One other initial thing we done was search for 'royalty free dramatic trailer music' as music is conventional of trailers, so we went on Youtube and looked through lots of different tracks, only two of which stood out. We first found a track that was sad and slow-paced which was good for the beginning of the trailer in terms of conventions and content. And then we found a more epic and dramatic track which was promising because we clearly imagined how the video will match it, like in parts when the music pauses for Haden to say 'find them' and the climatic end. Here's the music we found:
Just like last year we used Premiere Elements 9 on the PC, but it brought us problems straight away. On the software, when it came to importing and sourcing files on we were confronted with technical problems each time which took around 30 minutes of the lesson just to overcome, leaving us with minimal editing achieved. Eventually the computer began to not cooperate to meet our pace, often switched itself off randomly and sometimes the software would close without saving. This was a major issue and we realised quite early on how we needed to transfer to a different one. We moved to the Apple Mac which actually had Premiere Elements 11 and ran much more smoothly. Despite having already starting editing on the PC, we decided it would be better in the long run to start over on the Mac, as it couldn't open the saves made on the PC anyway.
We began with the introduction of the trailer, this included the 'goodnight mum' and disappearances. We also included the new production logo and used the 'epic and dramatic' music to help cut shots to coexist with each other. In explaining the more abstract disappearance shots, we included copy to instantly establish the plot 'all of the adults' 'gone' which was separated with both disappearance shots for effect. To make it more interesting, we looked through different transition for the copy. And because we had the footage, we edited the chase scene together, with some 'dip to black' dissolves between them to make it seem less scene like and more likes snippets from the chase.
Although we had done four shoots, we needed the rest piece it together. So we came back to it in January after filming at my house and the beach. Using the story boards to help us create structure on the timeline, we split the trailer up into parts: context, adults gone/realising change, establishing shots, result of event/group identities, mid-trailer climax ('find them'/chase), themes/imagery, cliff hanger climax beach battle. We realised that the second soundtrack didn't fit with video to create a dramatic and quick enough pace, even with manipulating it with time stretch it didn't work. We even considered using our AS music choices but we all knew that was a dead end! We wanted to get it done soon so we stayed back after college many nights and Iain volunteered to look for other music in replacement.
We changed the use of the beach/pier walk of Michael and Eve, placing them before the establishing shots as they were slow and fixed. I suggested that we include a voiceover on these shots, since the audio was unusable on the actual shots. I thought Lizzie would sound best, even though now I think it should have been Michael instead to show him as more of the protagonist because it places the audience more in the mind of Eve. To help cross from the event to the after effects, we decided the speech to be 'with the adults gone, everything was different...' as it would intrigue the viewers more. This took about 10 attempts using Iain;s phone to record her, and we thought the first one sounded most natural. I thought having a black screen for the 'everything was different' part would be effective because it encourages the viewers to entirely focus on those words, making it sound more meaningful and emotional. We then ensured a pause was evident so the viewer has time to think, right before the establishing shots disrupted it.
To reflect the how unexpected the event was we selected music that buzzed loudly several times, one for each establishing shot. This drastically changed the tone and pace of the trailer which we thought was effective. We decided what shots to use, and I think only two were changed because we gathered extra shots of locations. We didn't use a forest or town location but we added the street and beach ones. Lizzie scooped the music for this right at the beginning of planning in June, here's what song it's from: see 36 seconds, not the song.
Going back to our music issue, Iain found some different tracks, and personally I didn't like them as much but we still gave them a try. On the morning Lizzie had a class so Iain and I tested it out but I was more focused on making the other one work. But then I had a class and Lizzie came in to edit and she tried the new tracks With Iain and they realised one actually fits well enough. I took some convincing still because I thought the tones just changed too much in too little time, and the third track in the trailer started off really quiet and slow with a low pitch piano. Here's the track:
As a Hollywood styled company, it's conventional to use orchestral music in apocalyptic genre film trailers. But obviously we don't have that, so we thought it was best to seek some that are from real trailers/film soundtracks, as all the royalty free music we found didn't satisfy what we were looking for. Also, from listening to this you can recognise how our version is different and shorter because we edited it a lot in order to correspond with the visuals.
After applying the soundtrack and just focusing on the video, they thought that it didn't make much sense an then they realised copy was missing in order to communicate the story. They added 'with no authority' 'people will change' 'friends become enemies' and 'secrets aren't safe' (referring to the folder). And so when I arrived back we needed one more copy and I suggested 'no where to hide' as that tied to the chase scene and other shots of Michael in the house peeping through the window, and Even and her brother running in their home and hiding in the dark room with a match. This wasn't reflected in our storyboards as we agreed to decided what the copy should say during editing. We also applied further copy that we did plan, one word copy that raised key themes in the plot, leading to the climax. The use of copy was extremely helpful in establishing structure and pinning trailer conventions.
We then complete the climax beach battle, using many of my improvised fighting shots, ensuring a quick pace. But the main focus was between Eve and Selene, and then Michael and Haden. We had to dub Clare's dialogue due to the ambiant sound interfering with the microphone at the beach. And just as planned we added the slow motion time lapse to the slamming of Michael which was on crafted to be on time with the music for a maximised effect. We made sure the music was reflective of the visual throughout as it's conventional and it make something appear much better and powerful. We did plan to have a countdown at the very end too, reinforcing the theme of time, and displaying an element used within The Hunger Games trailer cliff hanger. We found a sci-fi female voice and a more evil sounding male one, we were uncertain about both. But after trying this we had to scrap the idea because it really seemed like too much. Here's the countdown voiceover videos and dubbing video:
Next we added the title at the end, still matching the music, we included a slow revealing of the title 'TIME'. We decided to make the font different from the one we chose for copy to stand out more and kind of match the font on our poster and magazine cover for synergy. The institution details were added at the end to include more conventions and so was a trailer certificate at the beginning.
Lizzie and Iain decided the trailer would look better without the 'goodnight mum' introduction, despite some people agreeing. I thought it was kind of important and structurally conventional, but it adds to the enigma of a trailer in retrospect. We agreed that we will rely on audience feedback to see how well people understood the plot without the intro scene. We didn't use it after all because people understood the narrative.
We then spent some time adding filters, and manually changing the colour corrections of some shots, like when Eves mother is in the kitchen I said the lighting was way too high key and ambient due to daylight to represent any sadness or loss, so we dimmed it down. In reflection, I don't think you can actually tell that we changed exposures on shots, it still looked normal.
