PLANNING: FILM POSTER

When planning a film poster, there are various aspects which are consistent through all of them:

• The film's title 
• Tagline 
• The names of the main actors
• Billing block
• Social media accounts (Facebook, Instagram...etc.)
• Images of the main characters (Four Students, Doctor)

I was inspired by the poster of the 2008 thriller, Disturbia, since I feel that the aspects shown throughout the poster can be adapted to fit the story of Risk. I decided to label the aspects of the Disturbia poster, in which I will be adapting and say what they will be on my poster:

A: This is where the four main protagonists will be located. With two in each binocular lens, it will show towards the audience the importance of the characters and that they are being watched. I would like the colour to be tinted a light red to go with the whole theme of Risk's social media campaign and how red signifies danger and betrayal.

B: The person will be the Doctor, who is the person spying on them and controlling their minds with the drugs, in which they gave. I felt that he was an important character and needed to be included in the poster.

C: The tagline has to be short and has to catch the attention of the viewer, so that they can become intrigued in the film. We as a group have decided that 'Will you take the Risk?' was a excellent, since it incorporated the title into it and the plot reference on how they will be have to do dangerous things.

D: The silhouette will be of the Belvedere building, since it is an important aspect of the film.

E: The title of the film, Risk

F: I decided that the billing block, should rather go underneath the image of the head, rather than to the side, because in that area I wanted puffs and critical acclaim about the film, which would attract an audience.

I decided on doing a brief sketch on how I would like the poster to look like. This would give me a clear understanding of what I would be able to do revolving the constraints of the poster's dimensions. 

RESEARCH: FILM POSTER

When deciding on what our film poster should look like, I decided to do some research into film posters in the psychological thriller genre. I looked on various websites such as on Pinterest and on Google Images, to see what the main aspects were of psychological thriller film posters and what the poster did to draw the audience in. When looking at the posters, there was a common factor in most of them, which was that they all feature close ups of faces and featured predominantly black backgrounds with a hint of a different colour. All of the psychological thriller posters I have looked at contain the main character, who is the victim of the story (in this case victims, since four students get the drug) and the antagonist, who looks sly and dark.

Since we all would develop different posters, we decided to choose ideas for our own poster, which we though represented the film in the best way. Since our film is about a doctor that gives four students a drug which controls their minds, I thought it would be a great and innovative idea to incorporate that into the poster. Therefore, I decided that all of the five characters (four students and one doctor) should be on the poster.

I really liked the poster concept of the 2008 thriller, Disturbia which consists of a black and white image of Shia Leboeuf using binoculars to spy on someone, and the image inside the binoculars is red orange colour, which is the exact aspect I was previously talking about which was the hint of colour. I felt like I could easily adapt this towards my poster, since the doctor does spy on them to see if the mind controlling drugs are working and the characters situated inside the binoculars would be the 4 students. As well, the skyline of the houses on the man's neck could be of the Belvedere building which is an important aspect of the film, which I thought would give intrigue towards the film, since I think that the building looks quite creepy and mysterious.

RESEARCH: 'ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY' FILM MAGAZINE ANALYSIS

These are magazine covers from the popular American film and television magazine, Entertainment Weekly'. Both of them have a similar layout, with central images dominating the page, with the first, centering on Bridget Jones and her romantic interests, whereas the latter features the eponymous character, Maleficent. Both of them stand out from the plain background and both are brought in front of the magazine title. The large subtexts refer to the picture of the magazine.

RESEARCH: LA LA LAND POSTER ANALYSIS

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RESEARCH: 'LA LA LAND' TRAILER

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Online Publishing from YUDU

PLANNING: CALL SHEET #2

2) CLOSE UPS

Shoot Date: 3rd November 2016

Location: Photography Studio, Claremont Fan Court School

Crew:

Bea Chavdarova: 7896 ******

Chloe McDowell: 7472 ******

Alex Davies: 7710 ******

James Eager: 7531 ******

Equipment:

Canon 750D Camera

Torch

Props:

None

PLANNING: CALL SHEET #1

1) THE FOUR MEET

Shoot Date: 11th October 2016

Location: Orchard Science Building, Claremont Fan Court School

Crew:

Bea Chavdarova: 7896 ******

Chloe McDowell: 7472 ******

Alex Davies: 7710 ******

James Eager: 7531 ******

Equipment:

Canon 750D Camera

Tripod

Props:

The Contracts (Sheets of Paper)

RESEARCH: AUDIENCE

MORAL PANICS

Moral Panics is the feeling that the situation is out of control in some way, and therefore represents a threat to the moral order. This can be related to the Media Effects Model in the sense that something should not be released for a reason, whether there is depravity in it, such as drug use, violence, torture, rape and murder. According to Stanley Cohen, the media play a massive role in enforcing moral panic – even if it just simply reporting the news.

MEDIA EFFECTS MODEL 

The Media Effect Model Some negative implications of this theory are when people do “copycat murders”. An example of the Media Effects Model, was in January 1998, 16-year-old Mario Padilla and his 14-year-old cousin, Samuel Ramirez stabbed Mario's mother, Gina Castillo, 45 times, killing her. The case became known as the "Scream murder" and fell under intense media scrutiny after the boys claimed they were inspired by Scream and Scream 2.

ADORNO THEORY

Adorno suggested that culture industries churn out a debased mass of unsophisticated, sentimental products which have replaced the more 'difficult' and critical art forms which might lead people to actually question social life. As well, he said that we are given false needs by the media, meaning that propaganda persuades us to consume the products and spend more money.

MASLOW'S HIERARCHY OF NEEDS

Maslow's hierarchy of needs is a motivational theory in psychology comprising a five tier model of human needs, often depicted as hierarchical levels within a pyramid. Maslow wanted to understand what motivates people. He believed that people possess a set of motivation systems unrelated to rewards or unconscious desires.

USERS AND GRATIFICATIONS MODEL

During the 1960s, people who are grew up with television, became apparent on how they are effected and make choices on the certain texts they consume. These texts can be either escape from everyday problems and life and values presented through texts. In 1948 Lasswell, a media theorist, suggested that media texts had functions for individuals and society:

• surveillance
• correlation
• entertainment
• cultural transmission

RECEPTION THEORY

Reception Theory is based on Stuart Hall's encoding/decoding model of the relationship between text and audience - the text is encoded by the producer, and decoded by the reader. When the producers use common codes and conventions, which lead the expectations of the audience, this leads to the audience reacting to the certain text in a positive way. These can be the genre, the use of stars and common themes used in the film. This leads to producers being able to position the audience in a certain amount of agreement on what the code means. This is known as a preferred reading.

TWO STEP MODEL

The theory follows that there are opinion leaders which love the mass media and pay close attention, which leads these leaders to tell other individuals in social contact. This leads to the spread of a certain media text, which can serve as advertisement. It is common, that when a friend recommends a media text, they are more likely to see it.

EXIT POLLS

Exit polls from Alexdavies44

ROLE OF BBFC

The role of the bbfc from Alexdavies44

RESEARCH: AUDIENCE PROFILE

 This is an audience profile for my upcoming film trailer we will produce: Risk

Age group: 15-22+, teens and young adults

Gender: Both males and females equally

TV Shows: They are likely to watch TV shows in the thriller genre, such as Pretty Little Liars and Bates Motel

Films: They are likely to see at the cinema youth-orientated thriller and horror films: Don’t Breathe, Nerve, Girl on the Train and Blair Witch

Leisure Time: In their leisure time, they will stream films via iTunes, drink Starbucks coffee and other similar beverages; hang out with friends at eat at common restaurants like McDonalds and Nandos

Clothes: H&M, Topshop, Urban Outfitters and American Eagle

Media: A recent model of the iPhone for using internet on the go and outside of their homes; An expensive laptop to watch films and TV shows, as well to go on websites like Amazon to buy products online for their own enjoyment

Social Media: They would go on social media, like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and use those to post pictures, videos, comments and posts about their everyday lives and to keep up with their friends and celebrities they follow. They will also use YouTube to watch trailers and pop culture entertainment

RESEARCH: MISS SLOANE POSTER ANALYSIS

TREATMENT AND TOP LINE

WORKING TITLE: RISK

The topline: four students Stephanie, Aaron, Cara and Richard in need of some quick cash respond to an advert for being guineau pigs in medical research. They report to a lab and chat nervously. Soon they are prostrate on beds, in patient gowns, being injected / swallowing tablets under the watchful eye of two doctors. A cutaway shot suggests some hallucinatory experiences.

The trailer cuts to Stephanie in her ktichen the next morning suddenly receiving a text. The phone screen looks like a game with a challenge / task. The screen goes black. Stephanie feels compelled to follow the instructions. She is told to break a few laws on the way (such as steal money from her mother's handbag, snatch a scooter left on the pavement, throw a stone at a window). She is surprised at her own behaviour. Her task is to surprise a stranger by breaking into their house.

She finds that the stranger's house belongs to Aaron. They exchange greetings. A text arrives simultaneously on both their phones, instructing them with the next task. This one is harder. It involves persuading someone to take a high-level selfie. The screen goes black. They carry out the task. The person falls to their death and they realize that they are in the power of a mind control drug.

The topline (one elegant sentence): A student who has take part in a drugs trial finds herself being controlled through the instructions appearing on her smart phone /tablet which forces her into increasingly dangerous situations that endanger her life and that of total strangers.

The big question: will the students resist the mind control drug before further challenges cause further traumas?

PLANNING: OUR TREATMENT

As part of my research into how to devise a treatment, I watched a FutureLearn video presented by Frank Ash.

 For Frank Ash, Creative Consultant who has taught storytelling and creativity techniques to teams across the BBC and beyond, it is important to focus on the audience: what will interest the audience? How will the narrative develop?

I decided to watch FutureLearn on YouTube which showed how Frank Ash would set up a treatment for a film. He said that you need to be interested in what you are creating and make sure that other people will be too. I feel like this information, will help me in creating my own trailer since I will follow these guidelines.

"So, if you’re aiming for your film to reach a large audience online, making sure it has universal appeal will be key"

TOP LINE DEFINITION: Think about your favourite book or film or any ‘good story’ you recently watched online, could you sum up its narrative into ‘one elegant sentence’ to provide its ‘toppling’

BIG QUESTION DEFINITION: What was its big story question, and how important was it to your appreciation of the text?"

STORYBOARD

Since we wanted to explore new technologies we decided to find different websites that could help us in the planning of our film trailer. We found a website named StoryboardThat, which creates digital storyboards in a comic-strip style. After creating one storyboard strip from a scene in our film using that website, we eventually decided to not use it, since we believed it would be much easier to add detail, since the website already has loaded images and we cannot customize. Therefore, we decided to draw the storyboards by hand rather than using digital technologies.

A three-part comic strip made using StoryboardThat

RESEARCH: 'THE QUEEN OF KATWE' TRAILER

I watched the trailer for the upcoming biographical drama film, 'Queen of Katwe'.
The genre of the film can be split between two distinct genres. One genre being biographical since the film is based on a real girl from the slums of Katwe, Uganda, and the other genre being family drama, since there is conflict between Phiona and her mother on her achieving her dream of becoming a chess champion.

It is clear to see that Phiona is the eponymous, Queen of Katwe, since she is the main character and protagonist of the film and the trailer follows her journey from Uganda all the way to the World Championships. Other characters which are seen among the trailer is Robert, who we assume is Phiona's best friend since he introduces Phiona to chess and teaches her how to play and is very optimistic and encourages her to follow her dream. Phiona's mother is the polar opposite to Robert, since she is controlling and feels that dreaming of "big things" is a waste of time.

The location and setting of the film is conveyed very well throughout the trailer, since in the opening seconds, a title of 'Katwe, Uganda' comes up, which immediately shows to the viewer that it is set in a urban African area, since Katwe is a shanty town. The large number of slums and busy streets, further emphasize how Phiona is so small and that she is trying to follow her dreams in a place that hectic.

There is a POV shot, whereby she is looking through some wood of a slum and witnessing the chess pieces roll on the table. This look of imagination and wonder, shows how Phiona is curious about chess, which is what begins her dream to become a champion.

The clothes which are shown throughout the trailer, for Phiona are either long dresses or short sleeve shirts and skirts. This is the similar attire of all the other women in Katwe, since Phiona is part of the working class and cannot afford expensive clothes. The song in the background of the trailer is 'Thick Skin' by Leona Lewis. The lyrics of the song can draw a parallel to the synopsis of the film, since she has to keep fighting against people who are bringing her down and succeeded on her own terms.

RESEARCH: 'MILK' TRAILER

I watched the trailer for the bio-pic film, 'Milk' and analysed in a SlideShare presentation.

MILK - TRAILER ANALYSIS from Alexdavies44

RESEARCH: CAROL POSTER ANALYSIS

RESEARCH: 'CAROL' TRAILER

I watched the trailer for the critically-acclaimed film, Carol. I was engaged with the two and half minute video, which portrayed a subtle, yet passionate forbidden romance through slow piano music and transitions between the two main characters, Carol and Therese.

Carol - trailer analysis from Alexdavies44

RESEARCH: FILM EDUCATION - TRAILER MAKER

We decided since we will be constructing a trailer in the upcoming year, to personalize and make a trailer from previous clips of a film. This was very useful, when it came to seeing how a trailer was constructed and what were the key aspects needed, such as inter titles.

Here is a LINK