Major Project: Double Exposure Promotions & Website

Between the Fine Cut and Final Cut of the film, I decided to create a simplistic promotional website for Double Exposure to give it more of a professional feel and to provide an easy and accessible place to watch a sneak peak of the film, the whole film, find out information, and get in contact without production group. Also during this time, our group made the decision that I would recreate our promotional poster that had been previously created by our hired promotions person, as we were not entirely happy with the result and had only a small time frame to change this. Meaning that by the time he would have updated it and sent it back to us, it would be too late by our submission deadline. So I recreated the visuals of our poster, and our DOP added all of the logos and required details to the end result.

Website & YouTube

Having used Wix.com previously to create my pre-production unit package and my own current portfolio website, I chose to create the website through this engine in order to create it quickly and with a high quality look. I also created a professional email for Double Exposure (doubleexposurefilm@gmail.com) for anyone that would be interested in contacting us, along with a YouTube channel for us to upload our 3 minute extract, trailer, and eventually final film. A screenshot of the YouTube page can be seen below...

Our YouTube page can be found HERE

Website 'Home' Page

Using the previously created Double Exposure logo and selected fonts of 'Pistara' and 'Stark', I decided to keep the home page relatively simplistic. Featuring the film title, cast, month and year of release, 3 minute 'sneak peak' clip that had previously been decided on by our group, and menu bar, I wanted the home page to have most of the key information along with a sample of the film, without overloading it with too much information.

I stuck to the overall slick branding that our promotional material and film's visuals have (such as opening and closing credits), using mostly monotone colours, sharp lines for separating text and our two specific fonts across the whole website.

Below is a completed first draft of the website's home page with a template background in editing mode...

And here is the finalised home page with the 3 minute extract video below...

'About' Page

Keeping to the key information of the film, this section consists of the fact that Double Exposure is a psychological thriller short film, a very brief description of the plot without giving anything away, our production group credits and the UCA credit, along with a link to the 'Watch the Film' page. I think that by including basic information and only our production group's credits, it ensures that the 'About' page doesn't provide too much information and bore the reader, but still gives them a feel for the film.

I also felt that this page was an appropriate area to include the completed promotional poster and a number of film stills to liven up the website (3 of which were the decided submission stills). I think that by adding these images the film comes to life on the page before even viewing it. Here are two screenshots of the finalised page...

'Watch the Film' Page

As agreed with the rest of my group, I will add an online copy of the film to this page after our course screening has taken place on the 25th of May, as this acts as a premiere for the film. This page will then simply consist of the video available for viewing, but for the time being, this page consists of a traditional 'Coming Soon' message, as can be seen below...

'Contact' Page

As a more fundamental page, this simply consists of our film's email address and a contact form linked to this address so that anyone interested in our production can contact us. I think that this page gives the website a useful purpose of networking as well as simply promoting the film.

Finished Website

Although the website will only be completely finished once the film is added to it after the screening, I think it looks very polished and retains the overall themes of Double Exposure, as well as acting as a useful way to promote the film and make our production team available for contact.

The website address is below...

www.doubleexposurefilm.wixsite.com/2017

The website is also useable through mobile devices, as can be seen in a preview below...

Making it extremely easy to access and navigate. I will also be adding this link to the film's credits as an easy way for the audience to learn that the film has it's own website, and as a group we will be sharing the website, film and promotional materials on social networks to further promote the film. I think the addition of this website gives the whole project an even more professional feel and slick, modern look.

Promotional Poster

As a group, we felt that our promotional materials creator had overdone the 'double exposure' effect on our poster - blending hillside trees with our two main cast members - although impressive, he overused the effect of the trees and gave the impression of a mystical/fantasy genre as opposed to the actual themes of the film, along with the finalised image becoming too unusual to look at. With only a week left to create a new poster, we had too little time left to rely on someone outside of our group, so our DOP and I took on the responsibilities of the poster.

Using an early photoshop file that the creator had made to test blending a hillside image (the same location as where Emily takes photos in the film) with the two cast members, I worked from this as a template. By making colour corrections, tidying and blending the edges of the image, and adding a low opacity image of the house location for further reference to the film, I was able to fine tune the photoshop file and give a much more simplistic but effective double exposure appearance that suited our film.

After this, I used his previously created background (a cloud-like pale image) and added my new image over this. I then added white and grey gradients to the poster to give it extra shading and available space for text to be later added. Below is my finished poster before our DOP worked on it...

And here is the finished poster once our DOP added our group-decided text and logos...

Poster Result

I think that the end result of the poster appears very professional and eye-catching, with a large amount of visual context and locations explored through using the double exposure effect over the cast members' image. I also think that by being able to keep to the plan of the poster using double exposure to represent the title and photography aspect of the film, the poster is in-keeping with the film's themes and highly represents it's content. Lastly, I'm very happy with the overall aesthetics as I think the colours of the couple's image stands out amongst the monotone text and background, while still being suited within the poster.

The last reason why I feel that the poster appears to be very professional is our DOP's addition of the text and logos, using the film academy style for our group's credits, the UCA TV Production official logo, our production logo, film title logo and official fonts for the cast's credits, I think that they fit with industry-standard posters, provide key information on the film, and give it a finished, slick look.

Promotions Critical Reflection

Overall, although my role within the film is the Editor, I feel that it made sense for me to create and edit promotional material aspects of Double Exposure, as I feel that I have a keen eye for post-production visuals, I thoroughly enjoy creating promotional images and websites, and I think it's important for our group to work on any and all areas that are required to make the best possible film.