Evaluation - Luke Robinson
Evaluation of Teaser Trailer – Chased
In our teaser trailer, we used all of the technical aspects of media to create an effective teaser trailer for our film concept 'Chased'. The trailer begins with our ident, which I feel shows off our production company's logo effectively while remaining quick and snappy, as to keep time to a minimum. The ident was fast but memorable, and provided a suitable opening to our teaser trailer.
Our trailer then continues with some clips, with slow paced editing that speeds up as more of the villain is shown. This style of editing was our attempt to create some suspense, and I believe we were fairly successful. I believe this could have been improved had we had more time, but I think we did well considering the time restraints. We very quickly cut and faded between shots of the villain towards the end, giving the idea that he was moving very fast towards the camera. We didn't use any filters or effects on the video, as we believed that the lighting and production of the original clips was of a high enough quality. The lighting in the location was great, and this definitely helped us to create the feel and atmosphere needed in a horror teaser trailer.
We used a variety of shot types, including handheld camera shots, long shots, medium shots and over the shoulder shots. This variety helped us maintain some of the atmosphere, as the handheld view allows the viewer to put themselves in the main character's shoes and almost experience the fear of being chased themselves. The long shots of the villain closing in create an almost 'out of body experience' with the lighting looking almost surreal. This brings forward the idea of the villain being supernatural and ghost-like.
We used text to show institutional information like a release month and a facebook page, but also to say things about the film like in other teaser trailers. For example, we had text saying 'This November' as institutional information, but also to say 'Prepare to be...' to create a build up to the final show of the film title 'Chased.' We also kept a consistent style and font for all text for consistency's sake.
For our sound, we decided to cut all production sound and add no foley sound, relying on music to create the atmosphere. I believe that this was a good idea as we had limited time on editing the sound. Instead of worrying about finding, creating and adding our own foley sound, we could spend more time tweaking the music to create just the right atmosphere. I believe that this worked to an extent, but we could have improved on the music to some degree if we'd had more time. I feel that some of this makes the trailer feel slightly empty and missing something, but I believe it is effective anyway.
Our teaser trailer was for the horror genre, and was made clear with the following production choices. Our narrative involved a woman running through a forest, outmatched by a supernatural being, which is based upon a stereotype of the horror genre. We used the stereotype of the female being chased, as is used in many horror films. The villain was a man dressed in black, with most of his face covered which immediately suggests that he is the antagonist.
A big part of our trailer was using lighting to highlight things in our scene. The mise-en-scene of the long shot of the antagonist teleporting highly uses lighting to emphasise and make the audience focus on certain parts of the scene. For example, the woman laying on the ground is highlighted by a beam of light, which clearly shows her in the foreground of the scene. The bright lighting in the forest highlights the antagonist's back clothing well against the background, helping to create the ominous feeling of the scene. This scene creates a very vivid image for the trailer.
I asked some people three questions about my teaser trailer to get an idea of what things went well in others' eyes, and what to improve on.
I asked: From this teaser trailer, would you consume the product advertised? Explain your reasons why?
Maybe, I wouldn't go out of my way to see it but I wouldn't mind it either because it doesnt seem that scary.”
Is the genre and storyline of the product obvious? Explain why it is apparent/not apparent?
“Not 100% but yeah it's pretty obvious. I thought it seemed to be a bit brightly lit for a horror film.”
What sort of audience do you believe the product is aimed at and why?
“Non-hardcore horror fans, people who enjoy a good scare but don't want to be scarred for life.”
The second person said:
From this teaser trailer, would you consume the product advertised? Explain your reasons why?
“Yes I would, because I'm an avid fan of horror movies and this looks like a good horror movie with new ideas.”
Is the genre and storyline of the product obvious? Explain why it is apparent/not apparent?
“Not so much the storyline isn't THAT obvious but the genre definitely is because the suspense the trailer actually creates spooks your out already. Whereas the story isn't as much seen.”
What sort of audience do you believe the product is aimed at and why?
“I think its aimed at teens who like horror movies because it doesn't seem scary enough for teens but seems scary enough for only teens and up to be able to see it.”
Looking at these responses, I do agree with what they say. I think that our storyline wasn't fleshed out in the trailer, but I feel that it was more effective at teasing, not giving away any information. I did not expect people to say that it lack scariness - But I understand that perhaps the use of bright sunlight changed the mood of the film to a brighter tone. I was surprised to find that people didn't mention the sound, as I thought that was one of the major points of improvement for the trailer. Overall, I believe that we created an effective and interesting horror teaser trailer.

