First Mock-up
This was my first mock up for my poster. I decided I wanted focus on the blood and dirt covering her, so I took all colour from the photo, changing it to a grey scale with only colour where there was blood, grass and dirt marks. I made the cut on her face by taking an image from the internet and placing it on her face, I then turned the opacity down and went over with a paint brush. This was to help me get the right shape and shading for the cut. When I thad finished I got rid of the original image all together so all that was left was the cut i had painted. I used a different type of brush and rearranged the spacing of the brushy to get the blood and grass stains on her top.
After I had finished editing the photo, I decided I didn't like the final product. The whole point of our film was that you didn't know that Alice was the killer, yet here I was blatantly showing her. To bring back obscurity into my poster I got rid of everything apart from her eyes so it looked like she was looking straight at the audience. It also makes it hard to define who it is standing there, looking at you. I finished putting everything together, all the small details of a conventional poster; the background, the names of the actors and the credits at the bottom.
Again I still felt that my poster was not quite finished. I wanted some colour, something to denote 'Poison'. It was at this point that my teacher suggested I incorporated the colour green, which is often associated with 'Poison' by many people. I played around with different ideas and eventually decided on making half my page green and the other half black. This both added colour and denoted 'poison' to my audience. I played around with different shades of green until i found one that worked for my poster (the final product can be found on under 'Construction').
Photo shoot
For the photo shoot, I wanted Alice to have a dirty looking top with rips and mud covering it. To do this I cut it up in places with scissors then using make-up, mud and paint I created the muddy, dirty look. Then to give it an even more authentic look I tied twigs to sleeve and kept some aside to put in Abigail's hair. I used the same make up on Alice to give her a hollow eyed and dirty look to reiterate that she had been running through the woods.
Below are all the photo's taken from the photo shoot.
planning for poster
- What type of photo do I want? What does Alice look like?
- Blood covering the body, cuts etc
- 1/2 Black and white, 1/2 Colour?
- Half-shaded face (shawl that looks like its being pulled off)
- Ideas for a tagline?
- Rhetorical question?
- At the bottom, a link for youtube, or a game something to draw the audience in
planning for photoshoot
Types of shots:
- MCU - so you can see her t-shirt and part of her body
- CU - so you only have focus on her face
- Straight - so it looks like she is on the same level as us, she is ordinary, no different to teens her age in real world
- High angle - Alice is crouched, to make it look like she is small and vulnerable
- Low Angle - Alice is above the audience, more power and control, more daunting
- Blank expression - eyes looking at the camera
- Smiling - eyes looking at the camera
Ideas
I took a few ideas from my research to come up with an idea for my poster. Below are my initial drafts. One shows what I want my photo to look like and the other shows what I want my final draft to look like.
I like both the Carrie (2013) and Orphan (2009) posters. Both are centred around a young girl, and both are horror films. Equally they both have the main character which is the focus for their posters, which is a concept I want to use for my own poster. I also like the idea from the Carrie poster where there is a focus on blood but it doesn't cover the whole of the character. Shown in the third poster half is black and white and the colour shown is a cut out quarter where blood is shown. This is an effective idea as it really stands out but also makes her face disjointed. A similar idea is used on the second poster, except the whole poster is in colour. The main focus here is the glass crack over the image which breaks up the normality of the girl and the small about of blood trickling down her face. I also plan to play around with my shots, similar to the first Carrie poster, where it is such a close up on her face, and covered in blood that the character is not easily identifiable. Furthermore I chose to look at the Orphan poster, because again it has a similar concept as our trailer does. The focus is on a single girl, the main character and she's looking directly at her audience. This time instead of a direct link to the Horror, its connoted through her make-up, costume and expression. I also like this idea, and making the Horror connoted through the appearance of Alice. Furthermore, I hope to draw the idea from Orphan where the letters are mixed between lower case and upper case letters which connotes to the audience the main character is a child. Both types of posters have a tagline for the film; Carrie's is 'A child raised in fear. A woman born in blood', and Orphan's is 'There's something wrong with Esther'. I like the idea of using a tagline in my poster as I feel it fully completes the poster and really draws in the viewers. Orphan also has a rhetorical question 'Can you keep a secret?' this will draw in the audience as they want to know what the secret is, we are curious as an audience and what to find everything that we can out.
film poster analysis
All three of these film posters have a familiar theme. Though the 'If I Stay' (2014) poster and 'Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix' (2007) poster have more than one character, the focus is still kept on the main character. On the 'If I Stay' poster the focus is kept on Mia, the protagonist, through the pictures being split up into sections but her face still on the majority of the poster and looking at the audience. On the 'Harry Potter' poster there is more than one character, the most loved characters and the important ones for that particular book. However focus is still kept on the protagonist Harry, as he is placed in the centre of the poster and a light glow is put around him. The 'Thor: The Dark World' (2013) poster only shows the audience Thor himself, so the focus is kept completely on him. Marketing companies do this so the audience know who is the main protagonist of the storyline is, and makes them want to find out what their story is. All three of the posters tell the audience the name of the main actors and actresses in the films are, this draws in the audience who like those particular actors and actresses from previous films. It also encourages audience members who knew these actors and actresses from other genres of films to see these films of a different genre. For example fans of Horror might have seen Chloe Grace Moretz in Carrie (2013) and Let Me In (2010), and seeing her in a new film may encourage them to go see 'If I Stay' which is a Drama Romance.
On the 'If I Stay' poster it is mentioned that it is 'Based on the Best Selling Novel'. This will draw audience members in of those who have read the book and enjoyed it. This means a wider audience, a combined of those who enjoy reading and those who enjoy Drama Romance films. The title itself is also very important 'If I Stay', this encourages people to go and see the film as you wonder what her story is and why she has to chose whether to stay or not. The title is the second thing a persons eyes will draw to on a poster, so it is important where it is placed, and if it is easily readable. The first place a persons eyes draw to is the eyes of the character Mia. She is looking straight out the audience and can be quite intimidating to those who are looking back. She has a blank expression, and looks innocent, but also as if she's trying to draw people in. The other images on the poster are also quite effective as they are in contrast to one another, some are happy and some show some sadness. This tells the audience Drama is involved and the image of Mia at an accident makes the audience want to go see what's happened, why she's there and why she looks so distressed.
The Thor poster is also quite iconic, with only the main character to show. Thor is in his iconic costume and is in a classic Thor stance. The audiences eyes move first to Thor's hammer, which is iconic to anyone who knows Marvel. It is surrounded by lightening bolts which connotes to the audience that there is a storm and some disturbances to the storyline. To support this Thor isn't looking pristine and godly he is dressed for battle, and looks windswept. This reiterates that something bad will happen in the storyline and encourages people to go see the film so they find out what battle he is up against now. The poster also has the Marvel logo on it, this draws in more audience members from the Marvel fan base, meaning fans of other films such as Iron Man, Captain America and Hulk will also enjoy this film.
Lastly the Harry Potter poster has some good aspects which brought in viewers. The main item on the poster that catches my eye is the tagline 'The Rebellion Begins', this will draw in members of the audience as it tells them this is where the main fight is going to start. The previous Harry Potter films have been calm and quite normal, and this tagline tells us this is where trouble starts to get shaken up. This is supported by the black background which tells us that this film is slightly darker, more sinister and suggests that there will be more action in this particular film. This will encourage more people to see the film as it connects to the audiences more sinister side, who want to see action, drama and fights. All the characters on this poster are looking out towards the members of the audience, encouraging them to come and join the 'Rebellion'. It's almost as if they are saying it to us through their eyes. Lastly on the Harry Potter poster is the date in bigger letters than the rest of the bulk of writing, this tells the audience when its out, so they know when they can get in with the action.
These are all good aspects of a poster, and I hope to use some of them in mine. This will hopefully mean my poster is successful as it is following what is successful for other movie posters in drawing their audience in.
On the 'If I Stay' poster it is mentioned that it is 'Based on the Best Selling Novel'. This will draw audience members in of those who have read the book and enjoyed it. This means a wider audience, a combined of those who enjoy reading and those who enjoy Drama Romance films. The title itself is also very important 'If I Stay', this encourages people to go and see the film as you wonder what her story is and why she has to chose whether to stay or not. The title is the second thing a persons eyes will draw to on a poster, so it is important where it is placed, and if it is easily readable. The first place a persons eyes draw to is the eyes of the character Mia. She is looking straight out the audience and can be quite intimidating to those who are looking back. She has a blank expression, and looks innocent, but also as if she's trying to draw people in. The other images on the poster are also quite effective as they are in contrast to one another, some are happy and some show some sadness. This tells the audience Drama is involved and the image of Mia at an accident makes the audience want to go see what's happened, why she's there and why she looks so distressed.
The Thor poster is also quite iconic, with only the main character to show. Thor is in his iconic costume and is in a classic Thor stance. The audiences eyes move first to Thor's hammer, which is iconic to anyone who knows Marvel. It is surrounded by lightening bolts which connotes to the audience that there is a storm and some disturbances to the storyline. To support this Thor isn't looking pristine and godly he is dressed for battle, and looks windswept. This reiterates that something bad will happen in the storyline and encourages people to go see the film so they find out what battle he is up against now. The poster also has the Marvel logo on it, this draws in more audience members from the Marvel fan base, meaning fans of other films such as Iron Man, Captain America and Hulk will also enjoy this film.
Lastly the Harry Potter poster has some good aspects which brought in viewers. The main item on the poster that catches my eye is the tagline 'The Rebellion Begins', this will draw in members of the audience as it tells them this is where the main fight is going to start. The previous Harry Potter films have been calm and quite normal, and this tagline tells us this is where trouble starts to get shaken up. This is supported by the black background which tells us that this film is slightly darker, more sinister and suggests that there will be more action in this particular film. This will encourage more people to see the film as it connects to the audiences more sinister side, who want to see action, drama and fights. All the characters on this poster are looking out towards the members of the audience, encouraging them to come and join the 'Rebellion'. It's almost as if they are saying it to us through their eyes. Lastly on the Harry Potter poster is the date in bigger letters than the rest of the bulk of writing, this tells the audience when its out, so they know when they can get in with the action.
These are all good aspects of a poster, and I hope to use some of them in mine. This will hopefully mean my poster is successful as it is following what is successful for other movie posters in drawing their audience in.