EVALUATION: PART TWOBY AIDAN KEENAN

I started the construction of my film poster by selecting a base image to start with. I chose a simple photo of myself

with zombie make-up applied. The photograph was taken on a black, simple backdrop lit with ambient lighting

(lighting which is placed to seem natural). This lighting also allowed me to make use of chiaroscuro, which is the use

of shadows, shade and silhouettes for a specific effect; in this case, it was used to enhance the creepiness of the

photograph.

With the base image ready, I cropped it into a portrait size, typical of movie posters, before editing the lighting to

enhance the use of low-key lighting, emphasizing the horror aspect of the poster and its respective connection to the

trailer. The focal point of this photograph is obviously that face of the subject, a focal point which is often common in

many horror movie posters, such as the poster for Scream (1996). Here we can see the poster is dominated by the

face of the woman, and in my poster, it is dominated by the head of the subject.

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary

texts?

http://media02.hongkiat.com/horror-movie-posters/Scream_movie_poster.jpg

With the photo in the correct size, I proceeded to edit

the levels to enhance the darkness and lower the

brightness of the light, making further use of chiaroscuro.

I then added two textures on top; one dirty texture and

one scratchy texture. After adjusting the layer style and

the opacity of these textures, they darkened the

photograph further, adding to the horror aspect of the

poster. A movie poster with a similar effect is the poster

for Shutter (2013) which uses a blurry texture and a

texture which looks like folded paper.

After the textures had been added, I used paintbrushes to add some blood effects to the neck and face of the

subject, reinforcing the gore aspect of the movie poster. While these brushes could simply look like paint, the pathetic

fallacy (the process of attaching meaning to inanimate objects, like sadness to rain) enforced by the overall feel of

the poster adds the element of horror and gore, showing that in this movie, people are going to be hurt, possibly in a

gory manner. Another movie poster that uses techniques along these lines is A Tale of Two Sisters (2003), which uses

blood on the dresses of the two girls. This connotes that these girls are either going to be hurt or hurt someone in the film. It

is more likely they will be hurt as they are wearing white, which commonly connotes innocence. Another aspect in

this poster is how the mother is gripping the right girls shoulders. It could be drawn from this that the mother tries to

control the girl, possibly resulting in hurting her. This is further enforced by the mother wearing black, which commonly

connotes death.

http://www.youthedesigner.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Horror-Movie-Posters-27.jpg

http://cdn.mos.totalfilm.com/images/a/a-tale-of-two-sisters-2003-.jpg

The next step was to add the most common

conventions of movie posters: the title, the tagline and

the logos. Using the font ‘True Lies’ from DaFont.com I

wrote the title ‘Butchered’ and the tagline ‘This time,

we’re on the menu.” in dark red, to connote the blood

and gore that would be present in the movie. I also

added two x’s over the eyes of the subject, using the

font ‘Drawing Blood’ also from DaFont.com, to add

another aspect of creepiness and horror to the poster.

An effect similar to this was used in the poster for The

Woman In Black (2012). After this, I added the

production credits at the bottom of the poster, common

throughout almost all movie posters, using the font ‘SF

Movie Poster Condensed’, again from DaFont.com. For

the final touches, I added the BBFC 18 certificate logo

and the ‘Inferno Films’ production company logo

created by our group as our made-up production

company.

http://i.azcentral.com/thingstodo/movies/images/107344/107344_ab.jpg

The construction of my magazine cover began similarly to my movie poster. I took a base photograph, a simple black backdrop and with the subject holding a fake machete. I wanted to keep the photograph simple, as many movie magazines keep their cover image simple, using only editing that highlights the photographs main features and not going overboard with effects. To follow these lines, I kept the editing simple by duplicating the image and changing the copy’s layer style to multiply. This darkened the image, connoting the horror side of the movie, and also highlighted the key features of the poster, being the machete and the face.

After this, I added the header title of ‘Total Films’ along with an issue number and date, a price and website and finally a strapline which reads ‘Total Fun. Total Facts. Total Films”. I then erased the parts of the header which layered over the head of the subject, to give the look that the subject is standing in front of the title. This is a commonly used practise in movie magazines, like on this cover of Total Film.

http://hannahb93.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/total-film.jpghttp://korous.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/salt.jpg

After this, I added the cover text, using a colour

scheme of red, yellow and white, which I also used in

the strapline and header. During the creation of the

magazine, I hoped to emulate the style of Empire

magazine, a professional and highly successful

magazine. Following along its line, I added a circular

‘sticker’, advertising one of the contents of the

magazine, and then erased part of it so the machete

sat in front of it, again adding to the almost 3-D

effect. Finishing the magazine off, I added the

barcode to the right-hand corner, another

convention of movie magazines.

Left: Empire Magazine cover. Right: My made-up magazine cover

HOW DOES YOUR POSTER AND MAGAZINE COVER TIE INTO THE STYLE

OF YOUR TRAILER? WHAT AUDIENCE ARE YOU AIMING FOR?

My poster and magazine cover tie into my trailer as they both contain characters or aspects of the trailer within them. The poster has a zombie on it, which feature prominently in our trailer as it is a zombie movie. The machete in the magazine cover also features prominently in our trailer as one of the main weapons, while the subject holding the machete features as a zombie. Both ancillary products reflect the darkness of the movie, about how it is a horror film, while the magazine cover also reflects the elements of action that appear in our trailer, with a ‘fighting stance’ commonly taken by many action heroes either on posters or magazine covers.

Our target audience is a rather mixed bag. The body horror aspect of our film would attract reformers and individuals, the most common audience for horror films as they reflect a subculture which is not happy with the state of our society. As horror films commonly challenge the CDI (Culturally Dominant Ideology; the values and beliefs held by the mainstream) in ways such as having female characters as the most powerful, showing government-like authority as corrupt and having religion as a negative influence. One example of this is in Stake Land (2011) where the Brotherhood represent the Christian religion and are presented as highly violent and evil. In a mainstream film, this would not easily be accepted, but even as a horror film it caused a lot of controversy.

However, while the body horror aspect of our film would attract reformers and individuals, the comedy aspect would attract mainstreamers to our film. Many comedy-horror or ‘black-comedy’ films equal out to a success in the mainstream, as they are usually not a controversial as standard horror movies. Shaun of the Dead (2004) is an example of this; it is obvious it is a horror film, but the comedy within it opened the film up to a greater audience. As such, I believe our film will be enjoyed by a larger audience than standard horror films, thanks to its comedic side.