Film Magazine Title Ideas

1. Daily Film - we liked this idea, but then realised we would not be publishing out film review magazine on a daily basis so may be misleading.
2. Monthly Film -  we thought of this idea as it made sense because our magazine is released monthly, however, we didn't think it was creative enough.
3. Love Cinema -  we decided to go with this idea as it was more creative, eye-catching and is clear that it is going to be a magazine about films. As our magazine is aimed at students, we thought this was a fun name for our magazine. It would also highly appeal to media students as we assume they too "love cinema".

Poster Idea 4

This is our 4th idea for our film poster, designed to show the contrast between the young child at the beginning of our film, to the depressed, drug addict at the end of our film. The film poster will portray a whole face, half being the younger girl and the other half being the elder. We have focused on the main character, who is female, as we are aiming with this particular poster to attract a more female audience. The main image reflects the plot of our film and the aging of children in British society.

When we create this film poster on professional software, we are going to make it look more like a poster for a thriller film. We will do this through dark backgrounds, scowling faces and gothic font. Even though are film has been designed to educate the audience and possibly be shown in schools or colleges, we decided to go for a more thriller themed poster as we believe this will attract a wider audience. 

This poster does not contain the names of our main actors as they are not well known and will have no effect on whether a person will want to see the film or not. To add to that, our short film is educational, and does not rely or need a A list cast. 

Poster Idea 3

For the poster I designed this image based on a suggestion by the group. The idea was to have the two actors of the main character on either side - younger on the left, older on the right. This way the poster could easily reflect the fact that it is a growing up story as well as giving the impression of a drama plot. The image is intended to be on a black background with the characters in low-key lighting. This will attract the viewer's attention towards the title first before the faces, as they will be slightly blended into the background. The poster does not use main actor crediting, since the actors are unknown and so would not attract the audience at all. The poster would most likely attract a female audience due to the focus on the main female character.

Poster Idea 2

The above image is a sketch of our second idea for the short film poster. This one is a still from the film itself; the last scene as this is the peak of the film therefore due to the fact that the posters we have chosen to be more thriller to grip the audience, this still seemed only fitting. Also, the darkness of it and sadness contrasts to the title which would intrigue the audience. We decided to aim the poster at females  which is why we decided to use the female character as the main image in this idea for a poster since females tend to relate to other females and would be more interested however another reason for using the female character is since she is the main one so it helps demonstrate the plot of the short film. The tag line above is in-correct as eventually we hope to use the tag line " we are our own poisoned apples" which links in well with the image used since the character is down, and looks almost destroyed. All this raises question for the audience: who is she? why is she alone? why is she a poisoned apple to herself? why does the title seem so happy and contradicting? all these would hook the audience and hopefully motivate them to watch the short film. The actor's names (technical code) are not displayed in this idea due to the fact it is a short film and the actor's are unknown therefore having them there would not make a difference to the audience. The lines underneath the "coming soon" represent the billing block where the actors will be mentioned in small as well as directors, writers, camera crew etc. 

Poster Idea 1

This was our first idea of our film poster, reflecting the educational side of our short film. It is designed to relay the message that drugs are never the answer. no matter what circumstance you are in. The image has not been taken from the film, it is a more bold, eye capturing image, that is very clearly designed to advise and educate.  The overall simplicity of the poster may not attract the wide range of audience that we had hoped, as it does not expose any information about the film itself, apart from that it is to do with drugs. After creating this rough poster, we asked ten 17/18 year old students would they potentially go and watch this film after seeing this poster on a side of a bus, or in a train station. It resulted in 8 out of the 10 students saying they would not want to see this film as the poster isn't very interesting, and it does not tell you anything about the film. The students also mentioned that the tagline, although got the message across, was not very snappy or inviting.

We soon realised this type of film poster was not going to attract the audience we wanted, and we would have the think up some more ideas.

Image Ideas for Poster

In order to create a unique and memorable film poster for our short film we must plan and think about the type of images we would like to use within the poster to portray the essence of the film as well as make it attractive. Due to our short film being quite a serious, educational film that should be impacting the audience, the film poster must do the same and show the contradiction between being an innocent young child to an older teenager in Britain.

Firstly, an idea would be to use a still from the film itself. The end of the film where the main character is slowly dying in front of her wall on the floor. This image would be effective as it contradicts the title of the film which will of course be on the poster as well. Also, this represents the film successfully since the film is about the change from innocence to the dark side which is shown through the title being fairly innocent and the image showing the opposite.

Another idea would be to do a face split in half representing the younger girl and the girl at an older age. A close up of both of their faces would be used to show emotion also and one half of the face would be the younger innocent girl, the other half the older darker girl. The close up would help as we can make sure to show the happiness in the younger girl's eyes and the tears and sadness in the girl as shes 18.

Film Magazine: Layout & Design Sketches

For the magazine I decided to use a simple design and consistent theming throughout. In all 3 page layouts the main image takes up around 1/3 of the page, supported by a smaller image. In the third design I decided to use a larger breakout box than the others so as to make up the space since the main image was also larger, and the additional use of a smaller image would use up too much space.

Throughout the design I decided to use the imagery of a film reel, something commonly associated with cinema, to theme the page. Since the reel design is simplistic and unobtrusive it helps avoid distracting the viewer from the main focus of the page, which is the writing.

Magazine Review article draft

When it comes to the magazine review article of our short film, as a group we must make sure to create drafts of the article and correct any mistakes making sure with the final product, it is of the highest quality and sounds professional.

Possible Introduction

"When I grow up, I want to be happy". Words that have been spoken by a young British girl dreaming about her fairy tale future; naive, innocent, bright. Little did such a character know that within a few short years of becoming a teenager, things would spiral downwards as short term happiness becomes the priority and long term consequences were completely forgotten. Sound familiar?

Since the article is aimed at students (mostly sixth form and lower university students) the introduction must hook readers in, in an intellectual manner immediately mentioning the film itself and getting to the point. As shown above within the first   couple sentences the plot of our short film is revealed without it being too obvious or over revealing for example a spoiler. The rhetorical question at the end of the introduction would aid to communicate with the readers more as they would feel personally addressed with the question helping them relate therefore more likely to watch our short film.

Main Paragraphs

These paragraphs must again be written in a formal manner however keeping in mind it is aimed at students who are possibly doing Media or Film studies. In order to make the article more engaging a quote of some sort should be used to add life for example from the director, or a member of the audience or some sort. Also, due to magazine reviews being a different company to the film production company it has to be unbiased therefore some realistic criticisms must be added to the article. 

Possible conclusion

The film leaves you wondering: in modern Britain can there be a "Happily Ever After?" 

The conclusion or ending paragraph being one simple sentence makes it effective and memorable. The incorporation of the title of the film within the rhetorical question asked again is an interesting way to engage readers to the last word.