Research for production - Applying recognizable conventions of trailers

In class we have been discussing the ways in which we could apply the knowledge of trailers and their conventions that we have gained through the research task into the creation of our own trailer. The task given to use was to create and promote a new London based horror movie titled 'Bloodshed High' in which we were asked to display the conventions of horror movies that we have been taught into the planning and creation of our trailer. We decided that because of the connotations of school and teenagers from the word 'High' used in the title that our film would centre around the lives of teenagers living in London which then allowed us to create our target audience of young people ranging from the ages of 15-21. From this we spent some time deliberating on what the plot of our movie would be first in order to transform that idea into a trailer. We decided to play on the school aspect of the title and set it at a school prom in order to appeal to our target audience which also helped us create our USP of mixing popular American culture with British culture and also British setting. The other unique selling point we decided to make was the use of a experienced director and a independent horror production company in order to not only create audience expectation, but also to attract a wider spectrum of audiences who are perhaps admirers of the work of our experienced director or followers of our production company.



One of our USP's was to mix popular
culture with British culture



It was important that the codes and conventions
we used was relevant in attracting target audiences  





Story board of our trailer

 After we came up with the plot we then had to draw up the story board of our trailer, showing the different conventions that we would be using in the trailer, some repeated and some varied

This includes:

.

E.G Warner Bros' logo here for Harry Potter

implies of doom and also adventure

• The use of a logo of the production company distributing the film, as the production company we're using is relatively unknown to audiences and so they do not know what to expect from it we felt it was important for us to highlight the genre of the movie through the logo of the production company so audiences are able to recognize the genre of the film as being a horror. We decided to do this by use a traditional sera-font usually used for horror films with a black background and a luminous red effect glowing from the logo in order to help the audience identify the genre of the film
• The use of a establishing shot showing the London school in which our movie is set in order for our audience to recognize the fact that our film is targeted at teenagers which also creates personal identification as education and school is something our target audience can identify and relate with
• The use of a montage of quick shots showing one line dialogue of conversation to introduce the characters of our film to our target audience. We plan to express the culture of teenage life in London and the problems faced for many teenagers living in London similar in the way that teenage life is portrayed in the film Kidulthood, the difference being that we have combined this with popular American culture in the shape of a prom within a horror genre to appeal to our target audience whilst also mixing the genres of horror and drama together.

Trailer will show similarities with Kidulthood
and their portrayal of London youth culture

• We then plan to show one second shots of different victims in the film being killed to not only create excitement but to also reveal some of the plot to our target audience whilst also highlighting the theme of the movie through the use of blood and gore. Throughout this we plan not to reveal the killers face as horror movies usually rely on the mystery and suspense created from the trailer to attract audiences and we plan to do this by hiding the identity of our villain. After these shots we plan to have the screen fade to black followed by our tagline as this creates a further sense of excitement whilst also hinting at a sense of doom
• We decided to use a variation of diegetic and non-diegetic sounds/ music to express the themes and genre of our movie. We plan to use eerie and frightening sounds appropriately, non-diegetic and diegetic, whenever a victim is being killed to create excitement and to also create a reaffirming sense of doom and high emotions associated with horror movies. As it is a London based film however set in a prom, we also plan to use urban London music from the natural surroundings in our trailer to express London teenage culture

  
  

  Our last shots will consist of a montage of really fast paced shots combined with constantly amplifying music order to build excitement, further reveal some of what the movie is about to audiences and also to bring the trailer to a climatic ending. Our very last shot will shot will reveal the person who directed the film (i.e. 'from the director of 28 days later'), the use of his name is however not necessary as many people will be able to associate the movie '28 days later' with our star director

Our last shot will show the film’s title 'BLOODSHED HIGH' will appear in the traditional serif font in bold red letters that resembles blood with a luminous glow coming from the outlines of the text as it plays on the name of the title, whilst also highlighting the blood and gore seen in horror movies. The last shot (in the same style of writing) will show our release date of 'Halloween 2011' as this is a popular holiday among teenagers and also very much so links to the genre of horror