Intro:

For My final major project, I took 60 portrait photographs, to create a horror movie poster as my end product. I didn’t stick to my original plan as I was originally going to create a horror movie trailer, with the time becoming shorter and the standard we was able to create with the equipment we have, we decided to change it to a movie poster, in order to get the best project at the end to a professional standard.

Technical quality of my photos:

I feel the technical quality of my photos was very good; the images I took were clear and looked like they had been taken professionally, according to my audience feedback. Abode Photoshop played a big part in getting my images where they needed to be, I used a lot on low opacity paint tools to create shadows under the eyes, redness in the eyes, and paler skin. I did this to create a scary and possessed like look to my model, in order to draw the audience in and wonder what the film is about and why she is like that. I took the pictures in a small room with a dark sheet behind; I pointed professional photography lighting in the direction of my model, and also used some under lighting for some of my images.

Have I acquired and new skills of further developed others?

I think that my knowledge of Photoshop and what you can do on there has defiantly increased and I have been able to create more professional looking projects especially on this one. I have also learnt how to make the text added to the picture more professional, creating depth, contours, highlights and different affects to the text itself, making it stand out and look more high-quality, reflecting the movie poster. The title and the way it looks are very important as this is what the audience will remember and will stay in their minds when discussing the movie choices.

Does my final project match my original intentions?

My original intentions for my final major project were to create a film trailer. I planned what I wanted the film to be like and what route we would go about to make it. It was going to be a trailer for a horror movie, about an Ouija board and the main character becoming possessed. After researching ways in which trailers are created, and the time and lack of equipment we had, we decided to change this into a poster campaign. I still used the same movie idea, and took portrait images of my model, then was able to create text and creating the advertisement side of the project, and created a much more professional and visually appealing final project than I would have if choosing to stick with the trailer.

Did you have any issues with time management or did you encounter any problems?

Nearing the middle-end of this assignment, when deciding to change my project idea, I encountered problems with time management as I then had to change what I need to do in a short space of time. Saying that, I was then able to stick to my schedule well, and created my 3 final images within the time I gave myself to a high and professional standard.

Have I been successful in reaching my target audience with my final major project?

Overall I think I have reached the audience I was aiming for in the beginning. The target audience for my project are young teens-adults 15 and above. I researched who watches these movies the most and also asked students and friends, to find out the true target audience. After finishing my project I then went and asked multiple students in my college for the feedback on my 3 final posters.

Through this audience feedback I have gathered, most think my posters have been a success in the professionalism and visually appealing aspect of the images. Using pie charts I asked students from my class to answer these questions and give me feedback straight away in what they saw.

I also created a survey for my posters. I sent this out to a more varied range of people, different ages, and not students attending my college, to gather a difference of opinions and make sure that my audience feedback was more in depth.

Here are the questions and answers given. This feedback has given me knowledge on what the audience want. I think that my posters have been a success as all said they make them want to see the movie, and that’s the main aim of my advertisement movie posters.

These are my final 3 posters for my project. I took to photograph’s of my model with a black backdrop to create a dark and scary look with only her head in the light. I did allot of work in Photoshop, to create a possessed look on my model, I darkened under her eyes with a low opacity paint tool, also darkened and widened the pupils to create a possessed look, also giving redness to the eyes. I did this on all of my chosen photos. On the middle poster, I merged two photos together to create a half and half look of the main character, and a scary looking doll, I thought this would work well to intrigue the audience and make them want to know why and what happens with them two characters. I did this by dragging and cropping both images to fit them together, and then started to blend the harsh lines between them in order to create a smoother and blended look.

For my text, I learnt to create a bevelled and contoured look making it more professional and to stand out to the audience, making it look more creative and less plain to look at also.

The credits at the bottom of my posters were creating by downloading the right font to use and from then I just chose my film producers etc. to fill the actual credits, I think by doing this it really makes my posters look like a real advertisement. Following on from this I created ‘quotes’ from magazines and newspapers giving a review and rating of the film, I think this made the posters look real also, and added an extra aspect to my posters.

Overall I am very pleased with the look of my posters, and I think that all the different aspects of each one make for a great advertisement, and they small changes and differences in each one make it an interesting poster campaign hopefully leaving the audience wanting more.