Q1) In What Way Does Your Product Use, Develop Or Challenge Forms And Conventions Of Real Media Products?

In order for my products to fulfil their ultimate purposes of attracting the audience into consuming it, I must use, develop and challenge the forms and conventions of real media products.

In my main task of creating a teaser trailer for an upcoming film of a genre of my choice I have, to some extent used a lot of ideas from existing products. The first is the time in which my trailer lasts for; it falls within the 50-90 second boundary that all teaser trailers, regardless of genre, usually last for. I have chosen to use this convention because if my trailer fell outside of these time boundaries, there is a chance that it will be too long to qualify for a teaser trailer or that it will simply be too short and contain too little detail about the narrative of the film. In context, the purpose of a teaser trailer is to tease the audience by creating a sense of enigma, therefore enticing them to consume the full products after completion so by keeping within the time boundaries of existing products, I have been able to give away neither too much, nor too little information regarding the narrative. In the section entitled ‘Codes And Conventions Of A Sports Drama’, I have listed the most common features that tend to appear in majority of films which fall into the same genre as my own. The setting, on a sports pitch, we have used is a common occurrence in real media products, so we decided to use this idea, especially as it matches the genre. The use of the protagonist participating in the sport he loves, on the pitch shows his passion for it, and keeps the key theme of 'sport' playing with the audiences' thoughts.

In order to make my trailer attract my desired audience, I must also develop some of the forms and conventions of real media products. I have done this in my main task of the teaser trailer, by exploring some slightly different themes to those in which existing texts use. In my trailer we chose to to focus on a key theme in detail, the use of drugs and it's effects, not for the protagonists' mind or body, but about how the people they care most about will react to their bad choice in life- whereas real media products, that I have researched 'Save The Last Dance' in which the characters of the narrative are taking drugs as a way of life, our protagonist is taking drugs to help enrich his life for very different reasons.

In order for my product to be a success however, I must also challenge the forms and conventions that are used in real media texts, this is so that the narrative of the trailer cannot be predicted due to the stereotypes that the audience will walk into the cinema with. A key setting of sports dramas is within a prison, this is featured in several films; 'Gridiron Gang', 'Mean Machine' and 'Escape To Victory'. I decided not to use this as a location at all, as I did not want to explore the harsh times associated with prison, this gave me the opportunity then to develop my narrative and explore some more relevant themes that are more likely to be closer to the audience, e.g. the theme of drugs and isolation from friends.

In my subsidiary task of creating a website in order to advertise the main product of the actual film, I must create a site that is going to complete this task effectively I must again, use develop and challenge the forms and conventions of real media products.

I chose to include a contact form on my website, which has been featured on other websites from films from a similar genre, for example; 'Rocky Balboa' and 'Coach Carter'. This gave my audience the chance to contact me, as the producer, with any comments or queries, this is another way to keep in continuous communication with the audience and gives them the chance to feedback through a different method- therefore this means that the amount of audience I am able to get feedback from is much wider than just the people I am in regular contact with at school. From my section entitled 'Website Analysis', I have identified that a trailer is a common feature on all websites, as an extra way of creating an element of audience participation- which in all is an effective way of keeping the audience attracted to the product. The use of featuring a trailer on the website also allows another way to market the film- using a new and different media technology.

In order to make my product unique and different to those that already exist I must also totally invent some elements to contain on my website. On some real media products that I have analysed there are some inspirational quotes from the film, whereas on some others there are none what so ever. I have chosen to develop the idea of featuring some quotes on my website, however, on the real products they are featured across the website and appear in a random sequence when you click from page to page ('Coach Carter'). However, due to technical issues with the website that I chose to use, I did not manage to figure out how to do this so instead I chose to put a small amount of quotes, 6, on the second page. I do believe, in a way, for this to be as good as the ways the real media products have used it, as when the quotes appear randomly you may see the same one a number of times, whereas all of my ones are there to read on one page.

One way in which I have made my product different unique, by challenging the conventions of real media products, is through the use of my background image. I chose to use an image of a road that seems to go on forever, instead of the conventional use of an image either from the film itself, or one set-up from the film- both still featuring the protagonist somewhere on the screen. My justification for doing this is simple; my website is there as a method to promote my film, and entice the audience to go out there and consume the main product, the film, so giving away too much information too early on does not seem like a logical idea to me, as if the actor playing my protagonist is not well known, this will give away the absolute minimal amount of information about him, and will build suspense for when the audience eventually gets to my casts page and sees them. I also chose to use this image because it links with the tagline of the film which is; 'Which Road Will You Take?', and as the image is of a straight road the audience will be led into believing that the protagonists' path is set out clear ahead of him, and in the early stages of the narrative, this is true- however the trailer which is featured on the website will reveal a different story for them.

My film posters, as my second subsidiary task will also need to use, develop and challenge forms of real media products. I decided to replicate the obvious choice of having the protagonist featured on my actual full film poster, as this gives the audience an insight into the cast list. I also chose to use the conventional layout of showing the title of the film in bold letters, with the inclusion of the actor that plays the main protagonist shown above. This could help to promote the film, as if the actor was well known and their name featured on the cover of the film poster, then the audience would be more enticed to consume the product.

Finally, I have also challenge the forms and conventions of real media products (teaser poster), I have chosen to do this because by doing so, I am effectively challenging the stereotypes associated to a particular genre, which will have the effect of keeping the audience on their toes. Challenging too many forms and conventions however, can leave you're audience split as if you challenge them too much, your product will differ too much to that of existing ones and will require your audience to almost change their views on a particular genre, which would be hard to do considering you are challenging the ideas of many iconic films. I have challenged forms and conventions on my teaser poster, by simply totally changing the layout- I chose to not have the main image, one of my protagonist, but of a couple of playing jerseys instead. This has the effect of creating an enigma for the audience consuming the product as they would almost be second guessing who would be in it. This could also have the opposite effect however, whereby the audience are not attracted to it at all because they are not able to see who the main actor is (if they don't recognise their name). However, when employing the spiral effect, where I attained feedback after creating a particular idea- my audience liked this idea, so I decided to keep it this way. I decided in the first place to challenge this convention because of the context of a teaser poster- it is designed to be released a long time before the film (so actors may not have been confirmed, or script totally written, or production even started) and because the whole idea is not to give away too much information, both of which i believe my product does successfully.

For the main poster, I chose to use the conventions of having a mid-shot of the protagonist as the main image, and have again used conventions but not really revealing the genre of the film with this main image. This too, is used in other products such as the Gridiron Gang and Coach Carter posters which I analysed previously in the blog.

However, in both instances they have used a smaller, or blended another image into the background in order for the genre and specific sport to be realised. But because of technological hinderances, it was not possibly for me to do this with such effect, so instead and the way I challenged codes and conventions was through changing the colour of both images into black and white and blending them together in that way. The majority of similar products in the same genre have not changed the colour to black and white, however, I think it works effectively because of the mise-en-scene of the mian image- the indirect mode of address and generally closed body position of the featured character, suggests that times may be hard, and that the colour has been taken out of his life. Which is a definitive link to the narrative of the trailer.