Evaluation Question 1 –Film Poster

Dan Brown

When looking at different horror film posters, many look very similar, this works for many of the films. Film posters follow a set of conventions to make their product as successful as many others. Some films decide to challenge conventions to see if they work and if they become more successful compared to the conventional poster however challenging conventions can be a hit or miss, it all depends on the audience for the film.

When creating my film poster, I was set on following many, if not all of the conventions seen on real media texts as it just makes the poster look a lot more authentic and overall, just a lot better in quality.

Slogan The first thing on my film poster is the slogan at the very top. I’ve seen this on many other horror film poster and feel that it works very effectively. The does work, however the slogan of the film has to be effective for it to work as conventionally people read from top to bottom, meaning that the first thing being read on the film poster on the slogan. If the slogan is poor, doesn’t stand out or doesn’t intrigue the audience, they won’t carry one reading the poster. I think that having a spooky slogan that makes the audience ask questions to themselves at the top is a great and effective way to sell advertise a film.

From the slogan to the picture on the poster, these horror poster normally include a big picture of the antagonist or the protagonist. This is normally a 50/50 split. I have decided to use the antagonist on my poster as I feel that it is more effective than using the protagonist, this is because the antagonist normally looks really scary, and when glanced at by an audience, maybe commented on. One of the posters I got inspiration from for this was ‘Friday the 13th . Their poster effectively shows the antagonist of the film, without giving too much about him away, as he is masked and really in a dark shadow.

Main Image

From the producers of… TitleUnlike real horror film posters I have decided to include a statement above the film name. I have put ‘From the producers of ‘Never Ending’ and ‘Alone’. Even though this is unconventionally of film posters, I have kept it, because I feel that it is other way to attract an audience, increasing the target audience for the film, making it more mainstream. People who have seen the other films by the producer, and liked them, would read that, and may go and watch it to see if it is as good as them. I feel that challenging this conventional would not cause a reduction in audience interest, if anything, it will increase the amount of people wanting to see the film. It’s just another way to advertise.

I have followed the conventions when placing the title of the film. Many horror film posters, have the name of the film towards the bottom of the poster. Allowing the main picture to be bigger as that is one of the main attractions to a film. The title of the films is also almost always bold, so that is does stand out as the film name compared to the other writing on the poster. The title of the films also conventionally uses a serif font as they look creepier than san-serif fonts, although this is another one which is split, but I have used a serif font, because I feel that it is more conventional to a horror film.

Based on a true story Billing BlockAnother thing that I have put is ‘Based on a true story’, I have done this because people like films which as based off of real life events, and the plot of this story unrealistic and could happen to anyone. This statement is not included on many horror films posters. I feel that because I have added this to my poster, it is more likely to appeal to an audience.

Underneath of that I gave included a billing block. This is conventional of almost every film made, as it is used to, almost advertising the jobs that have been done to create the film and the people who have put the time and effort into the full creation of the film. One of the most important credits is the name of the production companies and distribution companies whom have converged together to create the film. I think that a billing block is always at the bottom of film posters is because people whom were involved in the making of the film want recognition. The billing block always uses the same conventional font as well, where the job the person did is about half the size to the persons name.

Underneath the billing block, I have indicated that the film is ‘Coming Soon’, now it is conventionally for almost every film to include the release date, but I felt that putting coming soon and being unconventional may keep the audience wondering and looking out to find the actual release date to the film. This means that they are more likely to search the film up on a search engine which will mean that they will be looking more into the film and hopefully getting more drawn into the film. I have looked at the real media text ‘Final destination’ who have put the release date on their film poster too. They have put ‘August’ which is another way to keep audiences intrigued and looking out for the film.

Release Date Webpage?It is also conventionally for film posters to have the URL, web address of their films website at the bottom, I have also chosen to use this as it gives the audience another way to look into the films’ plot, who’s in it, a background to the story etc. This gives the film yet another platform to advertise on and a platform that is becoming even more popular. I have again used ‘Final Destination’ who also have a webpages URL at the bottom of their film poster.

Logo’s ColoursOn horror film posters, the colour used are conventionally very minimal and normally darker colour, as they go with the genre more than bright, elaborate colours. I have chosen to follow this convention as darker colours make the poster look a lot scarier, it also shows that what’s going to happen in the film, is likely to happen in the dark, giving smaller parts of the story away. The dark colours just create a spookier atmosphere. For this I have looked at the film poster for ‘Alone in the dark’, which also uses the dark colours and only uses white colouring for the text and grey for the main picture.

Another thing is the company’s logos which are conventionally placed at the very bottom of the poster. Which just gives the companies a little bit more advertising as they are the people who are putting a lot of money into the creation of the film and want recognition for that. As the film genre I am doing is horror, I how noticed that conventionally the logos don’t contain colour and are black and white. I have decided to follow this convention as I think it makes sense to still use contrasting colours.