Trailer Evaluation

TRAILER EVALUATION In this presentation I will be completing a detailed evaluation of the planning, filming, editing and the final product of the trailer based on the genre of ‘Gritty British Realism’ that I was set to produce.

GOAL In order to complete the course I was required to produce a second piece of video that represented the genre of ‘Gritty British Realism’.

The trailer that we were to create could be based on anything we wanted. However we had to bear in mind that we needed to create a piece that would present the real ‘Gritty’ side to Britain and not the fancy country the world believes it to be through its presentations in the media.

‘Gritty British Realism’ is the genre in which presents ‘Britain’s’ dark side as Britain isn’t the all wealthy and great country people think it is but there is the corrupt side that involves; crime, poverty and young violence.

INITIAL IDEA As I have mentioned previously my first ideas that came to my mind when starting this task was to have a family of three (mother, son & daughter) who immigrate to Britain, however my main character was Noor (daughter) as the trailer was based on her lifestyle. I had decided I wanted her to play a role where she possessed 2 distinct sides to her personality, presenting the influence of Britain that encouraged Noor to do wrong which gave her the second personality. She would do right at home and wrong outside of the home . She started by being a very traditional religious girl but Britain had influenced her otherwise.

PLANNING Planning is one of the most important processes that needs to be considered before the actual making of the film. Planning helps you make your mind up about what it is you aim to create. Planning is like a step to step presentation that I had created for myself to support me along the upcoming processes towards the making of the trailer. This trailer also involves the creation of a project plan, storyboard, shooting script and dialogue script. The things that I have mentioned is what has guided me to flow smoothly through this final course.

During the process of planning moving on from project plan to storyboard to the next, I had fiddled my ideas several times, therefore in each activity I may have different ideas that have either been added or removed. When creating a trailer it isn't very easy because when it gets to the filming process you could be getting on with more scenes than you had planned to record since trailers need to consist of many shots that appear swiftly.

FILMING This was one of the most difficult processes that needed to take place for the production of the trailer. I had to be practical at this stage and be very creative in what I was shooting. Although I had a plan that I could follow, as I got to the filming stage I had realised that I had not done enough in my plan in relation to what I would be filming when I got to this stage. Slowly moving on from scene to scene I kept coming up with new ideas as to how I could add ‘Gritty British Realism’ to my plot that would make my trailer a success. I used as much of my imagination as possible to have in mind how my footage would look when getting to the next process in which was the editing. Therefore I recorded as much relevant footage to suit my plot.

I had to take notice of the time I was spending on the filming because if I went over a limit of time, I knew I would be falling behind therefore I made sure I was filming the most appropriate shots that would work fine with the trailer.

EDITING In this process I had to be very detailed and needed to take my time because this is where I either get it completely wrong or as accurate to fit well as a trailer. Editing is the process in which I had to pay great attention to detail because it significantly determines the quality of the final product.

The editing software that I used in order to create my final product so that it would be closer to industry standard was ‘Final Cut Pro X’. This software allowed me to edit my trailer in the way that I felt was most suitable. This included breaking down scenes to fit into my time span, transitions between scenes so that one scene could flow into the next, sound to build tension and effects to give a dramatic feel to some of the shots that linked to ‘Gritty British Realism’. I also decided to add headlines so my trailer could look of a higher professional standard. When editing I wanted my trailer to look as realistic as it could be that wouldn't seem any different to an industry standard trailer.

ISSUES My trailer was going to include a unique selling point to make the trailer as realistic as possible. I wanted to have a scene located at a home of the family talking in Arabic language and I would have used subtitles at the bottom of the screen to translate what the characters were saying. This not only shows a different ethnicity living in Britain but it shows a clear representation that Britain is diverse and some people stick to their culture and traditions no matter their situation. However unfortunately this didn't’t take place because of the limited time I had left to complete this activity. Also at first I had decided to base my trailer around a girl who falls into problems such as ‘teenage pregnancy’ which I thought could fall under the genre of ‘G.B.R’. However once I thought again after watching a couple of other exemplar ‘G.B.R’ trailers, I realised my initial idea was not strong enough to show the representation of ‘G.B.R’. Therefore I changed my initial idea several times throughout all processes towards this final production. I needed my trailer to involve props such as drugs and weapons to give the realistic feel to the ‘G.B.R’ trailer I produced.

FINAL PRODUCT My target audience was 15+ because the main character (Noor) is at this age and therefore the plot of the film could fit in with this age group. What I have produced could easily grab the attention of many teenagers living in Britain today because this is the sort of plot that is common. However it is not necessarily the fact that a family has immigrated to Britain but according to research this is the sort of trouble many young teenagers get into.

In order to see how well I did and how effective my trailer was on the target audience I firstly previewed the video to as many young teenagers to see if they understood the message conveyed and how. However this was not enough as I needed the evidence in order to prove to myself that the trailer I had created was appropriate and that the genre of ‘Gritty British Realism’ was built-in productively.

COMPARE TO PRELIMINARY FILM I will briefly compare my previous preliminary film to the trailer. Firstly I believe that I have produced my trailer closer to industry quality than the preliminary film. Reasons for this may be because when creating the preliminary I did not completely know how I could have used the digital camera to shoot camera shots, angles and movements that gave the audience a clear perspective of what was being conveyed in that particular shot and what shots were most suited for the film. Further to this when it got to the editing I did not know much about how I could use tools such as effects to give a different look to the shot taken. Although my preliminary film was not so bad after the responses I received, I was still disappointed after realising how much better it could have looked if I had the knowledge I have now when creating the trailer. My trailer by far is of a higher standard than the preliminary film because the trailer consists of relevant sound, mise-en-scene, camera shots, angles and movements, editing effects and appropriate headlines that accurately relate to the genre of ‘Gritty British Realism’.

SURVEY MONKEY I have created a survey based on my trailer asking questions to see how well my trailer is produced. These questions consist of: Have you enjoyed watching the trailer?

Have I used mise-en-scene effectively?

Have I used camera shots, angles and movements effectively?

Have I used sound effectively?

Have I edited the trailer effectively?

Were the transitions flowing smoothly?

Have I presented the genre of ‘Gritty British Realism’ fairly?

What did you like the most about the trailer?

What did you dislike about the trailer?

On a scale from 1-10 what would you rate the trailer?

I will have posted my responses on a blog with the results print screened.