Storyboard

Horror Poster Analysis

The colours used on this poster are effective as they are dark and create mystery as it is a known fact that many people are afraid of the dark. The title of the film is put in big font in the middle bottom of the picture and the colour of the font is  a different colour to the rest of the poster. The setting of the film itself is established through the object seen on the picture which is the underground and it is clear that there are deaths in the film as there is blood on the window. A review is included at the top of the poster and the film company and certificate is at the bottom.

Organisation of Actors,Locations, Costumes & Props

Actors: After we decided on our story line we needed to consider people that could act in our trailer. Based on the audience research we did, we discovered that our target audience prefer horror trailers/films with only one victim and one villain and therefore we didn't need a great number of actors. Also, we didn't want the villain to be seen as it creates suspense and mystery so we only needed one actor. After watching previous existing horror trailers, it became clear that most victims are young women as they're more vulnerable, therefore we felt that this would be effective in our trailer. In the end one of us decided to be part of the production while the other filmed. 

Locations: We decided to film in an isolated location where we had a lot of space and privacy to experiment with different camera shots. The woods that we filmed in created suspense and we deliberately shot the trailer in a place where no one else was at the time to represent her vulnerability. We also filmed in a corridor in our college as it was accessible and there was no one around. We needed to stick posters on either side of the wall and using the shot that we did, we were able to capture this well. It was easy accessing the locations we needed to film in because we didn't need permission to use them. 

Costumes & Props: We didn't need to create or buy any special costumes for the actor to wear as we wanted the trailer to look realistic as the story line is realistic, and therefore we used ordinary clothes that a normal teenage girl would wear. The only prop we used was the poster of the main character, which we decided to stick on the walls of the corridor in our college. This prop shows that the villain is familiar with his victim as it'll appear as though he stuck the posters in a place where he knew she will see them. 

Audience Reasearch-Pearl and Dean

We used the website "PearlandDean.com" to compare our trailer and type of film with those similar which have previously been released. We decided that "The Ring" was similar as at the very beginning, the victim is a young girl, similar to what you see in our trailer. The statistics are shown below:

The ring age gender 4-6 0% male 41% 7-11 0% female 59% 12-14 0% class 15-24 9% AB 55% 25-34 41% C1 40% 35-44 15% C2 2% 45+ 35% DE 3% source: CAVIAR

As you can see, more females went to see this film than males, indicating that females would be more interested to see this type of film. This helped us to create our trailer as we used a female character and victim so that the viewer will be more able to put themselves in the position of the person they see on screen. It is also clear from these results that the age group most interested in seeing this film were aged within the 20-30 range. Therefore we had to make our storyline believable and using the idea of a stalker who then murders his victims through obsession was realistic.

The film "Creep" was also relevant to our film as in the trailer you see the victim who is a young female running away from her killer in a train station after it has closed. This is similar to our idea as our victim is also a young woman who is running away from the person who is trying to kill her and she is also isolated in her surroundings by being alone in the woods. It is also similar as you do not actually see the killer in the trailer, you have to go and see the film in order to do that. Below are the statistics we found from the Pearl and Dean website:

Creep age gender 4-6 0% male 67% 7-11 0% female 33% 12-14 0% class 15-24 42% AB 30% 25-34 22% C1 29% 35-44 21% C2 23% 45+ 15% DE 18% source: CAVIAR

As you can see from these results more men went to see this film than women unlike the previously compared film. Using ideas from this trailer to put in our own was useful as it meant that we would be able to attract both men and women to see the film. The girl in our trailer is a teenager which was also effective as it can be seen here that this age group was most interested in seeing this film. The older audience however was not that keen as only 15% went to see it and therefore we only show one person in the trailer who is a young female as it is certain that this will be the type of audience we will attract.

Questionnaire Results

The Working Script

Working script

Shot 1- Girl walks down a corridor with the camera filming her from the front using a long shot. Along the corridor on both walls are pictures of her. She slows down her pace 

as she sees the pictures. She pulls one down off of the wall and looks at it. 

Shot 2- From use of an over the shoulder shot, the viewer can see the picture of the girl as the young girl holds it in front of her. The camera zooms in on the picture and at this point the music changes and becomes more fast paced.

Shot 3- There is a jump cut showing the girl from the poster running through the woods and looking back over her shoulder as if she is being chased by somebody. use of a handheld camera and a tracking shot shows the point of view of the person who is chasing her. 

Shot 4- Subtitles come up with the words “she tried to ignore it” in a flickering font and a black background.

Shot 5- A mid shot of the girl is then shown as she is standing in front of a tree and looking around with a panicked expression as if she is hiding from someone. An effect is used here which causes the shot to be broken up and overlap itself.

Shot 6- Subtitles appear following on the previous one saying “But it won’t go away” the same effect is used as the last one.

Shot 7- A panning shot is used as if the killer is turning around quickly looking for his victim. The surroundings are quite isolated and they create suspense. As this panning shot is used there is also a change of non diegetic sound to make it sound more dramatic and emphasize fear.

Shot 8- The words “It will find you” appear on the screen in the same font and using the same effect as the previous text shots. 

Shot 9- There is a quick tracking shot of the victim running away.

Shot 10- “No matter what.” appears on the screen with a black background.

Shot 11- The shot goes back to a point of view shot of the killer using a hand held camera. He walks past the tree that the girl is hiding behind and then quickly turns around and we can see the girl on screen the camera moves in towards her as she screams showing that the killer has found her.

Shot 12- “ A live Works Film” appears on the screen using the same font and background as the previous text shown throughout the trailer. This shows the name of the production company.

Shot 13- The name of the film “Taken” is shown on the screen and the release date  with a background of a camera shot showing the sky which is used to symbolise that the murder is over.

Shot 14- A jump cut is used to then end the trailer and it takes it back to the start of the trailer where an over the shoulder shot was used to show the picture of the victim. The camera zooms in on her face and the fades along with the music. 

Our teaser trailer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VP97NxDTLEk