How did you use new media for your research and

planning?

Section A:What key aspects did you include in your poster?When it came to my research and planning there were various media technologies that were useful in supporting my research and planning, I would say the two most vital was YouTube and Netflix. YouTube was so important because it allowed me view existing trailers like Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Scream 4 and Cloverfield, meaning that I could then analyse them, gaining ideas for my own trailer as well as techniques. This then proved to be very beneficial to my work and ideas process because it allowed me to have a deep insight into how trailers work, especially in the Scream 4 trailer where I thought the collision cutting was very effective as it used montage to make the slow editing more intense and dramatic which then heightened the panic of the jump scares, especially when it comes to the end of the trailer where the two blonde women are talking about the killer then suddenly it switches to him stabbing towards the camera, very effective collision cutting as it goes from the slow of conversation to the panic of the jump scare.

Section A:What key aspects did you include in your poster?Netflix was also very useful because this allowed having access to a large amount of horror films at a touch of a button, which meant I could pick and choose the most suitable film for the project. This gave me an even deeper depth of knowledge on the horror genres because I got to see techniques being used over a whole course of numerous films. Another media technology that was very useful was IMDb, it would easily let me see the most popular horror films, what their sub-genre was and the narratives behind them, and I could document the film easily through the details of its crew, release date and sub-genre. All of this research and planning made it easy to decide the appropriate target audience/demographic as I had been given a very good knowledge of how current trailers work and how my proposal would work, this was then backed up by the class favourite horror research and class research for our proposal.

Section B:How did you use new media in your construction phases?There were various programs that were used over the course of construction for both my ancillary products and trailer. These were Adobe Photoshop CC, Adobe Premiere Pro CC and Adobe After Effects CC.

Ancillary Products:

For my film poster and magazine cover I used Adobe Photoshop CC. I already possessed knowledge on Photoshop due to AS Media Studies last year and my other creative subjects but this time around I began to be more experimental.

For this title of ‘Cut’ on my magazine cover I didn’t want to take too much away from the main image but I wanted it to be eye-catching and different. I decided that I would use the font I created on my poster and blend it over the top of the main image. This then allowed for the main features to come through but the colouring of a deep blood red to be very apparent too. I did this by going to ‘Blending options’ as seen at the right hand side of the page, which then gave me all of these different options. I scrolled through looking for a suitable blend and I came to ‘Darken’ which gave me exactly the effect that I was looking for.

Section B:How did you use new media in your construction phases?

For the ‘Cut’ title on the poster I wanted it to resemble body horror and curve with the arch of the killer’s back. I did this by going to ‘Edit’, ‘Transform’ and ‘Warp’. This allowed me to warp the title into whatever I wanted, giving me that 3D and angled feel.

For the main image on my poster I wanted to create a very intense light that showed the close-up of the final girl and also created the silhouette for the killer. The light was already there from the way we set up the shot but it wasn’t very intense, so I simply went on ‘Image’, ‘Adjustments’ and ‘Brightness and Contrast’, I then altered this until it was right.

Section B:How did you use new media in your construction phases?Inter-titles:

For the inter-titles in my horror trailer I used Adobe After Effects CC. I decided on the inter-titles that would best suit our trailer and add to understanding the narrative. I opted for the “Emerge” pre-set, and then typed in the text. Once I had completed them I exported them as a .mov file and inserted them onto Premiere Pro.

Section B:How did you use new media in your construction phases?Trailer:

We used Premiere Pro CC for our horror trailer, I was new to this software so it was a challenge trying to get to know my way around the program but once I did I began to surprise myself. On some of the shots the dialogue and the sound effects weren’t very effective as they were too quiet so I then expanded the audio levels and raised the volume bar. This made the audio more apparent and more effective, which didn’t lead to the audience being confused on what the characters said. In addition, in the car scene where the final girl is racing away from her psychotic husband, there was a shot that we had taken which was us driving down a country road but it didn’t seem quick, didn’t seem dramatic enough so we edited this. We did this by going up to ‘Clip’ then ‘Speed/Duration’ this allowed us to increase the speed of the clip which therefore made the clip a lot more intense as if the shot was in an actual car chase.

Section B:How did you use new media in your construction phases?Another effect that we did was to do with the look of some shots; a lot of the shots we filmed had ambient light so they didn’t connote any horror. To make the shots as scary as possible, we started off with increasing the contrast this made the colours more apparent and vivid. However, they still didn’t possess much power as there was too much focus on other parts of the shot, so we then added Omni lighting. Omni lighting allowed us to create focus on certain parts of the shot so they held more influence and the audience focused on the horror. Overall, this was a very effective program that allowed us to piece together our shots in the best way that we could.

Section C:How did you use new media to evaluate your products?Once I had completed my research, planning and construction phases, I still found that I was using media technology; this was in the form of Blogger and YouTube. I used Blogger to store all of my work in one place showing my progress throughout this project, posts being separated by labels. This was a very important media technology because it allowed for my work to be easily accessible from anywhere, allowing me to add things at any given time, it also is a great way of showcasing my work because I can arrange it how I want and in any style, which gives off a sense of my personality which I think is vital. This was a great media technology for my work because it meant it organised all my work in a secure location.

Section C:How did you use new media to evaluate your products?YouTube was also a very useful media technology when evaluating my products. Our class completed a focus group screening where we watched a rough cut of our trailers and then later on we watched our final trailer cuts. This was to highlight any praise and criticisms which they had which was great tool for us improving our trailer. We could then refer to the screening after it was posted on YouTube. YouTube is extremely easy to access with it being one of the most popular websites in the world. It was a very helpful technology to have because it made evaluating our work a lot easier because we gained an audience’s point of view which was there at almost the touch of a button. We also posted our final trailer on YouTube and could use comments and likes to determine the success or otherwise of Cut.