WEBSITE: Adding Social Networking Icons etc

WEBSITE: Adding Social Networking Icons etc

On our website and as a another convention, I added social networking links for our audience and website viewers to have the option of 'sharing' our film promotion. These icon links are very important because social networking as previously mentioned is a running theme for our film and in every promotional aspect e.g. our poster and our website, its vital the audience knows this.

(Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr, Blogger icons featured on the homepage)

Upon saving the website layout, it was time to name the site before publishing it e.g. wix.com/alternetmovie

The website is slowly coming together and attention to detail is important e.g. the bottom left shows the coypright title e.g. 2013 MEDIAINTERNET3

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WEBSITE- Adding Features

WEBSITE: Embedding Trailer/Pages/Movie Rating etc

When actually embedding our completed trailer onto our website, using the 'ADD' icon, one of the editing tools, I pasted the YouTube URL for our trailer and chose the option of allowing the video to play upon immediate opening of our webpage (on the homepage).

Next, I added made-up critics quotes and movie rating stars for our film as not only is it a convention of film websites but it again, adds to the credibility of the film for the target audience. (The text colour, blue and white, I decided in order to match the blue facebook banner and the rest of the text of the navigation buttons)

(Adding the blue navigation texts for the different pages)

On the website, I made three other pages aside from the homepage, this screenshot just the 'synopsis' page with a little background detail of the plot but what I want to point out is how the webpage background is the same for all the pages.

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WEBSITE: Layout/Background

WEBSITE: Layout/Background

Once I selected the website background, I proceeded to erasing the pre-set features of the template and used the icons on the left to navigate around the editing options e.g. selecting a new image as the background, similarly placed. Our website background we decided to keep black and plain because not only is it subtle but suitable for the 'feel' and running theme we are trying to create for our poster etc.  Understandably I realise that black used in this respect would typically be used for a horror movie perhaps and indeed we are making a 'psychological drama', so I think black can also be associated with 'mystery' and even the 'unknown'. These are definitely themes linked to the character and plot surrounding our character Matt.

For the background aside from the colour, I placed this rather close-up and focused image of our main protagonist, Matt. We chose this image because it is prominent and attention-grabbing, and we thought it was also quite eerie, in the sense that Matt is looking directly at the audience, direct eye contact. The image has been edited to create an effect, to make Matt appear almost isolated and the dark surroundings along with his solemn facial expression ties into this effect well.

(Adding the background Image)

Continuing to replace the pre-set features, I then added the movie logo/banner which we intended to emulate a 'Facebook' banner but instead it says 'alternet' our movie title and in the searchbar it says our movie slogan 'become your fantasy' (which is echoed in our trailer).

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WEBSITE: Using Wix (Initial Stages)

WEBSITE: Wix.com/alternetmovie


In considering production for our movie website, we have decided to use and sign up for an account on the very user-friendly and easy website maker 'Wix.com'.

'Wix (Windows Installer XML) is a free softwarre toolset that builds Windows Installer packages from an XML document'

Firstly, using our group pre-set login details used for our blog and YouTube page, I signed up for the Wix website and set out to make our website by selecting the category and primary purpose on our website e.g. The website can be classes under 'Entertainment' more specifically 'film'.

The next step is selecting a template amongst the options Wix has and that is suited to the ideas we already have as a group as to what our website will look like. Keeping in line with our drafts and movie theme e.g. internet and Facebook, we were straight away drawn to the Facebook layouts. Unfortunately, upon playing around  and trying to edit each of the 'Facebook' templates listed above, I realised the actual 'Facebook' logo and banner was not included or allowed to be featured on the actual website once published.

So instead of settling for any of the Facebook templates, I decided to pick any other template and manually edit the layout to how we initial wanted and as close as possible to the drafts we made.

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FILM TITLE: The meaning

ALTERNET: The meaning 

(Inital movie logo-movie title)

As a group, we decided that our movie title will be 'ALTERNET'. We came to this decision as we believe the title is unique and suitable for the nature of some of the themes we explore through our plot and movie itself.

ALTERNET is a word we coined ourself and it is a fusion between the words 'Alter' and 'Internet'. 

'Alter' deriving from late latin 'alterare' meaning 'other'. Dictionary.com defines 'alter' as 'to change, adjust or modifiy for a better fit' and in respect to our movie plot, 'alter' refers to the character of Matt desiring to almost change himself and his relationship with Jacob to a more intimate level but through a fake identity. This fake identity is posed as Matt's 'alter ego' (late latin meaning 'other I').

'Internet' deriving from the 1970's, is a universal term obviously referring to the 'global computer network providing a platform for information, communication methods'; most especially social networking which we are focusing on. The internet and how our characters utilise it, is such a big part of our equilibrium and disequilibrium and because its the main theme and we would like our audience to know that straight away, it make sense for us to try incorporate it into the movie title.

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EDITING- text

The final choice for our text that we would use throughout the trailer was very simplistic. We decided to use a simple format for the texts throughout the trailer because the actual edits done to our clips tended to be quite extravagant. To keep the trailer looking not over done we chose this font and effect.

THE EFFECT

The effect we used in the actual transitions was one called 'feature.' We chose this because of the subtlety it offered and also it suited our teaser trailer well because the clips were often quite exaggerated compared to the texts inputted. This effect was inspired by the Hard Candy text effects within its trailer. The story line of both Hard Candy and Alternet are quite twisted and being psychological dramas, the way the text subverts the extravagance of the trailers it makes it even more effective because of the simplicity of the texts. The fading away in our actual transition could even enforce the idea of loss of identity, because of the way the letters gradually vanish once they appear. This could represent our main protagonist and his loss of identity via the web.

THE TYPOGRAPHY

The typography that we chose for our texts was an ordinary non cursive style called [FIND NAME OF FONT AND GET PRINT SCREEN THEN ELABORATE SHAHNAZ BABESSS DON'T FORGET YOU SEXY CREATURE... sorry getting a bit carried away]

THE TIMINGS

Some of the texts with a longer sentence would be harder to read in such a short space of time, the one minute allowed for our overall trailer. So in order for our longer texts to stay for a longer duration so our audience had  more time to read them, the clip of the said texts had to be dissected into 3 parts, and the first and last cutting would be made shorter, but the middle clip would be made longer, so that the actual sentence, once it appeared, would stay on the screen for a longer period of time. This eventually made our trailer a lot more audience conscious fulfilling their satisfaction.

This effect and font used in the teaser trailer were all found on Final Cut Pro. These text were then added to our iMovie saved trailer by exporting the file.

EDITING- special effects

THE 'GLITCH'

The glitches you can see in the trailer when having introduced the names of our actors was added in to add something slightly more special so that it stood out and also made the trailer conform to the stereotypes of a psychological drama being quite harrowing as the intensity of the stares increases the 'fear factor.' 

This was achieved by firstly making the clip very short, so it was made to be 0.5 seconds. It was necessary to make the clip appear to be more 'smooth' and high in quality, so the effect of 'cartoon' was added which made the image appear slightly more softer. This was done by selecting the 'cartoon' effect and dragging it onto the clip.

Then to create the shaking effect the 'earthquake' effect had to be added, this was done in the same way as demonstrated in the paragraph above. This effect made the glitch move side to side slightly more to emphasise the glitch more so that it did not look like bad quality filming naturally.

This was then completed by adding the 'bad T.V' effect

THE 'PRISM' EFFECT

This effect was added to make the image seem in some way quite distorted but in a subtle way, to suggest how the protagonist seems normal to his friend but then there is something off key about him. This effect was found on Final Cut Pro. It was simply done by opening and cutting the clip on Final Cut Pro and adding the effect actually called 'prism' onto it by dragging it. This was then saved as a separate movie and then imported onto iMovie. This effect merely highlighted the outlines of the main elements in the clip, and this added a slight touch of oddity in the appearance of the clip.

FLASHING PENCIL EFFECT

This effect was made on Final Cut Pro and was done just to make the trailer more fast paced to add to the disoriented illusion we were trying to create. The quickness of the clip and the fastness adds to the nature and convention of a teaser trailer being short, so in this we were successful in meeting a teaser trailer's typical convention. Doing this followed the same procedure of dragging the effect onto the clip. Also this clip was added to create almost a small bridge before the clip that came after it as it was quite long, so by introducing those jump cuts with this small, snappy clip made the trailer flow a lot more visually.

TRAILER- final feedback

The final form of feedback we obtained was via Facebook. In order to obtain optimum audience feedback to ensure our trailer was not only popular but had also met peoples' expectations, the trailer was posted onto Facebook. This was connected to our video which was connected to YouTube. By using convergence it was very easy to make our trailer gain more popularity. Posting it on Facebook was a success as our views have/are increasing. By doing this, it was also a sort of assurance from the initial audience feedback we received, so we needed to make sure the trailer lived up to their expectations.

This image shows the likes and comments we received once we posted the trailer.

This image shows the likes and comments we received on YouTube for our trailer. The number of views are also displayed.

Mise en Scene - Artwork

After looking at the survey results and seeing there was a high vote that we include drawings of Jacob done by Matt, we included this as mise en scene for several scenes within our trailer.

I painted/drew from several photos of ‘Jacob’ (Shammael) and left one unfinished for some of the footage, so we could show ‘Matt’ at work on them if we wished to include this.

I later finished all of them and made copies so we could include shots of ‘Matt’ ripping them up to portray strong emotion such as anger for part of our disequilibrium.

EDITING- sound

There were sounds that were needed in our trailer which we included and these steps are demonstrated in the screen grabs below.

SOUND EFFECTS

We decided that the first clip of our trailer would be in silence, with only the sound of the clicking being heard for dramatic effect. So we did this by muting the actual clip, and then going on 'Sounds and Music' and searched for a clicking sound to ensure that it would sound crisp with no interference.

The screen grab above shows the two clicking sounds put into the trailer. We made them especially loud so that they could be loud and so that our audience would be able to hear this properly so that it makes the impact it needs to.

GETTING THE 'DROP' RIGHT

Our selection of music has the perfect silence we searched for which then is followed by the beat dropping into an intense instrumental. When assembling the clips, it was then necessary to make the beat drop exactly where the disequilibrium starts. This was successful though it was quite difficult getting the beat to drop exactly where it needed to, but this was eventually achieved. Once we had clipped all of our clips and then added the texts, at the start of the song on the timeline it was possible to open up the 'clip trimmer' for the sound on a drop down menu in the top left hand corner on the little white cog sign on the actual music. This enabled us to be able to adjust the drop to match the trailer.

MAKING THE MUSIC FADE

So the music ends on a not too abrupt stop it was essential to make the song fade towards the end. For the last clip (not including the 'coming soon' text clip following our final clip) we made the music fade by dragging a small white bead backwards which made the grooves of music rounded meaning that the last clip faded in sound and eventually came to a stop. This made it have an overall smoother sound making it sound professional, additionally.

COMPANY LOGO

The 'Revolver' company logo is introduced with a sort of subtle low 'whooshing' sound. This was done so that the music that followed the logo introduction did not just start without any backing whatsoever. This was achieved by inserting the company logo but then muting it and going onto the music sign icon on iMovie to find a dramatic but subtle enough sound to accompany the clip. This also is a feature of any kind of trailer, so we used a reputable film British film company logo in our own teaser trailer.

EDITING- the use of Final Cut Pro

It is noticeable that in the screen grabs that were taken of the editing process included images from Final Cut Pro. This software was used to add any special effects so it would make our trailer prominent and exciting to watch. This was a simple process as is illustrated below:

1. We imported the clip onto Final Cut Pro to begin with and then selected the edits we wanted

2. It was then necessary to press Command+E so that the file could then be shared. We gave the lone movie, that it would turn into, a name.

3. Then this clip was saved into our area as a movie on its own.

4.Subsequently, we would revert back to iMovie and then select 'import files'

5. We would open the file on iMovie and this would work as a clip on its own, ready to be used in the trailer.