Professional Film Posters
After researching film posters, I have found these two posters which I feel match the desired output that we want to achieve. As 'Doubt' (Left), is a religious film about a priest's relationship with a 12 year old black student and 'Trust' is a film about a teenage girl that is targeted by an online sexual predator.
Deconstructing the Film Posters
I have decided to deconstruct the above professional film posters, in order to find any conventions that could be used in our film poster. As many films, follow certain conventions depending upon the genre of the film i decided to deconstruct two film posters that covered the religious aspects (the rape scene and the step dad stereotype) and the fragility (Samantha; flashbacks, son and memory box) parts of our film. Below, I have inserted the film poster deconstruction documents.
Key:
Magenta - Symbolic Codes
Cyan - Technical Codes.
Photoshop Tutorial
I decided to research how to fade two images together using photoshop, i found the tutorial embedded below, which clearly shows how to fade two images together.1st Draft
I followed the above tutorial whilst creating the mask on the film poster, however, i came across many problems when trying to combine the two images together when using the layer mask. I re-imported the images and recreated the layer mask and it eventually worked. Below, I have embedded our 1st draft of the movie poster.
1st Draft Feedback
Key:
Black - Original Feedback
Red - Reply to Feedback
- The poster does not look like a film poster if compared with the professional examples. More conventions need to be followed or adapted to make the poster look more like a film poster.
- I agree that the poster does not look entirely like a film poster, however, some parts do follow the conventions.
- Ray looks like he is just floating around up the corner. Looking at the poster, he has no immediate purpose unless the audience has already watched the film.
- I also agree that Ray just looks like he is floating, the original idea worked better on paper than it did when created on the computer. I think that Ray should be taken out or a different photo of both Ray and Samantha should be used.
- Title is not bold enough at all, it doesn't stand out as a title. Whole title looks weird with the first letters in capitals; either all in capitals or not.
- The title is lost with the gray background behind, i think that we need to use a different much bolder font for the title. Another convention of film posters is that the title is often in capitals, I think we need to change the current titles into all uppercase capital letters.
- Bottom gradient just stops at the edge of the image. Either use a gradient or remove the background.
- I think that we need to fade the bottom of the image into the gray background, which will work alot better than just a line where the image meets the background. Use of the gradient tool is needed.
- The credits look okay and follow the usual conventions along with the release date.
- I think that the credits also follow the usual conventions and that they should remain the same, however, inclusion of the release date is in question.
Evaluation of Feedback
After concurring with the feedback, I believe that in order to create a higher grade film poster, it would be better to re-design and start again, as the amount of work required is much greater and even then, we are still left with the same formating problems, like where ray is to be positions and whether the correct images have been used.
I think that we should forget about the fading two images into each other effect, as unless this is completed successfully and perfectly then i do not think we will be able to get the output that we want or have designed, therefore, if we re-visit our research into professional film posters.
Conventions
After revisiting the film posters that we deconstructed, I believe that we need to make sure we cover the following vital conventions in order to create a successful film poster;
- What is the purpose of the poster?
- What colours have been used? Associations?
- What are the Key images and objects?
- What is the colour of the title? Associations? Significance?
- What font has been chosen? Why? Associations? Significance?
- What is the tag line? What does it reveal?
- Layout used? Why?
- What is the target audience?
Photoshop Tutorials 2:
As we designed to have a chain attached to the cross, i needed to research into how to create a chain in photoshop, below I found a useful tutorial in which i adapted to suit my needs.
Creating the Film Poster:
Below, I have recorded a screen cast of myself, creating the film poster, describing the different effects and tricks that i used in order to create the film poster.
Final Film Poster;
Below, i have inserted our final film poster for our film 'Reborn from Sin'. I believe that our film poster follows the usual conventions of a film poster.
Our film poster conventions
As earlier described, I believed that we need to meet these 8 conventions in order to have a successful and recognisable film poster.
- What is the purpose of the poster?
- What colours have been used? Associations?
- What are the Key images and objects?
- What is the colour of the title? Associations? Significance?
- What font has been chosen? Why? Associations? Significance?
- What is the tag line? What does it reveal?
- Layout used? Why?
- What is the target audience?
Conclusion
I believe that we have successfully created a professional film poster by which we have followed and adapted conventions that are often used on professional film posters. All of the conventions are easily identifiable, the genre is easily obtained and the poster works well as a piece of advertising medium for the film.
I believe that we have successfully created a professional film poster by which we have followed and adapted conventions that are often used on professional film posters. All of the conventions are easily identifiable, the genre is easily obtained and the poster works well as a piece of advertising medium for the film.
