Mood board of the Horror Genre

I decided that to give me inspiration through imagery, the use of colour and lighting, I would create a mood board that typically represented the horror genre. I gathered images off the internet and arranged them to show what I typically think of when I think of horror films. Some of the films included The Omen, The Shining, Psycho and It.

Further Marketing Campaign for upcoming film 'Devil's Due'

It is so fascinating to see amazing technological advances used to their full as part of a marketing campaign for a film. This disturbing stunt pulled off in New York went viral online and accumulated more than 4.8 million views on YouTube in one day. A creepy animatronic infant - known as the "devil baby" - terrorised unsuspecting New Yorkers, by cruising around in a remote controlled stroller, crying to catch attention. When a bystander comes near to aid help to the crying "baby" it pops up un-expectedly screaming, vomiting, growling and in some cases swearing.

This viral marketing stunt was set up to promote the January 17th 2014 release of the upcoming horror film, 'Devil's Due'. This kind of viral marketing is not only very smart in terms of promoting the film but also reaches out to a much wider audience, as with the video on YouTube gaining such a huge response, this then easily attracts the varied generations of YouTube itself but also this would then lead to people talking about the viral video on social networking sites such as Twitter. This instantly gets people talking about the film before even a trailer is released and would hopefully gear up a following before much is even seen of the film, bringing it more popularity and in turn, when the film is released, a lot more money.

Below I have included the video of the viral marketing stunt;

New Marketing techniques

While researching marketing campaigns across all media platform, I stumbled across this really interesting, clever and captivating marketing technique to promote the upcoming remake of the film "Carrie" (originally produced in 1976). An elaborate prank was set up in a coffee shop in America that displayed characteristics and features of Carrie (the main protagonist in the film) to try and encourage the audience to go and see the film, set to be released in November of this year.

Research a Full Marketing Campaign - 'The Woman In Black'

As I had previously analysed the poster and trailer released to promote the film 'The Woman In Black', I thought I would research the marketing campaign as a whole, as Daniel Radcliffe did a lot of promotion alone. Focusing on the horror genre of film, I have decided to look further into its marketing campaign to help me when creating components of my own campaign. 

The first case of marketing for this film began with the showing of the first trailer, on the 10th of April 2011 at 'Kapow!' Comic Con in London. Due to the fact that many people who go to Comic Con are interested in films, and possibly even franchises like Harry Potter (which Daniel Radcliffe starred in), this may intrigue them. Later that year, in July 2011, another trailer was advertised before showings of the final film in the Harry Potter series, 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2'. Again, with the finale of the series, 'The Woman in Black' may provide fans of Daniel Radcliffe to see him in a new film. This choice of advertisement means that a specific part of the target audience is addressed (which may result in more viewings when the film is released).
 One month later, on the 24th of August 2011, posters within the UK were released, and by the 14th of October the official UK trailer was released. Posters were displayed around the country from billboards to the sides of buses. The posters, with the blues and black colouring linked together with the trailers.

On the 14th of October 2012, Momentum pictures released an official International trailer, and even a new version of the already established book (which was written in 1983 by Susan Hill) was released with a brand new cover, featuring Daniel Radcliffe. Again, this attracts fans of Daniel Radcliffe and even Harry Potter fans.

Daniel Radcliffe also appeared on a lot of magazine covers during the campaign and was even invited to be on both The Jonathan Ross Show and The Graham Norton Show.

Furthermore, a national competition was held for people to submit their own original ghost stories, from the 31st of October (around halloween would further set the tone and hype around the film at this time). A video was filmed, featuring Daniel Radcliffe again requesting the entries. This competition promoted the film virally, and the competition was unique to this films advertising campaign, setting it apart from other films of its genre. 

The synergy throughout the campaign allows the advertisements to be viewed by many different types of people, right across the country and internationally on many different platforms that may be interested in different media such as, magazines for example. The website and Facebook pages also added to the advertisements across the internet, and overall, the campaign reached a lot of different demographics.

By analysing the trailer, poster and researching the while marketing campaign for the film, I have gained a real insight into every step of the process to create and promote this film. I have gained a lot of knowledge from conventions of the trailer alone and the components of the poster, to what different ways are used nowadays for contemporary media/films. This has provided me with a lot of inspiration as we are creating a trailer of a similar storyline and so I can take what I have learnt, and translate stand out conventions in to my own.

Synergy maintenance within Marketing Campaigns

I have learnt a lot about the key role synergy plays in all aspects of advertisement through analysing previously the posters, trailers and magazine covers for 'The Wolverine' and 'The conjuring'. It is clear to see that a certain image is created from various components and features that allow the audience to piece together key aspects and their own interpretation of what the film is all about through the links that the synergy between platforms has created.

After analysing a few media platforms in which the marketing campaign for 'The Wolverine' has taken to, to advertise the film, the synergy between them became apparent to me. Alongside traditional advertising such as film trailers, magazine covers and posters etc, the marketing campaign for 'The Wolverine' reached out to new social media platforms that are forming the basis and driving the hype around films such as Vine (social media site where people of all ages can create short 6 second clips or movies). This means that it would massively increase the films' publicity and the viewing figures that the film received. Today, technology plays a huge, crucial role in the marketing of films, allowing trailers to be promoted to cross cultural audiences through the internet, not only using film websites such as IMDB or Youtube. To kick off the marketing, teaser trailers and the International trailer were released alongside a 'Tweaser'. These are all used in-conjunction with one another to collectively advertise the film and entice audiences of all age groups to go and watch the film.



Also, as well as reaching out to a media driven audience, many posters to promote the film were created for those of an audience that may not use the internet as much, allowing them to still gain access to marketing of the film and be exposed to advertisements of some form. From this it is clear that the energy between media platforms to advertise a film is extremely crucial to reaching the widest possible audience and make the film a success. It will be interesting to see the success of the film due to this introduction of this new marketing technique.

Little White Lies magazine analysis

After discovering Little White Lies magazine, I decided to analyse one of their covers as it really grabbed my attention from it's interesting production process and artistic style. As I have already analysed the trailer for 'Let the Right One In', I thought it would be interesting to see how Little White Lies magazine interpreted the feel of the film and portrayed this on their cover, and so I decided to analyse this issue of the magazine below.

             

I really loved the simplistic and clean aesthetic to the Little White Lies magazine covers and style after research into their company and analysing a relevant theme that will aid me in my own creation. When producing my own magazine cover related to the horror genre, I will keep it simplistic and although I cannot produce an art based creative magazine due to the lack of resources, I will try and make it carry over all the codes and convention that portray the horror genre theme and make it intriguing through only one or two cover lines to make the audience want to read what it hold inside.

Little White Lies Magazine Company Background Research

             

Little White Lies is a bi-monthly, British independent movie magazine that features writing, illustration and photography related to cinema. It is published by London-based creative agency 'The Church of London'. The first issue was released in February 2005 and according to a report in The Guardian:

"Danny Miller conceived Little White Lies with his schoolfriend Matthew Bochenski aged 17, and they carried the dream with them through university and into their first jobs at skate and snowboard magazine Adrenalin. When the independent publishers behind Adrenalin collapsed last November, he put together the first issue of Little White Lies with Bochenski"

The design of each issue of 'Little White Lies' is inspired by its feature film, represented on the cover by an illustration of its lead actor. The cover film also influences interior aspects, such as editorial icons, chapter headings and custom typefaces. However, the overall template of the magazine remains the same. Little White Lies' content is split into six chapters: the lead review, an editorial introduction, a series of articles inspired by the feature film, theatrical reviews, the Back Section, and future releases. Also, Little White Lies is distributed throughout the UK and is stocked in shops including WHSmith, HMV, Urban Outfitters and Fopp. The magazine is also stocked in many of the UK's leading independent cinemas including all Curzon Cinemas, Picturehouse Cinemas and Everyman Cinemas.
Finally, In 2008, 'Little White Lies' won Best Designed Consumer Magazine of the Year at the Magazine Design and Journalism Awards.
I love this magazine in particular from the whole old-school way of producing everything that makes it's way into the final cut before distribution. It is a lot different to any other magazine I have seen before and that's what intrigues me the most to want to analyse of it's simplistic covers. Below are a selection of many of the Little White Lies issues.

The Making of the 'Black Swan' Issue of Little White Lies Magazine

             

I came across this video on YouTube while researching new marketing techniques, of a magazine company titled 'Little White Lies'. The 1:55 minute video covers the whole process of creating an Independent magazine solely focused on film. I found this really interesting and an amazing behind the scenes to how much work goes into every component of this arty magazine, from the illustrations and photography, down to the tinkering with each letter of handwritten articles within the contents of it's pages. I have decided to do some research into this Independent company and analyse one of it's magazine covers as inspiration for my own. I love the style and artistic take on each aspect of the magazine and so will do more research into the company itself.

The Conjuring - Film poster analysis

This is the international poster that I chose that was part of the advertising campaign for the new horror film "The Conjuring".

Here is the link to my analysis of this film poster on Flikr;
http://www.flickr.com/photos/101147147@N03/9670324483/

I find this poster very effective and this is actually the poster that encouraged me to go and see this film myself as a viewer compared with the previous trailer that I analysed. The main component that I like on this poster is the simplicity of it. There is not a lot going on but every small detail portrays mystery and the fear of the unknown, which draws you in to want to find out what it is thats making her so afraid, made effective by the low key lighting. As my budget is only small this poster brought it home to me that it is possible to make a poster that is simple yet really effective in drawing in an audience and so when creating my own film poster, I want to create this simplicity for the same use.

The Conjuring - International Film Trailer Analysis

                             

The Wolverine - Empire Magazine cover Analysis

As well as looking at the poster to promote 'The Wolverine', I also looked at a magazine cover for Empire, which was The Wolverine featured issue that was promoted on the front cover.

              

By analysing the codes and conventions of this issue of Empire, it has allowed me to see how a large budget and established magazine promotes a Blockbuster film. It was clear to me that I would not be able to reproduce a magazine cover of my own to this standard, as the level of CGI is higher than I could achieve on Photoshop only and the time I have to complete this task. This has given me an overview of one end of the scale of quality of promotion within magazine production and I will next find magazines that are more independent and that have a cover that I will be able to create with my own skills and ability. 

The Wolverine - Poster Analysis

After analysing the international trailer for "The Wolverine", I wanted to cover the whole production of the movie to see how it was marketed and advertised on all platforms and so chose one of the many posters that were released leading up to the premiere screening. Posters and advertising play a major role in how many people will go and see the film and through analysis you can find the smallest details that can give you an insight into the film from Day 1 of the lead up without giving anything away. How professional and captivating a poster is, may determine the viewing numbers and influence viewers to get excited to see the film.

The link to my analysis of "The Wolverine" film poster is below:

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/101147147@N03/9665062206/

This poster is an example of how a company or film with a large budget can create to widely advertise a movie worldwide. I think that this poster is extremely effective in attracting the right demographic of people interested in films in the action genre. I have learnt a lot from analysing this poster alone, as it was brought together all on computer with the aid of a lot of professional CGI, but done so professionally and has shown me that if you have a large budget anything is possible. It has given me a lot to think about when creating my own film poster.