Black may represent darkness because is it a horror filmThis is a quite from a magazine perhaps that has seen the premier of the film

This is a shot from one of the scenes in the film, informing potential viewers what the film is about

Red may represent danger

This is the film name

The poster also includes a date of release

This is a poster for the film Paranormal Activity 2, which is a horror film. I will analyse this poster and discussing the potential genre conventions that this poster uses and deviates from for my poster research so this will help me to gain some ideas for what to use on my horror film poster. In this movie poster I can see that generally dark colours are used because it is a horror film and that allows the audience to tell that it is a horror film from a comedy/action film, the film poster may also use dark colours because this is a film poster convention that they may want to conform to. The film poster also includes a comment from a review about the film at the top of the poster and this may be because it would be used to entice an audience that wants to watch a film that makes their nerves unsteady or someone that wants to watch the most anticipated horror event of the year. Also a convention that I would have to conform is including the name of the film on the film poster otherwise without this the poster wouldnt look real and I need to make the poster look as realistic as possible. I would want to use dark colours on my poster and in particular the colour black, because on this poster the colour black has been used and it helps to create a sense of darkness amongst the other features of the poster such as the screenshot of one of the scenes from the film, and this is a feature I would also like to include in my film because it helps grabs the audiences attention because it is previewing something from the film and therefore make the potential audience think that I want to watch that film and see what happens and it also makes the poster look realistic if you have used an image that is in the film.

By looking at all the Paranormal Activity film posters it is clearly visible that they all share the same layout and therefore all share the same conventions, however one convention that is missing is a safety certificate which means that these posters do lack a bit of authenticity about them, on my film poster I would like to put a film safety certificate on it to make it look more realistic as other horror film poster do have them. I would also like to use the same sort of format that paranormal activity use because I feel that all the words and the pictures come together more and looks better with the dark background and the white contrasts the darkness which gives a sense of not knowing what will happen about the film through the film poster.

Strapline for the film Names of cast membersName of directorTitle of the filmRed may be used to represent danger Scene from the film used a background picture

This is a film poster for the film The Exorcist, the film poster has a sense of fear about it when looking at the picture in the middle, this is because the picture is dark and all the light in the photo focuses on one man in the middle which creates him as mysterious. The poster also has a strapline which I think makes a poster stand out as it allows the audience to understand more about the film and what it may be about, although the colours and pictures used on this poster easily suggest that it is a horror film poster. I like how the title of the film is in the bottom of the page as this allows for the picture to take up more room therefore more colours too which would create more of an effect. The poster also seems to flow better than the paranormal activity poster because the picture is not cut out it is simply just darkened around the areas of text and to the side of the poster. The way that the names of the cast are printed at the bottom of the poster makes it look more realistic compared to other posters such as the paranormal film poster. Overall when creating my poster I think that I will use a range of conventions that the exorcist and the paranormal activity film poster have used, for example I want to have the names of the members of cast at the bottom of the film poster to make the film look realistic, also I would put a certificate of rating on my poster too, to give it a sense of authentication which I think the paranormal activity posters lacked. Also I would choose to have a screenshot from one of the scenes in the middle and use the colour black to give it a sense of uncertainty which wont give anything away and would use white to contrast this is darkness to further not give anything away by the film poster, I would also have a strapline below the name of the film as I think it would be better suited there as it would lead on from the film name, giving a little bit of the film away to the audience to entice them further to watch it.