WELCOME MODERATOR

LUCAS KEECH 1636
CLAREMONT FAN COURT SCHOOL 64680

I worked with THOMAS MACLEOD 9134 and ALFRED BEILL 6008 

Our brief was to make the titles and effects of a fictional thriller trailer. The title of our film is EXTINCTION. 

Our film is immediately below and my preliminary exercise is in the pages section above. 



TRAILER

TEASER TRAILER

All my RESEARCH and PLANNING follow below on the main blog roll, in reverse order, starting with the latest first. To present my research and planning, I have used a wide variety of platforms and tools. These include; Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Photoshop, Piktochart, Movie Maker, Slideshare and iMovie. 

DIRECTING

When it came to the directing, we split up the role on what we would do regarding our skill set for that specific situation. For example, I had a heavy influence on the directing of the trailer when it came to my part of the acting. When I was acting out my parts of the trailer, I told people which camera angle I wanted the camera to be at, how I wanted to act out the scene and my facial expressions etc. I found this to be more efficient and effective when filming our trailer. 

I really enjoyed directing the scene where I (Larry in the trailer) am in the bomb shelter asking my fellow survivors 'where everyone is'. The was a slight hiccup during filming this scene where the sun was obstructing the shot. I took initiative to change the location of the tripod slightly, and in turn, we ended up getting a well-focused shot. 


EDITING
For the editing section we also used a combination of skills sets to complete this. When it came to my part in the editing section, I was involved in the sound effects and visuals of our trailer. For example, I was involved in the shortening and lengthening of clips to make sure that our production flowed well throughout. I also added some special effects to the inter-titles to make it look dystopian and desolate. 


CAMERAWORK
 For the majority of the shots I was in front of the camera as I played the main role in the film, however I also got behind the camera as I took some of the establishing shots for our production, as well as the shots of my fellow survivors, using a wide range of techniques I had learned over my the course like a pan shot. I also created our films Instagram to post some of our amazing shots, and also because I realised social media is key to a successful promo pack. 

PLANNING: SHOT LIST

PLANNING: TREATMENT

TREATMENT

TITLE: EXTINCTION

LOGLINE 
These trailers are to promote a film in which we follow three boys who are survivors of a unthinkable natural disaster as they battle to run away from the terrors of what is left of the world. 

SYNOPSIS

The first scene depicts the impact of the global disaster where we see buildings on fire and people screaming in fear of their lives etc. Then, the scene changes to what we can assume is the aftermath of the initial wreckage of the disaster, we see a close up of a man standing with his face blocked off by a flickering fire and he mutters, "What is happening?". An intertitle lets us know this is set ten years from now. Shots of isolated and empty harbours and desolate roads make it obvious that the number of survivors are minimal.

The scene then cuts to showing the same man walking into a room where he is met by the question "How many people do you think are still alive?". A shot-reverse-shot allows us to see a very unwell man, who asked the question, and another person in a two-shot. Lucas, the man to walk into the room, replies, "In the world? Not very many." As he sits by the fire and begins to cook some food.

Afterwards, we are taken through the daily tasks of these boys the first one being, WAKE. They wake up slowly, looking ragged and defeated by their poor conditions. Then they start their second objective, SEARCH. They begin their daily search for food, water and good shelter. we see one of the survivors find a can of coke which makes them ecstatic with happiness and we see how truly desperate they are as a close up shows the expression on his face as he drinks it in a matter of seconds. 

The third mission is to KEEP MOVING. a POV of a finger tracing down a map indicates the survivors are heading towards a safe haven of some sort, or maybe running away from a threat. A variety tracking shots show the survivors trekking through fields and forests. and the final objective... HIDE. There's a shot of the survivors hiding in the shrubbery from an unknown attacker on a motorbike. A close-up of the attacker flipping his visor up shows the animalistic, frightening look in his eyes as he prowls looking for his prey. Intertitles then state: "IN A WORLD WHERE RESOURCES ARE SCARCE.... HUMAN IS ON THE MENU."

 The trailer ends with the remaining survivors running off into the distance being chased by the attacker on the motorbike. The screen then fades to black.

PLANNING: INITIAL IDEAS

Here is a brief mind map and brainstorm of our initial ideas we came up with when we first started thinking about the production of our trailer. This was useful because I believe many of these initial ideas were developed on and eventually made it into our final production. However, many of these ideas were just one-off ideas, and were not taken any further than the initial ideas part.

RESEARCH: TRAILER CONVENTIONS

In order to communicate key messages and factors to an audience, the producers of film trailers use a variety of conventions and devices. I have completed a chart on the Teaching Trailers website on different trailer conventions used within film trailers and films themselves.

We utilised this guidance on trailer conventions and codes in our editing, for example:

• We conveyed key points through inter titles
• Conversations between characters consist of one-liners
• The trailer builds to a climax where it ends

PLANNING: STORYBOARD

We created a storyboard whilst planning our film to give us a vivid image of what we intend to film and what props we would need for each shot. For me, being a visual learner, this was extremely useful to me when it came to filming our trailer because I could look at what shot we were filming, and instantly gain an understanding of what needed to be done or, what I was required to do.

PLANNING: CALL SHEET

Shoot date: 1st and 2nd February 2020

Location: Bembridge, The Isle of Wight

Crew: TM, LK and AB (all phone numbers and emails have been exchanged)

Camera Equipment:

- Tri-pod

- Battery

- Camera bag and protective lenses

Props:

- Can of coke

- Fire

- Map

- Mask

- Car

Wardrobe for TM: 

Outdoor, Dark clothing

Wardrobe for LK: 
Dark, weathered clothing

Wardrobe for AB:
Dark clothing that looks old, possibly torn.

Map showing filming location 'Bembridge' in the East of the Isle of Wight

CONSTRUCTION: EDITING THE BACKGROUND

For one of our shots, we realised after looking back at it that the horizon was off-shot. In order to fix this we had to bring the footage of the harbour - which was one of our shots within our trailer - onto keynote and then press the align button on the right-hand side menu to correct this issue. After this you can manually turn the video so that the horizon is completely level, and the shot was no longer at an angle which we did not desire. 

CONSTRUCTION: OUR INSTAGRAM

After I had finished researching films like Captain Marvel and Star Wars: Rogue One, I came to a conclusion that social media was key to a successful promotional package. It can attract larger audiences through viral marketing and is a form of free publicity. It is also a cross promotional technique that attracts a wider range of audiences due to people of all ages being connected to social media. This is why I decided to solely create an Instagram account for our film EXTINCTION which I then showed my team members.

PLANNING: RISK ASSESSMENT

CONSTRUCTION: BBFC CERTIFICATE

The BBFC film certificate is provided at the beginning of a film to help families with young children especially, decide what's appropriate and what's not appropriate for them to go and view. 

The BBFC certificate's views are usually spot on, and therefore people can trust whether to go and watch the film, and who to take to watch, whether it be a toddler or a teenager. 

CONSTRUCTION: FILM COMPANY IDENT

For our trailer, we needed to create a film company production identification. Our company is called ALT Media. We wanted our ident to have a different feel about it, we wanted to create something that we enjoyed making and an ident that looked futuristic, artistic and unique.

To achieve this we used a variety of different coloured inks flowing through water behind our production name.

On top of this we used a bold flashy font named 'Star Galaxy', and to combine these aspects all together we used a combination of iMovie, Photoshop and StopMotion Studio.

PLANNING: LOCATIONS

PLANNING: PROPS LIST

FRANK ASH: TOPLINE AND THE BIG QUESTION

FILM POSTER ANALYSIS

PLANNING: CASTING

Larry (Survivor)

This character is the leader of the group. He is very protective of his friends however he has realised if they are to survive, they will have to leave one of the survivors (Tom) who is fatally ill. He will wear warm clothing that is worse for wear and will look hardened by the environment.

Timothy (Survivor) 

Timothy is approaching the end and this makes him heartbroken because he feels like he didn't even get a chance to see the world. He just hopes he survives to see his friends find refuge.

Clarence (Survivor)

Clarence and Timothy are brothers who found Larry whilst trying to escape from the dangers after the initial outbreak. He is determined to keep his brother alive as long as he can even though he knows he will soon pass away he only wishes his brother goes peacefully in a place he feels safe.

Lesley (Attacker)

The attacker has been driven crazy from hunger and is willing to go to any lengths in order to find his next meal. He encountered the three young survivors on their travels and has been tracking them down, hunting them ever since.

PLANNING: ADVANCED PRODUCTION INITIAL DEVELOPMENT

We came up with an idea to create a violent thriller. Our idea consists of a dystopian future where there is little resources such as food, drink and shelter. It comes down to survival and the people go to extreme measures to achieve this. Our initial idea was to create a murder scene and use special effects to depict blood/gore. We gathered several ideas and watched several trailers within the thriller/action genres and gathered ideas and inspiration for our trailer.

After we gathered our ideas together, we created a mind-map to present our ideas shown in the image below:

Mind-map presenting our ideas and thoughts for our film trailer

My main source of inspiration for this idea and type of film trailer was from the film El Camino. In this film, there is a theme of killing in order to survive and rough conditions and I thought that this would link in well with our film trailer idea. We took this idea, and planned our film trailer using parts from the film as inspiration.

We also chose to include costumes within the mind-map that linked in with our dystopian future and violent thriller idea. We chose to include ripped clothes to give the tense effect to the trailer. The ripped clothes would be down to the battling and fighting between the characters and would give the audience the impression of survival to the fullest effect and this may appeal to audiences who prefer action/thriller movies. We also opted to include a suited character in the film who would play a hitman who would be ordered to kill people by other people attempting to survive.

We also chose to include a few props within the film such as a balaclava and fake blood. The balaclava would add to the dramatic effect of not knowing who is behind the mask. It gives the audience a sense of mystery. Finally, the fake blood would add to the gore and violence within our trailer and would intensify fighting scenes due to the audience knowing the extreme lengths that these people are going to, to survive.

RESEARCH: AUDIENCE QUESTIONNAIRE

I created an audience questionnaire to elicit a variety of different pieces information on what our target audience of 35+ years olds would like to see. I used Google Forms which is very useful because I was able to send it out to a range of my peers. Using this, I could present data that I collected in both graphical forms and words, as I asked questions that yielded both qualitative and quantitative data.

Question 1: Are you 35 or over?

Question 2: Are you a Male or Female

Question 3: Where about's do you watch films the most? Cinema, Netflix, Amazon or other streaming platforms.

Question 4: What genre of film interests you the most?

Question 5: What three films have you enjoyed the most that you have been recently released?

Question 6: Have you seen any trailers of these films you have recently watched?

Question 7: What attracts you the most about a film? E.g. Actor, director, sequels

Question 8: Do you use any social media platforms to find out about new releases? E.g. Instagram, Twitter, Facebook.

Question 9: Do you take interest to trailers at the cinema prior to the film?

Question 10: Are you regularly influenced by the reviews people have given about the films?

RESEARCH: SCOOP.IT! FILM TRAILERS, FILM POSTERS & FILM MARKETING

RESEARCH: HOW IS THE FILM TO BE MARKETED & PROMOTED?

McDowell Digital Media, Inc. by Lucas Keech

ADVANCED PRODUCTION: FILM PROMOTION PACKAGE

RESEARCH: THE ROLE OF THE DISTRIBUTOR

RESEARCH: WHY IS THE TRAILER MADE?

RESEARCH: WHAT ARE THE FILM'S SELLING POINTS?

RESEARCH: WHO ARE THE TARGET AUDIENCE?

WHO ARE THE TARGET AUDIENCE? by Lucas Keech

RESEARCH: WHERE WILL THE FILM BE RELEASED?

Made with Visme Presentation Maker