How Effective is the combination of your Main Product and Ancillary Texts?

There was a clear awarness to make sure as a group that our brand was obvious and notible. As our teaser trailer went along the lines of a ‘real-life’ cult we wanted our advertising to be all similar and striking enough to know that it was our brand straight away. We knew our audience was probably to be aimed at a 15+ audience and therefore we made the branding less childish and more sophisticated

When looking at our main ancillary tasks we knew that as there was to be a strong link between all three tasks we  looked at several factors that effected all three.

TYPOGRAPHY 

We experimented with many different kinds of typography. However in the end we decided on the font 'typewriter condensed' from the font website 'dafont' it seemed to have a  very sci-fi feel to it, but therefore holds those connotations of conspiracy and suspense that we'd like. It also looks like a lot more modern in the style of typewriter - like old 90's computer font which gives more technological connotations we'd like. 

(Research: Typography)

(Final Poster Design)

We used the font in all three of our tasks therefore creating a clear sense of connection between all three.

CHARACTER

One of the codes and conventions of psychological thriller is to have a key protagonist and especially in our case we only introduced one key character who may be seen to be our cult leader or the leader of the political broadcast.

We used our actress in all three of our tasks.

(Screen Test Lauren Bradley)

TECHNOLOGY IMAGERY

In all of our tasks, especially our trailer itself we gave connotations and ideas of technology throughout. On our website we used a television static background, giving connotations of problems with the ideas of technology involved. In our poster design we used a bright screen with our cult symbol on it to reflect onto our actress' eye. This again gives connotations of a technological cult impacting on the mind through brainwashing. And in our trailer itself we used many short shots involving technology.

(The Resolution: Viral)

(Subliminal Messaging)

(Green Screen Test #3)

What have you learned through audience feedback?

Audience feedback is crucial in establishing overall opinions of the teaser trailer and how it is seen through the viewers perspective. We used a variety of methods to accumulate feedback to achieve a firm understanding on how well the teaser trailer is received.

The Media Screening

We held a media screening that allowed a variety of different people to view our teaser trailer and fill out an evaluation sheet about our trailer. The results were helpful in generating an understanding of how our trailer is viewed by others, and gave us the ability to see which elements of our teaser trailer were most successful. 

When asked the question 'What genre of film do you think the teaser is?' we received a large mixture of results, with a significant number unsure of the genre. We fully expected this as we were essentially creating our own genre and the ambiguity of the film storyline and genre was intentional to put emphasis of the 'tease' of the trailer. Despite this, the majority of the results generated were centred mainly around 'Psychological', 'Cult' and 'Thriller', meaning that the majority understand the general basis of the genre.

We asked our audience 'How well do you think the trailer fits the intended genre?' and we found the large majority felt it fitted 'very well'. Most people that felt it fitted very well answered the former question with answers such as 'Psychological Thriller' and 'psychological cult' meaning that our teaser fitted well with the idea of 'Psychological', a significant part of  our intended genre 'Technological Psychological Thriller'.

When asked the question 'What do you think the most effective element of the teaser is?' the majority answered 'camerawork/editing', we spent a large amount of time editing the teaser to achieve a fast-paced, brainwashing effect and this therefore proves that it was effective in reaching the audience in a significant way. The second most popular result was our use of 'sound' within our teaser trailer, an element we spent a large amount of time perfecting and researching, especially in achieving the most successful music to accompany our 'brainwashing' segment of our trailer. 

We asked the question 'Who do you think the target audience is for this teaser trailer?' and the most popular results that we generated were:

• Age: Teenagers
• Sex: Both genders but predominately male
• Interests: social networking, religion, culture, politics and cults

The feedback to this question supports what we wished to achieve in the creation of our teaser trailer. We wanted to make it applicable to all ages but predominately teenagers so therefore it is fully understandable why the majority felt it was aimed at teenagers due to the use of youthful techno music and modern technology The implicature that it is aimed at predominately male is understandable as there is a distinct masculine feel to the teaser that was intentional to put emphasis on the power of the cult. Through creating the teaser trailer, we wished to put emphasis on religious, cultural and political issues and the  feedback to this question proves that we were successful in doing so. 

The final question that we asked was 'What was the most memorable moment in the teaser trailer for you?' and our overall feedback was:

• combination of images in brainwashing segment
• Close up of the lips 
• Flashing Symbols and repetition of the phrase 'we are the answer'
• promotional speech

We spent a large amount of time collating the material for the brainwashing section of the teaser trailer and through doing this evaluation we have learned that we were successful in reaching the viewer in a memorable way. 

Overall through doing this media screening we were able to view the trailer from an outsiders perspective and learn how the trailer appears to others. We learned that through  leaving the exact definition of our genre open we were taking a risk, but we feel that the overall consensus of the genre was along the right lines and the inability to exactly define the genre was expected and understandable. Furthermore, the intended 'tease' of the trailer would not have been as effective had we incorporated more of a storyline to create a firm genre and therefore we were happy with our overall decision to keep it ambiguous. 

YouTube Feedback

We posted our teaser trailer on Youtube, which allowed us to get feedback from anybody who wished to view the trailer. Youtube capabilities allow people give feedback through 'likes' and comments and gives us a general overview of the typical age and gender of the average viewer. 

The feedback shows that the average viewers are females between the age of 13-17 and both genders between the age of 18-24. This was to be expected as it was our general target audience and proves that we were successful in reaching our intended audience.

Comments such as 'I want to join the resolution' and 'I just joined the resolution' are proof that we were successful in creating a promotional cult tool as well as a teaser trailer. This feedback is fully appreciated as it means that we have succeeded in our goal of creating something that blurs the line between a realistic promotional cult advertisement and a film trailer. 

Facebook Feedback

Facebook worked as a successful tool in receiving feedback from our target audience of teenagers and allowed us to circulate the trailer online. 

It was another outlet for us to access our client and allowed us to get some interesting feedback from people online. One of the main pieces of feedback that arose from our Facebook Feedback was the originality of what we have created and how we have challenged ourselves by not choosing the more popular genres such as horror. 

In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

"directly addressing the audience with one centre figure"

The first convention we’ve used and developed quite significantly would be the actual convention of the teaser trailer itself – its tease, exposing as little narrative as possible but just enough to whet the audience’s appetite. By making our trailer almost interactive, directly addressing the audience with one centre figure delivering a speech, we’ve taken this enticing the audience into the cinema one step further by actually directly inviting them. Our idea of interrupting broadcast at the beginning, adding the title cards and static were purposely placed to make the trailer look as if it were actually interrupting broadcast and has in a sense interrupted the viewer’s life. We’ve tried to make it seem as real as possible to make it really resonate with the viewer – I think it is always slightly frightening to be directly addressed in a cinema or through a screen – we all feel safe behind our screens and the anonymity they provide us so to be actually addressed is quite startling, if unsettling – we are intruding on their anonymity and therefore lives, and threatening their sense of safety.

"the footage of the Jonestown massacre and the A-bomb"



All the ideas we tried to incorporate into it - the brainwashing and symbols, the footage of the Jonestown massacre and the A –bomb, the shots of technology - we wanted to be especially modern, especially relevant issues to our viewer. We wanted to play on all these threats and fears that society has and the public hold – the threat of terrorism, of cyber terrorism, of technology, of cults etc. By playing on these fears they already have and attempting to hyperbolise them, not only will this make the fear we generate seem all the more real and all the more dangerous, hopefully leaving an imprint of our trailerin the viewer’s mind, it should induce the viewer to think and to contemplate these issues they possibly already worry about. I think this makes our trailer especially eerie and a psychological tease, and perhaps we have created a new convention of a teaser trailer – one that not only entices you to see the movie, but entices you to think? The more the viewer does think and contemplate the issues we bring up, the more likely they are to see the film in the hope of it resolving them. I think we developed this ‘tease’ quite significantly – we revealed no narrative, but just enough to set up the concept of our cult, but could still intrigue and draw in viewers.

"we would have the trailer 'interrupting broadcast' "



I think we definitely challenged the conventions of advertising and marketing our film. We came to look upon it as marketing the actual cult itself, not the film, and went about creating the trailer and the promotional material as we thought a cult might attempting to lure in members and this was where the original idea of the brainwashing video came from. We would have the trailer ‘interrupting broadcast’ to, as I mentioned before, set up this realism and intrude into the viewer’s sense of safety, and then have them addressed by our central figure, a representative of the cult.

"symbol we created for our cult"

Real media products select their audience demographic by featuring certain paradigms to entice a certain viewer and attach certain connotations - within our trailer, we wanted to push this convention and include as many different paradigms as possible leaving the concept completely open for interpretation with so many connotations. We experimented with this idea of subliminal messaging – which if worked, should hopefully subconsciously ingrain itself into the viewer’s mind, but also tried to find a balance between simplicity and chaos. We wanted the brainwashing sequence to be especially fast and almost blinding, but the symbols being shown to be clear and concise and memorable to the eye – we incorporated the symbol we created for our cult as many times as we could and phrases such as ‘We are the answer,’ ‘Join us now’ – short and concise. We again liked this idea of trying to ‘recruit’ members and kept the date, the name and tagline as clear and memorable as we could so it would be kept in the viewer’s mind.

I think our trailer would definitely class as a psychological thriller, if not a technological thriller and I think our trailer succumbed to the conventions of both. We hyped up the paranoia, attempting to play on current fears and threw into question several conspiracy theories – I think it is definitely very psychological and creates a suspense, but one that you consider after you’ve watched the trailer and reflect on it. I suppose the ultimate test of whether a thriller is in fact a thriller is if it actually thrills and I believe ours does, specifically through sound. We layered many different sounds – the music but also bleeps and buzzes and sounds of just technology whirring away, to build up to a peak, that then silences into the voice re-quoting our tagline – we liked the contrast of noise then stopping into the softness of a human voice. Though no particularly sophisticated technology is featured in our trailer, technology is very prevalent throughout it – we incorporated shots of Facebook, Twitter, iPhones, Macs etc. - as is the idea of technology threatening us and our society which is essentially the plot for all techno thrillers.

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

Research and Planning

We used surveypirate to collect our audience research, which we then used to plan our trailer to fit the specific requirements set by the audience. By using the internet we were able to ask a wider audience including different genders and age groups, which enabled us to create a trailer that was unique.

We used the internet to research previous "cult" films and camera angles they used so we could fit the specifications required for our trailer. Websites such as Youtube have become increasingly popular to find strange film trailers and other mind control clips that the public have posted, so this was our key source of information for viewing existing products.


We researched into colours used in existing posters for our genre along with poster layout. We discovered that blue, black and white were the most commonly used in posters and websites, therefore they were included in our plans and final products.

Construction
We used Imovie 09 to edit our trailer, we changed the contrast of the scenes with our actress, as we attempted using Greenscreen. We set up the Greenscreen in several rooms with different lighting techniques such as the 3-point lighting. As we went to edit the greenscreen technique on the imovie software, we realised the lighting wasn't right meaning that where the lighting was harsh on Laurens face, the face became invisible. After attempting this in different rooms we decide to change the contrast to white with her face only slightly visible. This made her look slightly ghostlike.


We used Garageband to edit the sound we took from imovie and soundcloud to accompany our trailer. We had a small noise during the dialogue of our trailer, which after precise and careful editing on Garageband, enabled us to remove it without creating a gap in the speech. Finally we changed the sound level of the music, so that it crescendo at the beginning and the loud bang in the music matched the atomic bomb picture.


We used Youtube, Facebook and Twitter in the filming of our trailer to portray a current "cult" that was rapidly growing and if you didn't follow you would feel isolated. The reason we incorporated social networking sites into our trailer was to explore the issues with digital technology, and to show the influence it can have.

We used the website Wix to create our website. It was designed so that the audience have to watch the pre-teaser trailer before being able to enter the site. We included the "static" as a background which is parallel to our teaser trailer. We decided to use this as well as the "no signal" input in our trailer to portray a professional trailer, and as we wanted a promotional video of a cult, we wanted to give the impression the cult could maybe control the signal.

Evaluation

When we began to evaluate our trailer, we posted it on Youtube, Facebook and Twitter to try to obtain audience feedback. Through posting our trailer on Youtube, we were able to compare our trailer with other A-level trailers as well as current film teaser trailers being released.
We posted our trailer on these websites to try and obtain as much audience feedback as we could, and these sites are the most popular for social networking and sharing media with other people.  

Subliminal Messaging.

Why we veered away from Horror.

We decided to veer away from Horror as we became more interested in the mysterious and technology aspects of Thriller and therefore looked more closely at Psychological Thriller. The main aspects of Horror films is to make and audience jump and to disgust or panic the audience, which after discussing the intentions we wanted our trailer to convey decided that Horror did not match the expectations we had.

We felt that a Psychological Thriller would be more challenging as we incorporated more modern Thriller aspects such as Political and Technological. After researching into political broadcasts, we discovered that the politicians always talk directly to the camera hence talking directly to the audience which is what we intended for Lauren's speech at the beginning of the trailer.