In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

CCTV shots are a common convention of horror films because they show the action which can take place at any time and so the film instantly becomes more realistic. I think that the use of a young girl standing like the one in the actual horror trailer is an effective use of camera shots and the reason for the CCTV being put up in a house in the first place means something's gone wrong, meaning the effect is ideal for the horror genre.

The return of the repressed is a recurrent native theme in the horror genre, things or events from the past are brought back and repeated. In my horror trailer we used a shot of the father finding the old newspaper about the past of the house they have now moved into, this is effective because the audience are given an explanation for the events that are now occurring to the family. A horror trailer will often give away a past reason for the new events to make the happenings more realistic and frightening for the audience as bad things could have resulted from the past event.

The face morph from ‘Grave encounters’ influenced my horror trailer, because of the reaction we would get from the audience because it shocks the audience because they aren’t expecting it. The face morph also allows the audience to identify with the family because they are seeing the ‘monster’ in a close up shot, showing the fear and to the extent of the change in their daughter. The face morph would definitely appear in horror trailers because it gives away something that fans of horror would be attracted to, they want to know more. It is a prime example of CGI, and is a way of showing the ‘monster’ emerging from the shadows and so this technology has helped lead to the ‘gorenography’ subgenre.

The ‘girl on the swing’ shot is typical to the horror conventions because it is representing innocence in the character the audience is supposed to fear, often done by using iconic props or locations to connote the hidden evil behind innocence, it works so well because they are binary opposites. The way I have represented this is the use of location, a children's swing, with the main girl swinging, looking with a blank expression into space, this is ideal for a horror trailer as it doesn't give much away but still has an effect. The swing has no connation of threat in real life but in horrors, any innocence is a threat.

The CCTV shot of the girl rocking, in my case, the corner of the room, represents madness within the most innocent of people. The horror convention of madness within us all, is shown in the shot and is effective at creating suspense of what the girl might do next. The three great themes of horror can relate to our horror, with the ‘Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’ with the instinct of repressed madness in us all being a strong influence in our trailer. The shot would be typical in horror trailers as the audience are given a reason to be afraid of the girl, and will be attracted to the trailer by the simple use of a movement that forms a question of all our sanity.

Props that are stereotypical in horror films are knives, they are a more effective weapon because the fear of a gun is less than a knife as the gun would be a quick easy way to kill the victims of the film and the suspense of the ‘chase’ or threat to the family would be gone. So the playing with the knife represents the evil in the girl and that the girl would rather play with knives than toys, connoting that there is something very wrong with the girl and the ‘monster’ character function is strongly represented.

The mirror shot of the girl is a shot that is a mid shot, that lets the audience relate to the girl even though the shot isn't a close up because she is looking at herself and realising what she has become, ‘a monster’, and this is stereotypical of horrors as the innocent are often found to contain evil. The girl is looking at herself, this shows a split personality almost, which is ideal for the horror trailer.

The extreme close up of the swing shot in my horror trailer is effective because it gives a certain paranormal aspect to the small action of a swing moving. The clear dull colours are specifically edited to make the shot look a lot more dramatic and intensify the simple shot. Extreme close ups of objects moving in horrors are stereo typical because of the idea of a paranormal world linked to ours which scares the audience and the fact that expressive camerawork helps the most insignificant of things become something to fear and help them gain importance.

The long shot of the twins in the corridor is very similar to the shot of the girl in my trailer that stands at the top of the stares simply staring at the camera. The fact the shot gives no emotion makes the audience feel on edge and fear the girl. The long shot of the ‘monster’ is common in horror trailers because we can see a entire image of what we are supposed to be fearing and we don’t identify with them because of the distance we have between them and the camera.

The typical CONVENTIONS of the horror genre in trailers is that there a quick flashes of shots that allow the audience to fear the ‘monster’ without giving too much information away.Teaser trailers are usually shorter versions of trailers that last 1 minute 30 seconds approx, which we achieved to do in our trailer. The trailer gives away the genre, some of the narrative and suspense that makes the film attract the typical target audience of teenagers.Numerous types of shots like close ups and CCTV in the trailer creates an interest to the audience and builds the enigma. We have used a lot of repetitive shots in the trailer to build up the fear of the protagonist. The use of the heartbeat sound and the suspenseful music was to express stereotypical aspects of horror trailers, as the sound sets the mood altogether, the sound effects of crackling with the CCTV is vital in attracting the audience just through sound.

The voiceovers, especially the ‘whats happening to her?!’ one, they give a dramatic reality to what the reaction to the strange events are and influence the audience to think about what is going to happen next and what actually is the cause of the events. My trailer is typical to the horror genre and to trailers as it gives little narrative away but still allows the audience to identify with the family and fear the girl.

The colour of the ‘Nightmare Endings’ and intertitles represents the simple colour use and are typical to horror, with mostly red, white and black being used.