To consider every aspect of my teaser trailer a lot of planning must be conducted. After brainstorming several ideas and thinking up different settings and story lines.
After depicting what was the best and most realistic story lines this is a break down I have come up with that covers many aspects to allow me to have a clear view of how my piece is going.
Taking inspiration from dark, haunting trailers such as Frozen and Hostel I have picked out similar conventions and brainstormed ideas based on a psychological thriller.
These ideas have come about from location viewing, story lines that work well with the equipment I have however it is still a rough outline and during the process may alter slightly.
Visions.
Title- Wired – this is due to the thought of electrical/scientific equipment/ investigations.
Genre- psychological thriller
Target audience- 18-35 years who enjoy psychology, deep thinking independent films
Style- gritty looking, nothing to glamorous on camera creating a sense of kidnap, torture and danger.
Here below is a series on images, inter-titles and other music videos that has helped inspire ideas and create an overall look.
Plot summary
Teaser trailers do not intend to create a flowing, obvious story line it is simply a hint to what is to come creating a sense of genre and the use on inter-titles sometimes help give an overview of the plot.
The overview I have come to is this. A young male age 19-20 goes missing with no trace of murder or anything else just disappears. The rest of the film consists of bodies of other people similarly been taken used for scientific experiments and torture to see how the human body reacts. More and more happens throughout to create suspense and struggle to get away. A shrine to him throughout with many close up stalker like images and videos strung throughout to create a sense of being watched and researched.
Narrative
The trailer will hopefully begin with the sense of someone missing, a odd figure surrounded in this shrine to him and images, headlines presenting to the male that no one knows where he is or where to look so a sense of being stuck is given. Then the trailer will build with quicker shots of escape, torture and scientific equipment and end with the shrine being destroyed or the candles blown out to symbolise the end.
Monday
Re-visiting storyboard
When looking at other trailers, a typical convention of them had the production company advertised at the start only for a few seconds. I have created my own brand name and have kept it simple by simply having "A muddle box production" in white on a black background to then use a cross disolve transition to a different typography of it- cracked being the most likely at the moment to set the horror genre theme straight away similar to the typography in trailers such as "Hostel"
In these shots, I will use a photo collage of the actor with headlines such that post questions such as Murder?, What happened? Missing. Itll then have a transition into a candle being lit in front of this collage that the criminal has collected and created to then appear as a sort of shrine.
For this shot I want to try to create a spot light on the victims face of them having been tied up and this being all you can see so that it begins the trailer of slowly still asking questions.
For my middle section of the trailer, I want to use quick shots one after the other to build tension and keep viewers entertained this will be achieved by quick editing with effective shots. I have already played around with shots outside using water and the actor throwing it back up as a hint into torture or attempt of murder via drowning. The shots I did as practice have worked effectively and I will upload these as development towards my final trailer. The second image is just a hand trying to escape from being tied up. Simple but effective.
These shots are other ones I have thought of that I dont have to record much off to give a sense of what is going on. Tbere is a person being tied up and dragged by their feet. Then a display of tools and electrical equipment the criminal is using in his experiment.
Again, these are just quickly drawn, quickly thought of attempts to keep pace in the middle fast. There is a shot of seeing someone being wired and also another shot from the outside "drowning" shots.
This scene mirrors the start shot yet we see the actor trying to break away. Then again we are shown the shrine with the candle yet the candle is being blown out. This slows down the trailer bringing it to an end yet still asking questions.
Sunday
Collage of inspiration
Through my research I have put together a collage of images that give a similar feel to what I would like to achieve within the same genre. These have been screen grabbed via youtube from music videos and trailers.
Saturday
Voice over research
After two of my favourite teaser trailers being Remember me- where the actor uses his voice from the film as a narrative for the trailer and 500 days of summer- where instead of inter titles a male voice is spoken over the top to create the narrative, I looked into voice overs to see if they worked with horror/thriller genres.
Short sentences seem to be used continuously moving the narrative swiftly on. In 500 days of summer it doesn't give to much away but creates a narrative which really suits the independent quirky love film.
Why I feel a voice over is good to use, is that is captures the audiences attention where you can but pictures/shots to words to create a overall image and idea of what the film is about. However, in watching thriller trailers, this is never present it is diagetic sounds from the scenes used as sound effects to enhance the genre. I think using effects on the inter titles will help reiterate the intended genre without taking focus away from what they are watching. This is where music is very important in supporting the inter-titles and helping it all flow together.
Short sentences seem to be used continuously moving the narrative swiftly on. In 500 days of summer it doesn't give to much away but creates a narrative which really suits the independent quirky love film.
Why I feel a voice over is good to use, is that is captures the audiences attention where you can but pictures/shots to words to create a overall image and idea of what the film is about. However, in watching thriller trailers, this is never present it is diagetic sounds from the scenes used as sound effects to enhance the genre. I think using effects on the inter titles will help reiterate the intended genre without taking focus away from what they are watching. This is where music is very important in supporting the inter-titles and helping it all flow together.
Intertitles
I looked at the Hostel trailer for their use of inter titles as this is a trailer I found with the biggest link to the genre and theme I have tried to create. By looking at hostel I have analysed the overall teaser trailer to pick out any extra conventions I may have missed that helps create a overall feel. And also a step by step analysis looking at inter title use and camera angles.
The overall feel I get throughout is that of static and ambience. The whole tone of the music and lighting makes it feel tense and unknown with the attempt to make the viewer feel uncomfortable and on edge. The tension and build up on the viewer of shots and sounds also helps to create this. The establishing shot of the male strapped to the chair is accompanied by flickering lights to make the shot quick and capture the viewers’ attention as they have to work out what is going on. It also has static sound around the room making it seem scientific or experimental with this body attached hostage to a chair. All of these fall into typical conventions of a horror. The fact that it is set in a secluded area raise tension and suspense and a sense of distress from the leading character in this clip furthers the fear factor of a viewer.
The camera shots seem to move swiftly from establishing the setting, slowly revealing the equipment and setting to the viewer to move into rapid, up close shots giving every detail of really what is going on and helping to build the tension and suspense and fear of viewers.
The overall feel I get throughout is that of static and ambience. The whole tone of the music and lighting makes it feel tense and unknown with the attempt to make the viewer feel uncomfortable and on edge. The tension and build up on the viewer of shots and sounds also helps to create this. The establishing shot of the male strapped to the chair is accompanied by flickering lights to make the shot quick and capture the viewers’ attention as they have to work out what is going on. It also has static sound around the room making it seem scientific or experimental with this body attached hostage to a chair. All of these fall into typical conventions of a horror. The fact that it is set in a secluded area raise tension and suspense and a sense of distress from the leading character in this clip furthers the fear factor of a viewer.
The camera shots seem to move swiftly from establishing the setting, slowly revealing the equipment and setting to the viewer to move into rapid, up close shots giving every detail of really what is going on and helping to build the tension and suspense and fear of viewers.
Hostel and intertitles
View more documents from Aimee Deegan.
Tuesday
Audience Questionnaire
Along side the viewing and asking to say words that associated with what they were seeing in the trailer, I asked them to complete a questionnaire in which I have analysed and here are two i made into graphs as I found the music and genre link successful and it useful to know the audiences view on inter titles so that the overall piece stayed fluent, fast and interesting.
Audience questionnaire
View more documents from Aimee Deegan.
Audience initial feedback
After viewing the opening of my trailer and the ruff cut so far, I asked 15 males and females ages 17-21 for their initial thoughts on on genre, narrative etc and my trailer. This is a powerpoint i have put together.
Audience initial feedback
View more presentations from Aimee Deegan.
Monday
Ruff Cut
This was my initial plan of ideas without sound.
I feel some of the clips are to dark and this is something I will look at when it comes to my next ruff cut.
Also there are no inter titles as of yet. When asking audience for feedback, the most useful thing I taken from it is that they didn't like the distorted scene at the end.
Jade Freeman said
" I like the overall idea, and the story line attempting to come through yet I feel the shots are to slow and there needs to be something in the middle to speed them up. I don't think as of yet it really flows but its a good starting point. I also think that the end could be a bit tidier as I don't think the distortion really works or is effective it looks a bit random along with the rest of your trailer.
I feel some of the clips are to dark and this is something I will look at when it comes to my next ruff cut.
Also there are no inter titles as of yet. When asking audience for feedback, the most useful thing I taken from it is that they didn't like the distorted scene at the end.
Jade Freeman said
" I like the overall idea, and the story line attempting to come through yet I feel the shots are to slow and there needs to be something in the middle to speed them up. I don't think as of yet it really flows but its a good starting point. I also think that the end could be a bit tidier as I don't think the distortion really works or is effective it looks a bit random along with the rest of your trailer.
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