Teaser trailers are trailers used to advertise the film months before the release date to spark interest, they need to make the audience interested but left unsatisfied and wanting to see more. They do this by very carefully showing the audience certain parts of the film over a two minute period, It is important that enough to is shown to the audience for them to understand the basic story and identify the roles of characters but not show enough so there is ‘closure’. One effective way trailers do this is by mixing up the narrative. It is important that the audience want to find out more about the film and how it will end. In our trailer we show the ‘final girl’ being tied up and tortured but also being chased and in different locations, the audience do not know what order this happens in so there not sure if she’s escaping or about to get captured and this helps keep the audience interested. In the trailer you want to scare and surprise the audience to get them interested and wanting to see more. In a horror trailer there is usually very little dialogue as there is only a two minute slot and the dialogue is not that important, the character roles and basic plot can be explained with the use of good shot choice and inter-titles/voice over. There usually is a voice over or inter-titles but rarely both are used.
The music we used increase the mood of the shot, it also tied the inter-titles and shots together with the linking of sound and on screen action. some of the sound was taken from royalty free sources and then put together using garage band along along with some original music we made. Our soundtrack speeds up throughout the trailer and has good rhythm. The use of drums gives a good feel as the protagonist is chased before fading out and the sound of a heartbeat can be heard. We added in some diagetic sound such as footsteps but more sounds could have been added if we had more time. we used some non-diagetic sound to enhance the effect such as the scream and whispers.
1: I took a shot from the 2004 film "Saw" showing a low angle shot of lights. The lights in Saw look industrial and clean which gives an almost surgical feel whereas with ours, we used a more yellow light to make it look more grimy and at home like.
2: this shot is from the film "Eden Lake". Both shots show a grassy, forest area with the protagonist running. Both shots are lit quite darkly but shot during the day as darkness is one of the horror conventions it was important to us to lower the brightness.
3: These two shots both have very similar setting and lighting with faint light seen through the trees but the shots are very different, we used a tilted angle and long shot instead. I think it worked well as your not quite sure what your seeing straight away. Tilted angles are often used in horror to disorient the audience.
4: The chair shots are similar due to lighting and content, both are very dark with a bright spot of light. once again though we decided to use a different shot as we believed it worked better. A close up we thought had more effect and is used more often in horrors too. The contrast in these shots give the feeling of a large empty place and once again darkness is a horror convention.
5: The close up of the distressed protagonist is a film convention to show the audience who the main character is and to relate to them. In both shots the protagonist is worried/scared with along with the close up helps the audience to put themselves in the same situation as the character. By putting them in the same place it has more effect on the audience.
6: Shot of window from top of the stairs gives the idea of being inescapable as it is high up and makes you feel enclosed as you can only see the sky. Again the subject from Halloween is very similar. The source of light from the windows act as symbol of safety and escape from the danger. The rest of the shot is very dark showing that the protagonist is in danger.
7: we used a basement to make the audience feel trapped. The outline of the antagonist is very faint on both which makes the audience uncertain about who it is. Although the idea is similar the effect of our shots are very different, the professional trailer gives more of a feel of being trapped and searched for by a low angle shot and light at the top of the stairs. Our trailer has a idea of suddenly stumbling across something and knowing they have been seen.
8: the outline of the antagonist here is my favorite shot. The face is unclear, which is a good horror convention as once the monster is revealed it looses some of it horror. The lighting is dark and its is a low angle shot to show dominance and power, it makes the audience feel small and vulnerable to the antagonist. Both shots are very similar to each other with ours being lighter and a more white which gives the idea of a more public place such as a school where this shot was set.
9: Finally the shot of the door. The door shows both the chance to escape but also for it to open at any moment and for their to be trouble on the other side. In our shot the camera is dragged away from the door giving the idea that your being pulled away from escape and are truly trapped. The zooming back is also quite disorientating as it feels unnatural.
This is good but although sometimes you need to expand a little for example on number 5. Explain how horror uses close-ups and extreme close-ups and the effect of these on the audience. Also this would look much better if you split the image up so that the text could go underneath each pair.
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