Final Edit: 'Raze' Trailer

Here is the final edit of our film trailer for 'Raze', edited with Adobe Premier Pro C4 and uploaded onto YouTube (account: RazeFilm):


Any use of music in this trailer complies with 'Fair Dealing' under the 1988 Copyright Designs and Patents Act (UK), Sections 6(i) and 6(ii); Fair dealing is a term used to describe some limited activities that are allowed without infringing copyright. Briefly these are as follows: Section 6i: Research and private study. Copying parts of a literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work or of a typographical arrangement of a published edition for the purpose of research or private study is allowed under the following conditions: The copy is made for the purposes of research or private study; The copy is made for non-commercial purposes; The source of the material is acknowledged; The person making the copy does not make copies of the material available for a number of people.

Featuring: 2 minutes 28 seconds of Flux Pavillion - Cracks (Freestylers Remix)

UK Film Council: Lottery Funded logo

13 seconds of Optimum Releasing Ident

Final Evaluation

Now that our film trailer is finish, I will evaluate our media product. I am extremely happy with the final edit of our trailer as i feel that we have had a firm idea and vision from the beginning of the planning process and I feel that our vision has been realised successfully.

Forms & Conventions

Our trailer follows and uses forms and conventions of real media products in the way that it has been produced and edited, along with the music and credits that we have added to give it an authentic and realistic style. we have added in typical credits that we have seen from analysing existing film trailers, including the name of our production company, adding in company logos and an ident, the film title and name of the main actress in our film. In terms of these features, we have analysed typical features of film trailers and adapted and used them in our of media product.

In other ways we have challenged codes and conventions of real media products in terms of the content of our film, film genre and our main protagonist/character. From our analysis of thriller films at the beginning of the planning process, we found that generally protagonists in these films are adult males so we decided to challenge the conventions of this genre and have a young, female main character to act as the lead to our film. We decided to have a social realist twist on our thriller and decided to play upon common ideologies and sterotypes in society about youths in contemporary society being antisocial, disrespectful and violent. We chose to provide an explanation- not an excuse- for the behaviour of some antiscoial youths in today's society. We created a background and life for the character of Erin so that an audience could empathise and relate to her behaviour, therefore challenging people's opinions and views on today's youths as well as relating to our chosen target audience by addressing issues such as abuse, violence and bullying in the trailer.

Ancillary Texts & Brand

I feel that the combination of the ancillary texts with our trailer is very effective as we have kept a continuous visual style through the three products, with the same inner-city, run-down and urban location used specifically towards the end of the trailer where the final scenes are shot in the subway - a significant location that links the poster, magazine cover and trailer together. By using the same 'Distorted & Scratchy' typography for our film title through all three products we have successfully created graphological coherence, reinforcing the brand. The font is also a great visual representation of our film and would act as a logo for an audience to remember, relate to and recognise as part of the 'Raze' brand.

The dress code of our main character Erin is also part of the film brand, as she wears her 'trademark' hooded jacket, white blouse and black trousers throughout the trailer so you become familiar with this dress code. This is also significant when representing the character as a young female, reminding the audience that she is young and still in school. The dress codes of the gang characters, specifically the males is also important when reinforcing the ideologies/stereotypes that we are playing on in our trailer as well as the sound effects of the smashing glass and police siren to really support the urban setting of our trailer.

Audience Feedback

We have recieved very positive feedback from our target audience who have viewed our film trailer. Some comments we have recieved include the use of music in the trailer as its fits well with our social realist/thriller genre. I agree with this comment as we chose a very modern piece of music from the dubstep genre which is extremely popular with young adults and teenagers today. The use of this piece of music would instantly relate to our target audience and get them interested in the film as it is a popular song within the dubstep genre. I also feel that the lyrics of the song are quite haunting and emotional, linking directly to the issues adressed in the content of the trailer and working really effectively with what is going on visually with the character.

Some other feedback we have recieved is that the trailer looks like an authentic media product due to the way we have used common conventions and forms of existing trailers to really give our own a professional and realistic look. The acting of our protagonist has also been positively commented on which I agree with, as I feel that Laura (who played Erin) did fantastic job as our main character, creating a believable performance that engages with the audience as she goes through a visual and emotional transition and change through the trailer that is really believable and strong.

Another comment that we recieved was on the various angles we filmed from, specifically the low view point from the 'victim's point of view and the close ups at the start and end of the trailer. Personally, I am also pleased with the different angles and view points we filmed from as I feel that it adds variety to our trailer as we tried out different things to get the best effect and experimented with angles so we had more options when it came to editing. I feel that by doing this I have also improved my skills greatly when it comes to directing and editing as I have had a much more hands-on and responsible role specifically with editing in comparison to last year. This has allowed me to take an idea that I have in my head for how I want something to look and do it myself, rather than having to explain it to someone else to then edit. Luckily, myself and my working partner Mia had the same vision and idea of how we wanted the trailer to look so it was not too much of a challenge to create the trailer in terms of disagreements and different ideas, although I spent some time on my own editing as she was absent for a short while but this just helped me improve my own skills and learn more about editing on my own.

Overall, all of the feedback we have recieved from our audience has been positive, complimenting the music, acting and direction of the trailer. From this, I can see that our trailer has successfully reached and related to our target audience and I specifically feel that the music choice for our trailer is key when reinforcing the genre and plotline of 'Raze', as it seems to have worked effectively with the audience when supporting the stereotypes we are challenging. I am also extremely happy with the way that we have edited the cuts of the trailer to the beat of the music, with key moments as well as credits really being emphasisied and reinforced with the use of our music.

Media Technologies

When we started planning our trailer, we did a lot of research and analysis on existing trailer to learn common conventions and forms of thriller trailers so that we could use these in our own product. We used YouTube to look at existing trailers to then analyse them on our blogs. This Blogger blog itself has been a vital media technology when documenting the progress throughout the coursework process and writing down any decisions or problems that have occurred.

Adobe Premier Pro has been a significant media program that we have used for the editing process. My editing skills have improved a lot throughout this project as I have learnt many things about this particular editing program in comparision to my very limited knowledge of Premier Pro at the start of this project. I am very pleased with my personal improvement in editing which will help me for my future course at university. My editing skills on Adobe Photoshop have also been developed when editing our film poster and magazine cover, with this media program again being extremely significant to our coursework.

Youtube is, again, an online technology that we have used to gain feedback from our audience and get our product into the public domain to see how effective it is. By uploading our trailer onto YouTube it has been possible for us to get it viewed possibly by millions of people over the world, specifically our target audience and this is important to us when evaluating our product.

Overall Evaluation

To conclude, I am extremely proud of our final media products, specifically our film trailer. I am pleased with the way that we have edited the trailer with the use of different shots, angles and view points to add variety to the trailer with an effective use of music to support our genre and theme of our film to effectively target and address our audience. My personal skills have been developed and improved throughout the planning, production and editing of the trailer as we have done everything ouselves with very little help from anyone not involved in our project.

I feel that our trailer is an authentic media product, with an effective use of credits and effects/transitions between shots, including fades in and out to blend between scenes and credits. The acting in our trailer is generally quite strong and believable, specifically from our main character Erin as well as a clear plotline and story that I feel is easy to understand and follow throughout the trailer.

Some minor issues that I have noticed in the trailer is the swearing in the kitchen scene with the mother. This may be an issue as it would not conform to television regulations as swearing cannot be played before the watershed so the trailer would not be suitable for daytime viewing, but we struggled to edit out the swearing ourselves without harming the rest of the audio for the scene. Apart from this issue, I feel that we have created an extremely successful set of media products that all work effectively together to create a visually recognisable brand for 'Raze'. I think that our plotline is strong throughout the trailer, with the storyline clear and understandable for the audience. The research and planning process has been extremely benificial to the outcome of our trailer and I feel that we have effectively followed and used forms and conventions of real media products, as well as challenging the typical elements of our chosen genre to create a very original and exciting film.

Film Poster: Process & Evaluation

For our film poster, we took photographs in the same location as the final scenes of our trailer as well as the setting four the main image of our magazine cover. This sets a specific style and brand for our film, with an urban, inner-city looking location that adds to the mis-en-scene of the film and reinforces the social realist aspect of our thriller film genre.

We took a number of photographs in different parts of the subway, from different angles and points of view as well as against various types of graffiti that are scrawled on the walls of the subway to see which image would work most effectively for our film poster. Some images worked well until we came to place typography on them and the colours clashed or the font did not show up against the graffiti, so this process was more challenging than the previous editing of the magazine cover. Here are three images that were taken on our photo shoot :




Image Layout & Editing

We decided to choose one particular image that did not feature such bold and bright typography, although it added to the social realist and urban city theme of our film, we felt that it drew the attention away from our film title/logo which we wanted ti act as an eye-catching and bold feature of the poster. The layout design of our film poster is strongly based on our design sketch, with a landscape format.

We started by trying out a few of the images on Photoshop, but then made a final decision by choosing this particular image as we felt it was the strongest one. We needed to edit the light at the end of the subway to make it look like the photograph was taken at night to match the scene that this image is based on in our trailer, as well as lower the lighting inside the tunnel to make it look more like artificial lighting that comes on at night time in subways and underground pedestrian walkways.

Typography

The next stage of editing our poster was adding in the film title/logo in the Distorted & Scratchy typography that features in the magazine cover. We followed codes and conventions that are commonly visible in real, existing film posters and we had our film title 'Raze' in a very large, uppercase form to be the main focus of our film poster. We placed this to the left of the image, largely scaled and in black and white so the scratches in the letter forms are highlighted in white to give a really gritty and distorted effect against the grimy and rough texture of the subway walls.

We then added in the names of our actors - Laura Gray and James Mildenstein - sitting underneath our film logo/title in the same typography but in a smaller form. The name of our production company - An Absent Friends Production - was also added to sit on top of the film title to give and introduction to our film as well as follow conventions of some film posters, specifically the 'This is England' poster which we analysed and features a similar element. The name of our production company has been carried on from last year when we added this into our opening film sequence for coursework, and we felt that this year a production company name would add an authentic and professional look to our trailer so we decided to reuse the name again in our trailer and poster.

Other Features: Logos & Symbols

Further following common features and conventions of film posters, they usually feature a release date or 'coming soon' to tell the audience when the film will be available to watch in cinemas. We decided to add a 'Coming soon' to the poster as we did not want to set a specific date, but the use of this adds a mysterious and vague element which would intrigue and attract an audience as it is quite obscure, as well as the poster visually not giving too much away. A review from Empire magazine has also been added which links to our other ancillary text as well as following common conventions of film posters which often feature film reviews, quotes of star ratings to promote the film and attract an audience.

For our trailer, we wanted to choose well established company logos and idents to add in and create an authentic look to our trailer, so we chose Optimum Releasing - which often distributes films with a similar genre to our own - and UK Film Council which commonly funds British films which 'Raze' is, so we felt that these two companies would be well-suited and appropriate to our film. These company logos have been added to the bottom of our film poster, again following common conventions of film posters which typically do have the involving companies logos and names featured at the bottom of film posters, as well as a website address for our film in the Distorted & Scratchy font.

As well as these features that we have added to follow common conventions of film posters, we have added in certification to the poster, with a '15' certificate in the bottom, right-hand corner of the poster. This clearly adresses our audience with this symbol, attracting our target audience of teenagers and young adults. The use of this symbol is often used on posters and DVD cases to give a film an age certificate and this will immediately relate to our audience with this clear symbol.



Final Evaluation

Overall, I am extremely satisfied with the final edit of our film poster and it is my favourite of the two ancillary texts. I think the low, artificial lighting adds a moody atmosphere to the image, as well as the grimy, textured and graffitied walls of the subway really reinforcing the run-down, urban setting of the film, all contributing strongly to the mis-en-scene of the image and representing the film effectively. The lone figure of Erin crouched down in the subway is quite a mysterious and vague image, not giving too much away to the audience about the character which makes the image quite intruguing and exciting as you cannot really tell is the character is male, female, young or old.

The typography, again, is an effective representation of our film with the jagged and sharp cuts giving it an edgy effect as well as creating a recognisable brand and distinguishable logo for the film that people would recognise and relate to. The use of this font for the film website address is also important to stick with the brand effect that the font is vital to, in contrast to the Arial font used for the Empire quote/review and 'coming soon' features of the poster.

The darkness at the mouth of the subway is also an important visual element of the poster as it acts almost as a pathetic fallacy, setting the mood of the film to be quite dark and bleak, with the opposite of the phrase 'light at the end of the tunnel' being show visually in this image. This is an element of the picture that was not created on purpose, apart from to keep continuity in relation to the subway scenes in the trailer which were filmed at night. Instead, this is an accidental feature which works really well when effectively representing the content and plotline based around Erin who is a lonely and troubled character.

Altogether, the final outcome of our film poster is really effective and i feel that there is very little improvement to be made to it, apart from possibly changing the UK Film Council logo to black so it is less noticeable at the bottom of the image. I feel that it is a good representation of our film, portraying a lonely character in a run-down, urban location which hints the type of character and setting that is featured in the film without giving too much information about it, as well as having a running theme through the ancillary texts with the grimy, gloomy subway featuring in both images which creates cohesion and continuity through the images. Here is the final edit of the film poster: