Profile - Joe

Name - Joseph Black

Age - 17

Occupation - Student at barnsley college

Personality - Normal student who is friends with Jamie.

Role in the film - Joe is a very normal student who doesn't take much part in the film, just in a couple of conversations of the film.

Character Profile - Stewart

Name - Stewart ?

Age - 20..

Occupation - Student but not a lot is known about him.

Personality - Mysterious, doesn't talk and is very weird in his ways.

Role in film - Stalker who is very tall and mysterious, stalks Jamie throughout the film scaring and confusing him. Stewart has no friends and is very weird in the way he acts. During the film we never see his face as he is always in the shadows.

Character profile - Jamie

Name - Jamie Allsop

Age- 17

Occupation - Student at Barnsley College

Personality - Calm, normal teen who is very outgoing and friendly. 

Role in the film - Young student who is just living his normal life, when he suddenly realises a slight abnormality in the works. He becomes a victim of a stalker. Not knowing what to do Jamie is lost in his own madness. 

Changes to our film

In the script we have wrote, we have seen that there is a lot of focus on the journey that Jamie takes into college the day after the part has happened and that not much dialogue took place in them scenes. We have decided that Jamie and Joe will walk together into the classroom at lunch together talking about how Stuart Smith ( the stalker) has been adding them as friends on Facebook and been messaging them constantly. This sets the ending to the film in more context. Joe will walk out the room to answer a phone call meanwhile the lights go out on Jamie as he is doing some work. The lights then flicker and it shows Stuart in the room edging closer to Jamie.

Costume Ideas

Jamie:

Since Jamie is a regular college student he should go for:

• Jeans
• Jumper or t shirt
• Casual shoes
• Winter Coat
• College Card

Joe: 

Joe is also a regular teenager so he should go for the same look as Jamie

Stuart:

Stuart is a not a typical college student and can be said to be a bit weird so he should go for:

•  Big Hoodie
• Headphones with phone 
• College card

Character Profile- Stuart

Name: Stuart Smith

Age: 20

Occupation: Stuart is currently still at college as he has had trouble with getting his grades so is doing catch up years in order to get his qualifications. He also did extra years at school due to bad behavior.

Personality: Stuart is a student that keeps himself to himself and likes be by himself. He spends a lot of his time playing video games and plays in tournaments in order to win money. However he has a reputation for behaving badly and getting into things such as crime, drugs and drinking excessive amounts of alcohol. Due to this occurring on a regular basis, his education has suffered because of this and regularly suffers from depression.

Part in the story-line: Stuart is at fault for the stalking and following of Jamie. Stuart wears a hood round college so that Jamie can not identify who he is in case he gets into trouble for this.Stuart found out on Facebook about the gathering and attempted to hijack the party so that he could hurt Jamie as it turns out Jamie was Stuarts sisters ex boyfriend. Stuart planned to follow Jamie into the classroom at dinner time and confront him about his sister as he has a hatred fro Jamie.

Character Profile- Joe

Name: Joe Black

Age:

Occupation: Joe like Jamie is a college student and is in his last year of college before going onto university

Personality: Joe likes to go out and have drinks with friends. He is outgoing and likes going to gigs and music festivals. In his spare time he likes to watch tv series and films. Joe is also focused on getting his grades in order to get into university next year.

Part in the story-line: Joe is one of Jamie's friends at college and was at the gathering that took pace at one of his friends houses. Joe is speaking ti Jamie in the corridor the day after the gathering and points out a person that he thought he saw last night. You could not see the person and identify them as they had a hood which covered their face. Joe alerts Jamie about this, which leads to Jamie becoming more curious about who the person is and whether Jamie knows him. After this Joe goes to find Jamie to do some extra work with him but he disappears and is left frightened.

Character Profile- Jamie

Name: Jamie Allsop

Age:17

Occupation: Jamie is currently a A- Level student at college and he is in his last year before hopefully going onto study at university.

Personality- Jamie is a typical college student who likes to enjoy himself and spend time with his friends. He is also focused on playing sport and getting his grades in college in order for him to go onto study and university. Jamie had never felt like someone has been watching/stalking him before and is slightly nervous about why he is being followed.

Part in the story-line: Jamie is the main character in the film as the focus of the film is around him and him being followed and stalked by a mysterious person. Jamie first is invited to a party/gathering at his friends house and this is when the mysterious actions start. He goes to his friends house in his car and he is shown entering the house. His friend tom goes to get him a drink and the next minute Jamie is gone and he is no where to be seen. When he is walking into college the next day after a mysterious night Jamie feels like someone is watching and following him when he is walking into college. In the afternoon, Jamie is walking into a drama room to do some extra work during lunch. However no one is in and then suddenly Jamie is gone and all the lights are out.

Elliptical Editing- Short Journey

Our tutor set out a task for us to complete a short journey in which elliptical editing took place. This was handy for us as we could then use the techniques that we had practiced in this short journey for our main film that we shot after this. By doing this we had more of an understanding and experience at this type of editing and the shots involved. Firstly, we were asked to film a short journey that had taken place in which Tom walked down various flights of stairs to go to the library. After we had filmed these shots we were asked to make the film even more shorter but still include the main content of the film so that if you watched it you could understand the concept of the journey. As we had previous experience filming and editing we found this task fairly easy and it did not take us long to cut down the film and match the various shots together in order to make the journey smooth. Below are some shots that were in our film to show the journey that Tom took.

How to make a video look like a film

How to make a video look like a film

Depth of Field
New and current film makers think that depth of field is important when making video footage look like a film. Shallow focus would be used in a film in order to attract the attention of the audience. This may be focused on an important character or object. For example the area of focus for a film maybe the character/object and then the background of the shot will be out of focus.

Camera Movement

Camera movement is regarded as a key element is getting a film type look. There are no specific movements that you need to include in order to create a film but you should make movement of your camera a priority in order to make it look as cinematic as possible. Including a lot of handheld shots in your film may make viewing your film hard for the audience and make it look less professionally shot. You should always choose the correct type of camera movement and technique in order to make it look as professional as possible whether you need to use a tripod/crane or it requires a handheld shot.

Framing

Without framing, depth of field would not look right on the shot and therefor time would be wasted trying to get the depth of field correct. the subject that is included in the frame should be the main focus in the shot and the rest of the frame should be important in telling the audience the feelings, attitude and environment that the subject is feeling. The image below is from the film The Queens Speech and the framing in this shot creates a mood in which the actor is lonely and a feeling of emptiness.

 Lighting

Lighting in a shot can make a shot look really good and professional or make it look amateur and low budget. Although for some films you may have a big budget available to buy expensive light equipment but you should take time and put a lot of thinking into the lighting of your shots. Lighting will be important in the shots in order to create moods and atmospheres within the film. If the shot is poorly lit the mood/atmosphere may not be shown properly and make the film look amateur.

Film Poster

I have analysed the film poster above which is from the film 'Abduction'. Abduction is a similar film to ours as it is a drama/thriller film that has a stalker element to it. the film poster above firstly shows the star actor which is Taylor Lautner. this is shown to interest and make the public want to see the film because of the actors that are in the film. Then the main text on the poster is the title of the film. This stands out in the poster and attracts the eyes of the audience. Above this, the film is explained in a sentence to give the audience a teaser of what the film is about. This may attract the audience to go and watch the film as they may want to know what happens in the film and how this story unfolds. Below the title, company names involved in the film are listed and also actors and directors. These can be listed in order to show the audience the companies involved and the audience may look at the other actors involved as they may want to go and watch the film due to the actors that are involved.
Below this the release date of the film is shown to inform the audience and the website address of the movie is displayed so that the general public can go onto the website to have a look at features and other information about the film.

Editing Techniques

Editing techniques

We used various editing techniques which have helped us in the process of editing our 5 minute film. Techniques such as Continuity editing, non-continuity editing, transitions and shot duration/pace and rhythm.

Continuity editing -
Continuity editing helped us to put across what action is being taken, it helps the audience to realise the action that is taking place. Match on action shots are a big part of continuity editing as it makes the shot look continuous and makes it flow correct. A shot being on for too long can look boring so cutting it correctly can help the film flow.

Non-continuity editing -
So the shots are purposely mis matched and made to look like the shots do not match. This can be for a comedy factor or it can be for the purpose of confusing the audience. Jump cuts are good example as they can show an object jumping from one shot to another, this can be used to show the passing of time and which may disrupt the fact of linear editing.

Transitions-
Transitions are a very simple and effective way of cutting from one shot to another, this can be just simply cutting from one shot to another or using a technique to add some form of dynamic to the cutting of the shot. Fades, dissolves and wipes are all examples of transitions you can use.

Shot duration/ Pace-
The duration of shots throughout the film, maybe reflect the context of the film. For example in a chase scene you can use quick and fast shots but for a romance scene you can use slow and dragged out shots.

Editing Techniques

Editing Techniques

Continuity editing is editing that helps the viewer see what action is occurring in the shot. this is created by smooth cuts occurring to show a smooth flow from shot to shot. In continuity editing, establishing shots are used to establish the setting of the shots that are being shown to the viewer. Match on actions shots are also used in continuity editing. This may be used to show a path or journey that may be happening as their is a continuation of the same movement throughout the shots.

Non continuity editing is shots that are mismatched and non linear which may confuse the audience and not create a sense of reality. Jump cuts are used in this type of editing as an object may jump between shots which may show the passing of time between the movements which may disrupt linear time and sequences. Cross cutting, montages and flashbacks are other shots that can be used during non continuity editing.

Transitions is another editing technique that simply is the cutting of one shot to another. Usually a straight cut would be used to cut the two shots but transitions are available to film editors to create an effect between the shots. Fades, dissolves and wipes are different types of transitions that can be used. A transition such as a dissolve may mean/resemble something as the dissolve may be used to show a character dreaming.

Shot Duration/Pace and rhythm may also be used during editing. The duration of shots during a film may reflect the context of the film e.g. chase scene- quick fast shots. Long shot durations may create intensity during the film as facial expressions may need to be focused on during the film and this may be missed if a variety of shots were included.