Karl Rollason 11RLE

Media Coursework Mr. Wright

Media Trailer Write Up

For our year 11 trailer project, we had to make a trailer for a film that would be
shown on in cinemas and on terrestrial television. We had to work in groups of 4
and provide roles for each member for example, Actors, directors and producers.
Each member of the group had to provide something towards the development of
our trailer. The hole practical had to be based on our own ideas and we had to
develop them ourselves and within the group. Everyone in my group contributed
towards the development of our trailer and we all shared acting roles. We also
equally shared the role of editing the trailer and all had separate inputs to
different sections of the trailer.

The purpose of a movie trailer is to give its target audience the idea of what
the film entails. It is also made for advertising purposes for everyone before it is
released in the cinemas and then on to Television. A movie trailer usually involves
short clips taken from the film (usually the best scenes) and information on when
and where the film is to be released and who the film stars. The purpose of a
trailer is to give you a brief idea about the film, and not to give the whole plot
away and ruin the experience, however many films include the best parts of the
film in the trailer and ruin the film for the viewers. An example of a typical
trailer would be “Alpha Dog” as the trailer gives you the idea of what the film
entails, but does not give the whole plot away. It is made effective by using, short
but quick shots all the way through giving you the impression it is a fast moving
film. The trailer also includes a single hip-hop/ rap tune indicating that the film
is targeted at a younger rather than older audience. The Trailer also includes
sounds from the actual film, for example car doors slamming and gun shots
being fired. This is very effective as it almost shocks the audience, this relates to
the trailer as it is also useful as it gives the audience an idea of what to expect so
when they go to see the film they are not to shocked. The trailer also had shots of
the main characters it has starring in it, as do most film trailers including ours,
and when it was to be released. I chose to talk about this particular trailer as it
has always stuck in my mind, and made me want to go and see it.

In the beginning of the brainstorming ideas for our trailer, we had a lot of
creative ideas and explored many of the ideas; however we had a lack of
resources and crops so our trailer was created with what was on offer, also our
trailer needed to be based on a typical narrative of a Hollywood film. This
follows a three-act structure, which starts with an issue, then builds up to an
explanation, and then there is the resolution. Because our trailer was to be made
using this structure, we had to make a story board, with dialogue, images and the
plot.

Our media project included me, Billy Palmer, Louis McCusker and Ladon
Semsedini. In the beginning, the trailer was based on the kidnapping of the son
of a Kosovo ambassador, played by Ladon with me, Billy and Louis as the
kidnappers, and us holding Ladon at ransom, but as time went on, we realised a
lot of the things we had planned were not possible, for example using a Bentley
as a crop, and also that the story started to become so ludicrous, we lost sight of
the original plot so we changed the story line to a simple mugging and an exciting
Karl Rollason 11RLE
Media Coursework Mr. Wright
chase. Although we changed a lot of the original storyline, we still kept a lot of
the video clips as they contributed to the main storyline.

In the beginning of the trailer, there is a shot with Ladon walking past, with
mine, Billy’s and Louis’ heads following the direction in which Ladon is walking.
We then made three short clips, with effects of Ladon moving into the distance,
however they were not ordinary clips, we used long distanced shots and as each
clip ended, writing would come up on a black screen, with information on when
the film would be released and every time that clip ended Ladon would be
further away.

In the next part of the trailer we had a clip of Ladon walking into an ally way
and another of me and Billy following him. In the next clip we showed Ladon get
half way through the ally way then Louis coming through the gate, with his hood
up, the camera then took the outlook of Ladon turning around to see me and
Billy coming towards him. The next seen saw I and Billy beat him up and Louis
strangle Ladon with a belt he had previously taken off. The scene then suddenly
stops and Ladon is left lying there. We then used the same technique we used in
the beginning with the shots stopping but instead of Ladon moving away, the
camera and we did not use back screens but when we get to a certain point back,
Ladon spits, and this scene is in slow motion giving us the effect that Ladon has
been left for dead. The original of this scene was a lot longer and less to the point,
but we changed it, rearranged it, and put more shots in it, we also made a lot of
the shots shorter, more violent and more to the point. The scene also included a
lot of editing by me mostly on iMovie

The next scene introduced the additional character, Mr. James Rourke. We
added a chase scene, which showed Mr. Rourke sprinting towards a fence, then
me trying to climb the fence with Louis and Billy on the other side starting to
run, but me failing climbing the fence and a closing shot of one of the gloves I
was wearing caught on the fence with no sign of me or Billy or Louis. There are
no scenes that actually show me and Mr. Rourke together, the scene just implies
that he is chasing after me and in the end, when only the glove can be seen, the
implication is that Mr. Rourke has caught me and the rest if left to the viewers
imagination, this is also a bit of a cliff hanger, to fill the audience with suspense,
and make them want to go and see it. The idea of the trailer was to slowly build
up suspense though out and then for it to “explode” with help from the music.

The music that we used in the film was a tune we found on the schools
computer’s iTunes. We originally used the tune “battle of honour and humanity”
which we also found on the schools iTunes, and it worked very well with the
original trailer, however when we re-arranged it and added more scenes and took
more out, it did not fit as well as if did before and there was nothing we could do
for it to fit, so we had to change it. This turned out to be good as the new
instrumental we found was better than the one we had previous and went with
the storyline a lot better. We did not include any dialogue into our trailer as we
let the images do the talking and a good trailer does not need dialogue.

The program in which we used to edit our trailer is called “iMovie”. It is a simple
and easy program to use and with a bit of help from our media teacher, we
Karl Rollason 11RLE
Media Coursework Mr. Wright
mastered it and were able to accomplish everything we needed to do. “iMovie”
gives you the option to use effects such as slow motion and add in other effects
like lightening. It also lets you re-arrange certain parts, shorten or extend them.
It also allows you to put writing over the shots or put images. In order to edit our
footage on iMovie, it had to be imported from the camera we used to record, and
when we had imported it, we then had to choose what clips we were to use.

The role I played in the making of this trailer was mainly editing it, although I
did play a major role of acting however I did not do much recording or directing
as that was down to Billy and Louis.

In conclusion I am happy with the outcome of our trailer. I think that although it
underwent a lot of editing, rearranging and re-filming it turned out to be better
than our original idea and looks very professional. I think we managed to make
it look as professional as we stuck to the Typical narrative of a film and used
initiative to take good advantage of our surroundings, resources and footage we
already had. Over all I feel that our media trailer is a success and we are very
happy with it!