1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

POSTER

For our poster we experimented with various layouts before choosing our final image. We debated on whether we should portray our main protagonist as the victim or as the villain. The villainous images had more conventions of horror, but we found that by using an image of her inside the coffin it created a more definite link with our trailer narrative.

When designing the layout of our poster we applied the theory of “the golden section”. We placed the image of our victimised protagonist on the right side of the poster. According to “the golden section” this satisfies the viewer’s eye line and makes them engage with both the text and the image.

We used an extreme close up of our protagonist and a completely black background to induce the sense of claustrophobia, thus linking with our trailer narrative. The dark background makes the viewer focus on the beam of light that centres down the character’s face. The light is positioned on “the golden section” and draws the attention of viewers.

For our typography we decided to get creative and design the title of our film with an art focussed twist. We wanted to develop our title from the conventional style of horror typography. We therefore converted the “Y” from our title “Abyss” to represent a tree. The symbol of the tree satisfies our trailer narrative and makes the title of our film more distinct and recognisable. Our typography idea was inspired from our research into Tim Burton’s unique film titles.

WEBSITE

We chose to create a website rather than a magazine cover because of the increase of society transferring online. In doing this, it is likely to be more accessible to fans due to the websites becoming increasingly favoured over magazines.

We used a simple black background on the introduction page with a single image in the centre to focus the viewer’s eye. The use of red typography, white light on the picture and black background connotes a conventional gothic feel and clearly portrays a horror film. We wanted our website to be user friendly and easy to navigate, therefore we did not challenge the conventions of a website. This meant that users could comfortably navigate the site by presenting them with what they would expect from a film website. By not challenging the conventions of film websites we also created consistent branding by using the same logo and similar typography throughout. This allowed our target audience to recognise and associate this logo with our three media products.

We used the layout and design, particularly of our links, to induce a sense of claustrophobia, which directly relates to the concept of our narrative. The constant references to our narrative throughout our media products conform to the conventions of real media products.

 After researching promotional websites for films we found that having the trailer play automatically on the home page frequently occurred. This would allow new visitors to view the trailer instantly, which we feel is good promotion as we aimed for the black screen and the non diegetic sound at beginning of our teaser trailer to be the most memorable and intriguing part.

We also have links on every page of the website to an interview and gallery of pictures from filming. We have these links because it gives fans and visitors to the page an insight to the behind the scenes aspect, which will make them feel more involved and therefore valued. We created and uploaded the blooper reel to our website in order to create this same feeling among fans.

TEASER TRAILER

Before production of our teaser trailer we made sure we knew all the conventions for teaser trailers from real media products. This research was significantly useful because it gave us guidelines for our editing - creating anchorage, generating backing sound and constructing the whole trailer in an appropriate 1 minute.

We further researched into codes and conventions of general horror films, so that we satisfied our target audience. We found that the use of diegetic sound is crucial in making a horror because it makes the horror seem more realistic and relatable. We thought that its use would be particularly relevant for our teaser trailer because we wanted to create a sense of claustrophobia. To do this we also used the conventional black screen. The black screen removes all visuals so that the audience have to focus on the sound. By using both a black screen and diegetic sound we feel we achieved a sense of claustrophobia and terror. We extended this idea further and decided to introduce our teaser trailer narrative with just sound. The diegetic sound of dirt and digging supports our narrative and induces intrigue and mystery.

For the coffin scenes we examined films and television shows, including “Kill Bill”, the TV drama “Misfits” and the recently released “Buried”. From this research we were able to construct our own “coffin” with the exact angles we wanted to film from. The research also helped us when making lighting decisions. We explored many ideas including the use of a torch, a phone and iPod, but found when filming that the objects became awkward. It also made us have less control over the amount of light and shadows. We therefore settled on illuminating the coffin ourselves. We used a desktop light with a red tea towel over it, creating a red glow, to give connotations of danger, urgency and heat.

Propp’s theory on characters taking on roles of narrative or “spheres of action” deeply influenced our work. We began our narrative by conforming to Propp’s theory by introducing our victim and protagonist as a helpless teenage girl. We therefore chose an actress who had blonde hair and who could act the victim. However we developed this character by transforming her into a potential villain by the end of our teaser trailer, thus subverting Propp’s theory of traditional character roles. This linked with Levi-Strauss’ theory of binary opposition. We set up our narrative by implying the villain to be a middle aged male, but then subverted these expectations. This idea originated from our research on Friedrich Nietzsche. His theory stated that there is a dual recognition from the audience between both the villain and the heroic protagonist. Freudians also state that horror villains satisfy our “return of the repressed”. We decided to end our trailer on the transformation as a cliff hanger to entice viewers. The fact that it ends with a supernatural twist we feel adds another layer to our psychological horror.

Researching into theories in pre-production proved very useful. We subverted Todorov’s theory of equilibrium by beginning our trailer with the sense of disequilibrium. For research we created graphs of successful trailer narratives such as “Inception” and compared them with a graph of Todorov’s conventional narrative. To create a sense of disequilibrium we just used diegetic sound as our opening narrative and installed mystery by using quick edited close up shots. We continued the theme of disequilibrium throughout our teaser trailer by also manipulating the sense of time in the narrative. We used devices such as flash forwarding and repetition, for example in one of the shots we reversed and sped up our actress crawling up the hill, inducing a possible forking path narrative.

We also studied Sid Field’s theory of a three stage narrative for typical Hollywood films. Due to the conventions that make up a good teaser trailer, we only used “the setup” and “the confrontation” stages of his theory. Including “the resolution” would undermine the aim of a teaser trailer to literally “tease” and not spoil the outcome.

Another typical theme of horror is isolation, which has a definite link with our chosen sub-genre of psychological horror. We decided that we wanted to push the boundaries and explore notions of extreme isolation. This prompted us to think of the most primitive fear of being buried alive. The incident in October with the Chilean Miners being trapped underground made our choice of topic very up to date, and the release of “Buried” and Danni Boyle’s incredibly recent “127 hours” proves that it is still a very current topic of discussion. Due to this we wanted to focus on mainly of the notion of being trapped, therefore the major scene in our teaser trailer is of the main protagonist in the coffin. To support our theme of being buried alive we kept referring to visuals of dirt throughout our teaser trailer. For example, we used clips of the protagonist crawling up a slope, a worm tunnelling into the earth and bugs crawling in mud.

To support and develop this extended metaphor we also changed the colouring of clips to warm oranges and browns in post-production editing. We did this to induce the feeling of uncomfortable heat and to harmonise with the red light shots in the coffin.

We also used a white torch light in the dark and changed the contrast to create an opposing cold effect to the end shots to signify death and therefore the loss of her heart and feelings, such as guilt, allowing her to seek revenge without her conscience.


To keep our narrative open to interpretations we allowed for anachronic modular narratives. Ideas surrounding modular narratives were put forward by Allan Cameron. He explained that modular narratives “articulate a sense of time as divisible and subject to manipulation.” We created enigmas by repeating scenes from other characters perspectives and flashing forward to establish possible outcomes. For example we juxtaposed scenes with our victim inside the coffin to the villain filling in the grave. This technique helped to move our narrative into supernatural horror. It also helped to satisfy teaser trailer conventions of fast paced editing.

The narrative research for our A2 coursework played a major role in influencing our creative decisions. By studying narrative we were able to confirm our horror genre through teaser trailer conventions.