The 'Base' Of My Poster

(click image to enlarge)

Above is an annotation of the 'base' of my poster. I decided to make a layout of an image that I could then place a title, tagline,actors names etc on top of. By doing this I will be able to experiment with different layouts and fonts. I will also be able to alter the image itself - for example i could make add a sepia effect of put it in black and white. This is my first poster image that I think includes the conventions of of thriller posters, but I shall make another 'base' of a poster so that I can compare my ideas and decide on one that's appropriate.

Pictures Taken For My Poster

These are some of the pictures that I took for my poster. I wanted to play with light and colour (red) - so I used the headlights and reverse lights of a car to achieve this effect...

Further Developing Ideas For My Film Poster

The poster above is for the film 'Shutter Island' (M.Scorsese 2010) - however the poster is the Japanese version. I picked out elements of the poster that I liked that I may like to include in my own poster:

Section 1 - type writer style writing that looks subtle (rather than hugely standing out). Also gives the poster a more modern edge.

Section 2 - I like the way this section looks like a collage - in my own poster I'll take on a more modern version of this by having numerous images faded over others . However I'll give the images a grainy effect to create a contrast between 'old and new' (this will link to my trailer where I plan to include flashbacks edited to look 'old')

Section 3 - A white title against a dark background. I feel that for a thriller poster this black and white mix looks more striking and mysterious.

Ideas For My Film Poster

From my previous research into film posters for 'The Uninvited' and 'Brick' I noticed these conventions that I would like to include in my own poster:

• Strong contrast between light and dark -creates mystery and unease as there are strong shadows that contrast with soft (but bright) light areas...This is especially effective on faces as their identity then seems ambiguous.
• People -rather than having a main picture of the setting, the posters I looked at are focused on a figure. As I also looked at the trailers for the films the figures featured on the posters are main characters.
• Limited colour palette -although most of the posters I looked at included colour, the palette was very limited. For example one poster I looked at (for 'Brick') included just blue tones, whilst a poster for 'The Uninvited' had grey tones. I feel the lack of variation in colour makes the image featured more striking as the viewer isn’t distracted by a wide variation of colour.
• Mystery – the posters I looked at all had an element of mystery and ambiguity to them, through the use of shadow (that I described earlier) that may make the viewer question events in the film even before seeing it..
• Taglines, Comments & Ratings – the comments and ratings from newspapers or film magazines are usually in a light coloured font to contrast with the darker background. The tagline is usually below the title of the film, in a very small font so as not to draw attention away from the title.
• Grain of images – in most of the posters I looked at (plus posters from ‘Se7en’ (D.Fincher 1995) and ‘The Silence of The Lambs’ (J.Demmes 1991) the images are quite grainy rather than crisp and sharp which gives the impression of age or a memory. This then links to a common feature of psychological thrillers – the flashback.
  

I hope to incorporate these main conventions of psychological thriller film posters in my own poster. I’ll use close-ups of faces of the main characters (in my trailer) illuminated very dimly to create mystery and drama. I will experiment with different compositions and layouts for the images I use and the text to feature on it. I will experiment with incorporating different images for a more complex poster, and just using one image. After exploring different layouts I will decide on one poster that best represents and suits my film.