Creating Film Posters

  

The two images above are the posters that both Zach and I created in response to a task brief of creating our own film posters of varying different genres. We were required as part of the task to create a film poster fitting the Codes and Conventions of the "Romance" genre and separately another film poster depicting that of the Horror genre. We were given the same basic image to start with in assisting us with creating both of the images. In both of our constructed images we aimed to maintain a certain level of consistency by having the two posters share religious symbolism and connotations of crosses and a heavenly sky connoting religious attitudes. Indeed, the original image we were given to assist us in the creation of both of our posters was the base image of a set of crosses and two characters of  male and female characters. For our first poster image we created the poster image for fictitious romance film " 'TIll Death Do Us Part" with the male and female characters positioned in crucifix positions on the crosses in positions connoting self sacrifice, for the common aim of their undying love for one another. We used the religious connotations to our advantage in this task as we were aiming to symbolise the crosses as religious motifs and metaphors connoting the characters' union of love sealed through religious approval, highlighted through the use of the religious image of the crosses being used. Another indicator for the film identified in the poster as belonging to the Romance genre is hopefully signified through the title. The title ideally suggests romantic intentions as for most couples, and in stories mostly, true love can only be severed through the tragedy of death. Similarly, the crosses used in the poster also acted as a metaphor for death, referring to Christ's crucifixion on the cross as a symbol of death and passing.

On a separate, but not altogether removed, note the religious symbolism of the two crosses acted for an altogether different, far darker and grave purpose for our second film poster of a Horror poster. In stark and direct contrast to the Romance film poster that we created the row of crosses on our Horror poster depict a more sinister representation of death, attributed to gratuitous violence and extreme gore. This is additionally highlighted through the graphology of the poster which is of a more disfigured and warped position than when compared to the Romance poster. The title for our Horror film is "Stigmata", in deliberate reference to the act of Jesus being nailed to the cross at his crucifixion, or at least the marks that were supposedly left on his body in the aftermath of the crucifixion. We thought that this was an appropriate title owing to it's sinister religious connotations and reaffirmed to the audience the classification of the film belonging to that of the Horror genre, leaving potential viewers in little doubt as to the potentially disturbing, harmful and distressful content that would likely be contained within the film were it to be released in public exhibition and made into a full production.  Sticking to the Codes and Conventions further we ensured that billing and a release date was included on both of the posters to ensure this vital information was not missed by potential consumers of the film products.  

In conclusion, this task has taught me the fundamental differences associated with the various genres of film, knowing that spelling out the genre of the film is especially important to prospective audience members on a film poster. This can be achieved in a vast variety of ways such as positioning of the characters (foreground/background positioning), whether light or dark colours are used to portray a certain mood or atmosphere and the billing of actors or lack of them can help determine a film's genre through it's poster. However, primarily it will always be the main image that attracts the most attention and for this reason it is the main image that needs to connote the genre of the piece to the respective viewer. I feel this task has taught me a great deal about image manipulation on a poster and how it can easily change the mood and feel of an image. This is something I will consider when constructing my own film poster for my Ancillary Task.