Research

This is the research we did before producing our texts, we carried out audience research to help us build an audience profile and understand help us to produce our texts in a way that represents our audience's tastes.

We also carried out research of existing media products, this helped us to get a further understanding of the horror genre and how the texts we produced can conform to the typical convention of this genre.

Research Method-Questionaires

My choice of research is primary research, I have chosen to use a questionnaire. The reason being is they are easy to produce as well as they are a cheap research method. All of the questions are related to each other.

Benefits Of Questionnaires:

• Can be taken with you and completed anywhere.
• Information is obtained immediately.
• Questions can be asked immediately.
• Cheap

Drawbacks Of Questionnaires:

• Can be hard to analyse answers to open ended questions.
• People may be reluctant to fill them in properly.
• If you used closed ended answers the answers are limited.
• Time consuming to create.

For my questionnaire I will be interviewing 5 males between ages 16 and 18 and 5 females between ages 16 and 18. This is because this is the age group we will generally be targeting with our horror movie, this will be a basis for my 'audience profile'.

My Questionnaire

Tick next to the answer you wish to give:

What is your favourite film genre?

Horror?
Action?
Romance?
Comedy?
Romantic Comedy?

Where do you prefer to watch films?

At home on your TV?
In the cinema?
On your computer?

Do you watch trailers before seeing a film?

Yes
No

How many films do you watch per year? (roughly)

less than
5 to 10
10 to 15
15 to 20
20+

How many films do you buy per year? (roughly)

less than 5
5 to 10
10 to 15
15 to 20
20+

Do you buy a film on DVD if you like it in the cinema?

Yes
No

Do you visit the website for a film before seeing it?

Yes
No

What do you look for in a good horror movie?

Plot twists
Parts that make you jump
Gore
Special Effects
Scary Well Thought Out Story

What is your favourite horror movie out of this selection?

• Blair Witch Project
• The Shining
• REC

How long to you expect a film trailer to be?

0-30 seconds
30 seconds to 1 minute 5
1 minute to 1:30
1:30 to 2:00
2:00 to 2:30
2:30 to 3:00
3:00 minutes +

Where/how do you usually find out about up and coming films?

Trailers?
Tv Advertisements?
Internert i.e. the films website or youtube?
Posters?

Film Magazines?

What is your favourite film genre?

Horror?
Action?
Romance?
Comedy?
Romantic Comedy?

Where do you prefer to watch films?

At home on your TV?
In the cinema?
On your computer?

Do you watch trailers before seeing a film?

Yes
No

How many films do you watch per year? (roughly)

less than 5
5 to 10
10 to 15
15 to 20
20+

How many films do you buy per year? (roughly)

less than 5
5 to 10
10 to 15
15 to 20
20+

Do you buy a film on DVD if you like it in the cinema?

Yes
No

Do you visit the website for a film before seeing it?

Yes
No

What do you look for in a good horror movie?

Plot twists
Parts that make you jump
Gore
Special Effects
Scary Well Thought Out Story

How long to you expect a film trailer to be? (Roughly)

0-30 seconds
30 seconds to 1 minute 5
1 minute to 1:30
1:30 to 2:00
2:00 to 2:30
2:30 to 3:00
3:00 minutes +

Where/how do you usually find out about up and coming films?

Trailers?
Tv Advertisements?
Internert i.e. the films website or youtube?
Posters?

Magazines?

Answer Analysis: Where/How Do You Usually Find Out About Up and Coming Films?

This is clear evidence that the most effective way for us to reach our target audience with our film promotion package will be if it includes a trailer, website and poster.

Answer Analysis: How Long Do You Expect A Film Trailer To Be?

Here it shows that the target audience are split over the time for how long the trailer should be, becuase a large number chose between 1:30 and 2:00 we will aim for a trailer that is in that time frame but because a large number also said it doesn't matter how long the trailer is it won't matter too much if the trailer goes over or under that time frame.

Answer Analysis: What Is Your Favourite Horror Movie Out Of This Selection?

This question was used so that we could have a good idea which film to get inspiration from when creating the trailer for our film promotion package and helped us decide that a trailer in the same style as the blair witch project will be a highly effective way of reaching the majority of our target audience, this question also helps with our 'audience profile'.

Answer Analysis: What Do You Look For In A Good Horror Movie?

Here the results from our target audience are spread out, but once again there is a majority of people who have chosen the same option, which is that they believe a good horror film should have a 'scary' well thought-out story, this is something we will take into consideration and try to convey as best we can with our trailer.

Answer Analysis: Do You Visit The Website For A Film Before Seeing It?

It is made clear that the majority of our sampled target audience would visit the website for a film before seeing it, this shows us that creating a website to go with our film promotion package would be an extremely effective way of reaching our target audience, this also builds on our 'audience profile'.

Answer Analysis: Do You Buy A Film On DVD If You Like It In The Cinema?

Here we can see that if a film is of high enough quality then our target audience will purchase it on DVD after they have seen it at the cinema, this gives us an indications of the level of quality our audience will expect from our products.

Answer Analysis: How Many Films Do You Watch Per Year? (roughly)

Here we can see that the people who answered our questionnaire; i.e. our target audience, are big fans of films and this once again helps us build an audience profile.

Answer Analysis: How Many Films Do You Buy Per Year?

Here we can see that the mass majority of the target audience buy 5 to 10 films per year, this shows that they do not buy every film they see, this shows they have a high expectation for the quality of the films they purchase.

Answer Analysis: Do You Watch Trailers Before Seeing A Film?

Here we see that the majority of the target audience would watch a film trailer before seeing a movie, this tells us that creating a trailer will be an affect way of reacher the mass majority of our target audience.

Answers Analysis: What is your favourite film genre?

Here we can see that our choice of target audience was correct as the majority of the people who answered our questionnaire prefer horror movies.

Answer Analysis: Where do you prefer to watch films?

Here we can see that the majority of our target audience prefer to watch films when they are released at the cinema, this helps up build our 'audience profile'.

Website Research: Strangers

Here is the promotional website for the film "The Strangers".

The layout of this website is becoming more and more common with film promotional websites at the moment.

It is a simple homepage design with a trailer and minimal information about the film, this allows the trailer to speak for itself and I believe is a highly powerful and effective way of advertising and marketing a film, especially of this genre.

Website Research: The Blair Witch Project

Here is the website for the blair witch project, as you can see it's a fairly minimalistic website, but this adds to the effect of the film being 'independent' the black colour and strange symbols are iconography of the horror genre.

This webpage has round 5 pages in total, this is a typical number of pages for any film promotion website, however I feel with our website i will include the trailer for our movie in the centre of the page, this will allow the trailer to speak for itself.

The simplistic design doesn't give too much away to the audience here which encourages them to go further into the site and discover more.

Website Research: Wolfman and Drag Me To Hell

http://www.thewolfmanmovie.com/

This website contains many stereotypical aspects of the horror genre, it has a dark black colour scheme with the moon in the background, we can use these conventions in our production for the website of the trailer.

As well as this the centre peice for this homepage is the trailer, this is definately something we should think about encoporating into our final production for our website.


http://www.dragmetohell.co.uk/

This website has an excellent design with a central image of the central protagonist who is involved in the main horror plot of the film, it also has a review of the movie and very clear navigation buttons for different pages of the website, these are all things we could encorporate into our website.

Here we can see a convention that has recently emerged with film websites, it has links at the bottom of the page to facebook and twitter pages for the film, we could include this in our production of the website.

Website Research:1408

This is the promotional website for the film 1408, this once again is a horror genre movie.

Here as the main attraction to the movie they have used the strength of the actors names to attract the audience to the film, these actors already have a strong reputation and fan base and are to an extent a guarantee to the audience that this will be a film they will enjoy.

In terms of the website design its fairly simple, there's a menu with around 5 pages, this is the standard for almost all film promotional websites not just ones of the horror genre and the title of the movie is centre-piece of the website, this clearly shows the audience the title of the film and almost gives the film a brand name.

Also the central image here is of the location of the film, this is a powerful statement to the audience that shows them where the story of this film takes place and gives an indication toward the genre, combined with the actors names this will catch the eye of the target audience.

Website Research Conclusion

Overall through my research of existing horror movie websites, I have discovered that there are several different trends appear in almost all of them, I feel I can use these with the production of our horror movie promotional website.

For example I feel that having the trailer as the centre-piece for the website is a very powerful way of connecting with the target audience because it allows the film to speak for itself, this in itself is very powerful, by watching the trailer combined with the content of the website it will leave the audience wanting more, this in theory will lead to them going to see the entire film.

Also I feel that having a home page and around 4 other pages will be suitable as this is a common number for most of the websites I have seen, I also feel this gives us a chance to leave the audience with a very good impression of the film but keeps them wanting more as it doesn't give away too much about the plot of the film.

Colour scheme will be an important factor in the creation of the website because there are a set few colours that we have seen consistently come up in the research for the website, with our website I feel the most appropriate colour scheme would be of black and dark green, this would symbolise the location as a dark and mysterious forest, or black and dark red, the black is used once again to symbolise dark and mysterious and the dark red will symbolise blood, this will give the audience the impression that the film contains some kind of murder/killing conspiracy plot.

Trailer Research: Blair Witch Project

Here is the blair witch project trailer, we shall be using this as convention guidelines for our trailer and for our genre, we will however make a longer trailer as this is what was indicated to us by our target audience in our research.

Planning

This is the planning we did before the creation of our media products. We based this planning largely from our audience profile and research into existing products.

Website Planning

For the film promotional package we have decided to create a website as it was indicated to us by our audience research that this would be one of the best methods of reaching our target audience.


The software I used is 'Serif Web Plus X2" I chose this software package because it can deliver a proffesional product and is relatively easy to use.


The colour scheme we chose for the website was black and dark grey for the back ground to represent the genre of the film as these colours are typical conventions of the horror genre.


Here are the basic designs I have created for the website.



Homepage:



Directors:



Info:



Gallery:


Cast:

Trailer Storyboard

This is the storyboard we created to give us guidance when filming the trailer for our film 'Secret Alphabets'. To create this we used Adobe photoshop and in when creating the trailer we really tried to strictly abide by what we had created here on the storyboard.

This influenced our decisions on location and the filming equipment we used, it also help us choose timing and lighting dependent on the desired effect we wanted to portray with each and every shot.

Production

In terms of the production of the trailer I was responsible for the filming and my parter, Max Coles, was responsible for the editing, this way we were able to equally split the work between us and allow us to focus on different aspects so that the tasks and deadline we set were completed on time.

Also here is the production for the website I am going to produce as our audience research indicated it would be an effective way of reaching our target audience. I have applied the conventions and ideas I have found out and come up with in our research and these are shown in the designs.

I was responsible for the production of the website and my partner was responsible for the production of the poster.

Website Production: Master Page

The master page for a website contains the information and images you want to be featured on all of the pages of the website.

Here is the first version, all I had done at this stage is created a navigation bar so that if the target audience chose to visit the website they would be able to navigate around its pages with ease.

Here is the second version, here I have added conventions such as directors names, producing company and the logo for the company, these are the typical features you would find on any film promotional website, I have decided that I want these to appear on all of the pages of the website as they give the website a more authentic and professional look.

Here is the final master page, I have added the title of the film as I want this to appear on every page of the site, to reinforce the branding of the film into the target audiences mind.

Website Production: Homepage

Here is the homepage at the first stage of production, I have put the trailer here as the centre peice but there isn't much else to the page.

In this second version I have added endorsements from several external review critics, I have done this so that the audience are assured that this film is of a high standard and will encourage them to watch the trailer and hopefully be hooked in enough to go and see the film.

Here is the finalised version of the homepage. Since the last image I have added a background to it as it gives the audience an impression of the genre and the general themes in the film.

Website Production: Directors Page

Here is the first version of the directors page. As with all of the page on the website I have added a black and white distorted background image I have chosen to create a directors page is it is once again a typical convention of any film promotional website and it gives the audience an insight into how the film was produced and the people behind it, it can give them an impression of how this film would represent the horror genre.

In the second version I have added back stories for both of the directors and explained how they came up in the industry.

Here I've finalised the page by adding photos of both of the directors, this is simply because its is often a typical convention of any film promotional website and I decided that the best way to produce this website was to follow typical conventions.

Website Production: Info Page

Here is the first version of info page (this page provides information to the target audience about the theme and story of the film) once again I have chosen a woodland background with a grey scale effect to add to the theme of the film and it is also a typical convention of horror film websites to have the location as the background.

Here I've added in the back story for the film, this gives the audience a chance to read into the film and make a decision for themselves whether or not they like the direction the story is heading in, but doesn't give too much away that it ruins the film for them.

This gives the audience a chance at a negotiated reading as it allows them to decide for themselves whether or not they will go and see the film or whether they like the concept of it.

Website Production: Gallery Page

Here is the first version of the gallery page, I have chosen to create a gallery page as it is a convention seen on some film promotional websites and gives the audience and indication of the location and type of film, reinforcing the image in the head of the audience.

I have only included images of the location as I didn't want to give away too much of the story on the website and I have photos of the cast on another page with information about them.

Website Production: Cast Page

Here is the first version of the cast page, with the usual woodland background edited into grey scale.

Here I've added photos of the characters of the film, this just gives the audience and idea of the faces they can expect to see in the film and is a typical convention of most film promotional websites.

Here I have added back stories and information about the cast and some information about why they were picked for their roles.