These are the storyboards for our film trailer. We have deviated slightly from the original plans, when we were filming, as we felt certain things worked better using a different angle or shot type.
Tuesday, 13 October 2009
Wednesday, 7 October 2009
Action Film Conventions and Iconography
Given its physical nature this genre lends itself to action rather than extensive dialogue. Over the years action films have dominated the box office with many blockbusters which brought in millions of pounds to its directors and producers. There is a broad age range which action film directors will target and they tend to be aimed at a more male audience. This can be explained by male teenagers and their love of action films as they can escape from normal life and elude restrictions that adults put upon them but on the other hand, older people like watching action films like James Bond etc because they can enter a fantastical world where anything is possible. One of the reasons they were aimed at men is because the women were shown as objects of attraction like in the James Bond series. The James Bond series now replicates changes in social attitudes with women now entering a more intelligent role. Also women are fast becoming the people with the power in films such as the lead character in Lara Croft in Tomb Raider (2001)and Elektra (2005) which will open up the action film genre to a whole new female audience. The reason they are unique is because instead of men doing all the fighting and all the action sequences, as in normal action films, these women break the mould by being central to any action involved in their respective films.
The contemporary action film encompasses these certain aspects somewhere in the film: car chases, fast cuts, fist fights and elaborate action sequences.
Conventions you will probably find in any action film of any era are:
Time ticking down
A race to kill/save somebody
Love interest
Blood
Close ups
High emotion moments
Car chases
And a general fast paced feel throughout
Missions to be accomplished/ trials to be endured.
Action films can also include characters such as a maverick cop Dirty Harry released in 1971, and now some action films are starting to have a sci fi element to them Day After Tomorrow (2004) and War Of The Worlds (2005).
Action Films have certain iconography included in the films of that genre.
Gadgets - James Bond Films, Mission Impossible III (2006), The Hitman (1991).
Guns and various weaponry - A Man Apart (2003), Children Of Men (2006), Wanted (2008).
Fast Cars - Fast & Furious (2009), Bond Films, Taxi 2 (2000).
Explosions - Rambo: First Blood (1982), The Bourne Ultimatum (2007), Man On Fire (2004).
The contemporary action film encompasses these certain aspects somewhere in the film: car chases, fast cuts, fist fights and elaborate action sequences.
Conventions you will probably find in any action film of any era are:
Time ticking down
A race to kill/save somebody
Love interest
Blood
Close ups
High emotion moments
Car chases
And a general fast paced feel throughout
Missions to be accomplished/ trials to be endured.
Action films can also include characters such as a maverick cop Dirty Harry released in 1971, and now some action films are starting to have a sci fi element to them Day After Tomorrow (2004) and War Of The Worlds (2005).
Action Films have certain iconography included in the films of that genre.
Gadgets - James Bond Films, Mission Impossible III (2006), The Hitman (1991).
Guns and various weaponry - A Man Apart (2003), Children Of Men (2006), Wanted (2008).
Fast Cars - Fast & Furious (2009), Bond Films, Taxi 2 (2000).
Explosions - Rambo: First Blood (1982), The Bourne Ultimatum (2007), Man On Fire (2004).
Sound Research
After looking at lots of action trailers it was clear that sound plays a major part in creating atmosphere and in emphasising the action. For example in Gamer (released in 2009) the sounds compliments the action throughout. When the titles come up on screen at the start of the trailer, a lot of non diegetic sound can be heard on top of the action, for example thudding and crashing noises, to emphasise the writing on screen. After the titles there is a lull in the sound then the soundtrack kicks in which runs through most of the trailer. In parts of the trailer the music fades so the audience can concentrate on whats happening on screen and then the music will pick up again as the action continues. On the top of the music when necessary a deep stereotypical voice over starts and the music plays quietly in the background while the narrator speaks.
Inglorious Basterds starts with a non diegetic soundtrack playing softly in the background while the diegetic speech can be heard. Sounds effects then compliment the writing on screen as well. When the action picks up later in the trailer the music picks up also as the drums and guitars get louder to compliment the action.
As it was apparent from watching these trailers and many more that sound was key to making a successful trailer. We knew that any music in our trailer would have to be copyright free music so we looked on the Internet to see what options we had. First of all we looked on http://www.royaltyfreemusic.com/. There were a few songs of interest including Final Goal. The problem with that song was the sponsors kept saying their name over the top of the song every 5 seconds so that track was not an option. It quickly became apparent that this was the case on all song from this website so we decided to try a different website. We then decided to look at http://www.soundzabound.com/. This website had better quality songs than the previous website but after reading a bit into the terms and conditions of the website we found out that you would have to pay for the music which we felt wasn't necessary. Some of the songs we found that initially interested us on that website were titled Surge and Hard Slam.
The next website we tried was called http://www.freeplaymusic.com/. This was by far the best website we had tried and we checked that we didn't have to pay for these tracks. The first song we found was called Bouncing. But after all of the group had heard it we decided it wouldn't be suitable for our film. The next three we found were exactly what we were looking for. These were titled Eliminator, Mugshot and Apocalypse. After listening to some more songs from that website we only found one more of interest and that was called Only Human. We then listened to each song as a group and decided which bits from each track would song good in our trailer. We thought that the first 24 seconds of Mugshot was a really nice fast paced rock intro. Other sections of Mugshot we particularly liked was a section in the middle from 37-50 seconds and then from 1.26 to 1.50. The ending of Mugshot from 2.27 till the end we think would sound excellent at the end of any action film trailer.
The next song Eliminator also has a start that we particularly like so we chose 0-8 seconds as a good section of the song. Other parts of the song we liked was 8-26 seconds and then 1.31 till 1.55 seconds. We also noted down 2.15 as around there there is a good part to the song.
The third song we chose bits from is Apocalypse. This song has good bit from the start to 24 seconds. Then we liked 24-36, 36-1.00 and finally 1.10 till 2.00. Mugshot, Eliminator and Apocalypse are all quite heavy rock song so we felt we needed another song to counterbalance all the rock music and that is when we found the song Only Human. It's a slow song that is key to building tension and suspense in our trailer. What we liked about Only Human is the start to the song. Another song we discovered while looking at slow songs is On The Trigger. We especially liked the opening 40 seconds of that song.
Once we have made our trailer we may find that these songs don't fit but at the moment we feel the tracks we have chosen will fit our action film trailer.
Inglorious Basterds starts with a non diegetic soundtrack playing softly in the background while the diegetic speech can be heard. Sounds effects then compliment the writing on screen as well. When the action picks up later in the trailer the music picks up also as the drums and guitars get louder to compliment the action.
As it was apparent from watching these trailers and many more that sound was key to making a successful trailer. We knew that any music in our trailer would have to be copyright free music so we looked on the Internet to see what options we had. First of all we looked on http://www.royaltyfreemusic.com/. There were a few songs of interest including Final Goal. The problem with that song was the sponsors kept saying their name over the top of the song every 5 seconds so that track was not an option. It quickly became apparent that this was the case on all song from this website so we decided to try a different website. We then decided to look at http://www.soundzabound.com/. This website had better quality songs than the previous website but after reading a bit into the terms and conditions of the website we found out that you would have to pay for the music which we felt wasn't necessary. Some of the songs we found that initially interested us on that website were titled Surge and Hard Slam.
The next website we tried was called http://www.freeplaymusic.com/. This was by far the best website we had tried and we checked that we didn't have to pay for these tracks. The first song we found was called Bouncing. But after all of the group had heard it we decided it wouldn't be suitable for our film. The next three we found were exactly what we were looking for. These were titled Eliminator, Mugshot and Apocalypse. After listening to some more songs from that website we only found one more of interest and that was called Only Human. We then listened to each song as a group and decided which bits from each track would song good in our trailer. We thought that the first 24 seconds of Mugshot was a really nice fast paced rock intro. Other sections of Mugshot we particularly liked was a section in the middle from 37-50 seconds and then from 1.26 to 1.50. The ending of Mugshot from 2.27 till the end we think would sound excellent at the end of any action film trailer.
The next song Eliminator also has a start that we particularly like so we chose 0-8 seconds as a good section of the song. Other parts of the song we liked was 8-26 seconds and then 1.31 till 1.55 seconds. We also noted down 2.15 as around there there is a good part to the song.
The third song we chose bits from is Apocalypse. This song has good bit from the start to 24 seconds. Then we liked 24-36, 36-1.00 and finally 1.10 till 2.00. Mugshot, Eliminator and Apocalypse are all quite heavy rock song so we felt we needed another song to counterbalance all the rock music and that is when we found the song Only Human. It's a slow song that is key to building tension and suspense in our trailer. What we liked about Only Human is the start to the song. Another song we discovered while looking at slow songs is On The Trigger. We especially liked the opening 40 seconds of that song.
Once we have made our trailer we may find that these songs don't fit but at the moment we feel the tracks we have chosen will fit our action film trailer.
History Of Action Trailers & Technical Analysis
The action genre really became popular around the 1970s. One of the first action trailers was Dirty Harry which was made in 1971. It differs greatly from the action trailers of today because it has very long clips of up to 45 seconds when modern action film trailers have clips that lasts no more than 10-20 seconds. Modern film trailers can have upwards of 50 scenes in one trailer whereas the Dirty Harry trailer has just 5 different scenes. The sound in the film trailer is mostly diegetic which is also different to action film trailers nowadays as they use lots of non diegetic sounds. One of the main features of the Dirty Harry trailer is that they keep mentioning the main star Clint Eastwood, this is to make people go and see the film. The problem of this trailer is that it reveals too much of the films plot, the reason i feel for this is that in the 70's they couldn't add complex special effects to the film so they rely on showing more of the conversational action rather than explosions etc.
Still in the next decade the action film trailers of the time didn't develop too much. For example the 1983 film Scarface which introduces the main character Antonio Montana in a similar way to how Dirty Harry introduces Clint Eastwood. This is also to draw attention to the fact that the film has a star playing its main character. Yet again the trailer has a slow build up of dialogue filled scenes which in truth tend to drag on slightly. A fair bit of plot information is given away but not as much as there was given away in Dirty Harry. The beginning of what we would call modern action film trailers began with the film Die Hard made in 1989. This has a huge amount of the trailer being just action which is a lot different to Scarface which was made just 6 years earlier. Another difference Die Hard has to Scarface is the fact that they don't try to plug the actor over the film they just let the action speak for itself.
A film that really uses a lot of modern action film trailer genre conventions is Transporter 3. This film was made in 2008 and the trailer builds up slowly until it bursts into life with lots of action throughout benefiting from a wealth of special effects. This also uses a lot of non diegetic sound as they now have techniques which make the adding of sound from outside the film appear seamless.
Overall i think the main differences in the film trailers we have looked at is that modern trailers benefit from lots of special effects and film producing techniques which the older trailers could not have benefited from.
Technical analysis
The first trailer I studied in detail was Gamer. The trailer lasts 2min 31secs and includes 46 different scenes with 140 different shots. This gives an average of 3 shots per scene. It includes certain action film iconography like explosions and guns/weaponry. Also a fast motorbike is shown as a pose to a fast car seen in many action films.
I also studied the Dirty Harry trailer in detail. The trailer lasts 1min 52secs and includes 19 different scenes. There are 71 different shots included in this film. That is an average of 4 shots per scene. The examples of action film iconography used in the trailer are guns and cars crashing into buildings.
The next trailer i studied was the James Bond film Casino Royale.
Still in the next decade the action film trailers of the time didn't develop too much. For example the 1983 film Scarface which introduces the main character Antonio Montana in a similar way to how Dirty Harry introduces Clint Eastwood. This is also to draw attention to the fact that the film has a star playing its main character. Yet again the trailer has a slow build up of dialogue filled scenes which in truth tend to drag on slightly. A fair bit of plot information is given away but not as much as there was given away in Dirty Harry. The beginning of what we would call modern action film trailers began with the film Die Hard made in 1989. This has a huge amount of the trailer being just action which is a lot different to Scarface which was made just 6 years earlier. Another difference Die Hard has to Scarface is the fact that they don't try to plug the actor over the film they just let the action speak for itself.
A film that really uses a lot of modern action film trailer genre conventions is Transporter 3. This film was made in 2008 and the trailer builds up slowly until it bursts into life with lots of action throughout benefiting from a wealth of special effects. This also uses a lot of non diegetic sound as they now have techniques which make the adding of sound from outside the film appear seamless.
Overall i think the main differences in the film trailers we have looked at is that modern trailers benefit from lots of special effects and film producing techniques which the older trailers could not have benefited from.
Technical analysis
The first trailer I studied in detail was Gamer. The trailer lasts 2min 31secs and includes 46 different scenes with 140 different shots. This gives an average of 3 shots per scene. It includes certain action film iconography like explosions and guns/weaponry. Also a fast motorbike is shown as a pose to a fast car seen in many action films.
I also studied the Dirty Harry trailer in detail. The trailer lasts 1min 52secs and includes 19 different scenes. There are 71 different shots included in this film. That is an average of 4 shots per scene. The examples of action film iconography used in the trailer are guns and cars crashing into buildings.
The next trailer i studied was the James Bond film Casino Royale.
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