Research into Editing

http://www.chrisjonesblog.com/2012/02/how-to-edit-a-trailer-for-your-movie%E2%80%A6-but-the-guy-who-cuts-trailers-for-movies.html

From this blog post from editor, Chris Jones, I learned that when I edit the trailer for our film I need to make sure that the story I want to tell is clear and that the trailer follows the journey of one character, if there are any well known actors then I should put some screen time on them in order to attract an audience more. I need to make sure I know how I would want an audience to feel when watching so that I can stick to that when I am editing the trailer, I also need to make sure that text graphics help with the theme or story of the trailer and they are not just there unneccesarily. Be very concise with clips and I need to make it so clips don't 'out stay their welcome', clips that I use in the trailer shouldn't be as long as they would be in the film; this aplies to dialogue as well, only have essential lines if any is used. Voice overs are also optional. A good length for our trailer would be between 90 seconds and 2 minutes, hollywood trailers are usually around 2 minutes 30 seconds, but many consider these too long and they contain too much information, so keep is short and concise. The music is one of the most important parts of the trailer and the wrong music can ruin the trailer, one of the pieces of advise that applies to our film most is that if we have a low budget and little to no money, use music libraries and find musicians that would want to build their portfolio and would want to write us a unique piece of music for our film. If I am unsure about the music then don't hesitate to change it and find one that I am sure about.

The article gave me lots of important points that will really help me to edit the trailer specifically and a lot of the points can be applied to low budget productions such as ours, this means I will have some good pointers to remember in order to make our trailer look professional and achieve the same feel and look of a professional product that would be seen alongside main stream trailers.

From this video I learned that the trailer can be broken up into three sections in order to make the trailer easier to work through and easier to understand for people to watch. The first section will contain dialogue and set up the story and everything that will happen next in the trailer, there usually isn't any action as the scenes that are used show us the characters equilibrium. The second section is where all the action happens and its filled with interesting clips in order to interest a viewer and to show the main character's journey towards his goal, the pace in the middle will be very quick and there will be lots of cuts and sound effects, this layout is similar to how the film will actually play out. The last section is a clip that is slightly longer that will lead into you main title instead of just having it come in randomly, this can be a clip of high intensity or mystery and it has to be edited in such a way that fits the genre of the film before showing the titles and any other information that needs to be shown.Having one last clip of action at the end can be a good way to finish the trailer but is not something that was in the Taken 2 trailer but is something I see in lots of other trailers in all kinds of genres.

Music is also something that is very important and can be used in order to spark the viewer's interest. I learned that I shouldn't just use music that is constantly loud or built up, or use music that just keeps building constantly. I need to use music that spikes in places and then builds up and has lots of ups and downs as this will keep the viewer "on their toes" and this of course will make the trailer a lot more interesting to watch. I also need to edit the music to fit what I want from the trailer and not edit to the music.

Another video that I found on YouTube gave me a few key points to remember while editing which will make me take more time while editing and make sure that what I am doing looks good and fits what I am trying to create. The first point that was brought up was the pace and the tempo of what I am editing, I need to make sure that the trailer is the correct pace at the correct time, if it is too slow people will lose interest but if it is too fast people won't know what is going on and will become confused. The next point is to use the right take, make sure I use the take that gets the emotion and acting the trailer needs. This is much easier in a trailer as I can combine cuts from multiple takes in order to create the effect and the scene that I want as only small parts of a scene will be used at any one time. The third point doesn't really apply to me directly but I can take the point that I will need a large quantity of clips in order to be able to construct my trailer the way that our group envisions it, rather than having not enough footage and having the pace be way too slow for our genre. Again, the fourth point of multiple audio sources isn't really applicable to me but I will need to make sure that I have the right audio for my trailer as it is very important in creating mood and emotion for the viewer and it really helps to create an interest in the film being presented. The last point is the most important point, I am the last person that will control how the film looks, anyone else's mistakes i can fix and point out in the edit, but any of my errors will show up in the final product and can spoil the look of the trailer and there is no one to check my work after I'm done. This means I need to check my work multiple times before I render out the trailer and before I submit it to get feedback from the class.

This video from 4:30 has lots of good points about editing that I can use in my work in order to make the shots that have been given to me to use look more professional, all the editing tips are given for the software Adobe After Effects, which is the software I use. The first point is using an effect called Warp Stabilizer in order to smooth out the footage and remove any shakiness that is caused because a lack of equipment. It can give the look of a steady cam and and can the footage look a lot more professional, it can also completely immobilize footage so that it looks like it was shot on a tripod rather than handheld, just in case there was an error while filming and a tripod should have been used. The next point that was brought up was using a colour grade in order to bring out the emotion and mood that I want from a scene and this can be applied to my trailer. Two ways are mentioned in the video, RGB Curves and three-way colour grade, this both allow ways in order to colour grade the footage in order to show the mood visually, these plug ins are ones I can consider but I have a much more advanced plug in called Magic Bullet Looks, which gives me a much wider range of adjustments that I can make to the footage. Finally, I need to change the aspect ratio of the video that is produced, DSLRs shoot in a 16:9 ratio, but Hollywood productions usually use a 2.35:1 ratio. This can't be done using the camera settings so in post-production I can add black bars to the top and bottom of the footage (also know as letter boxing) in order to make the footage look more professional and just like the video you see in big budget films. All of these things can combine to make our footage look much more professional and this video gave me all the effects and tips that I need in order to achieve the look that is talked about in this video.

Research into Front Covers

Research into Similar Teaser Trailers - Taken 2 (Editing Timeline)

Research into Posters



Research into Similar Teaser Trailers - Taken 2

Taken 2 - International Trailer (2012):

The trailer starts by showing a cut down version of the distribution companies logo. It is cut down to keep the trailer fast paced and so that the editor can get a lot of action and story into the two minute running time of the trailer and immediately gives the audience a chance to see the pace of the trailer. There is a subtle boom sound at the start of the trailer as the logo appears setting the tone for the kind of music and audio we will hear throughout the trailer which gives me a better understanding of the genre of the film.

An establishing shot of the location that will be used for some of the film next to be shown in the trailer and there is no audio at this point just silence. The shot is also a long shot of a gathering of people at a graveyard and it cuts closer to this in the next shot, it cuts on another, louder, boom sound to show how sinister the people that are about to be shown are. We see a group of people at what we presume to be a funeral for multiple people as there are multiple coffin shaped holes in the ground. There is no audio other than the booms at this point, apart from soil rustling while there is a close up of a hand picking up some dirt. This very minimal use of sound puts the audience of the trailer on edge and makes them interested as to what is going to happen and makes them want to continue to watch the trailer.

We then see a medium shot of the figure who picked up the dirt and is holding it is his hand; a voice over who we presume is from this character starts to play in the background and starts with the line, "He slaughtered our men". We don't know if he is the protagonist or the antagonist yet, but the shot is filmed with the sun behind him so he is silhouetted and you can barely see his face, the antagonist of the film would likely be filmed in this way.

We then see flashbacks of how these people died, we know they are flashbacks because of the style of editing. The clips are over exposed and have a white glow to them which is a convention of a flashback; we know these clips are probable from the first film because this is a squeal. In the flashbacks there are fight scenes and gunshots and loud booms go along with the conventional audio we would expect to hear in a fight such as gunshots and punching sounds. Three loud booms and three clips are shown before it cuts to black and the audio of the loud booms continues to fade out. The voice over stops once the flashback starts to play.

After a couple flashback clips and loud boom sounds every time there is a cut, we see a black screen and then a very short clip of the people at the funeral fades in and we hear the voice over once again as the character talks about who was lost, "our brothers". We get that one very short piece of voice over before the trailer cuts back to another set of flashbacks and fades back to the people at the funeral from a black screen, this repeats three times.

On the final set of flashbacks we get a close up to the enemy of the characters that are talking, as this is a squeal we know that this is meant to be the protagonist of the film but he is portrayed as the antagonist at the start of this trailer. There is a slight jump cut as well as the framing gets much tighter on his face, flashes and hand held looking camera work is used to make him look more menacing and like he is the true antagonist.

We then get a final establishing shot from what seems to be a helicopter flying past the funeral. The editor cuts to a close up of the character that has been speaking this entire time as he says "We will have our revenge!", which gives a motive for the film and sets quite a lot of the main story line and the aims for this set of characters. We see a shot from inside one of the graves as this main character throws the dirt that he picked up right at the start of the trailer, as the dirt lands it cuts to black and we hear a large boom sound.

The first text graphic of the trailer then appears as the text "THIS YEAR" fades in and slowly gets larger in scale as it seems to move towards the screen. The text fades in from a black screen starting from the middle of the text, the fade seems to wipe vertically towards the top and bottom of the text, but then fades out over the top of the next clip in the trailer. The text lasts on screen for around three and a half seconds.

An establishing shot of where we presume the main body of the film will take place is then shown which seems to be a coastal town as the shot seems to filmed from a helicopter as it flies over the town. Music starts to play with very high pitched guitar as the most noticeable sound which is very menacing and makes the thriller genre apparent to us as we watch the trailer.

We then see the character that was portrayed as the antagonist and we see that he has a family and we see that he is in fact the protagonist of the film because of his light hearted nature and family man status. Medium shots are used and medium close ups in order to get the emotions of the characters to show that the main character is not as menacing as what he was just portrayed to be at the start of the trailer.

While we can still hear the dialogue from the conversation between the main character and his family we see a close up of someone reading a newspaper and a medium shot of a man sitting drinking a coffee, it is shot from an observers point of view and creates this idea of mystery to who they are. A sense of danger is also created as he resembles the men that can be seen at the funeral, the editor cuts to more shots just like this of similar men; we know they are trying to get revenge on him so this contradicts this feeling of safety with his family.

This introduction to the main characters to the film makes them out to be the protagonists of the film and this main character, that was talked about in such a negative way at the funeral, can be seen to be a family man and not as brutal and heartless as we first thought. It cuts to this shot of them hugging with a loud drum beat in the background, which is used to mark shots of significance.

The last shot fades out and a close up of a blacked out car fades in, the fade in/out is used to show the change from the protagonist to the antagonist on screen. The blacked out car is very mysterious and dark which usually is linked to the antagonist as black is not conventionally a happy colour. Then there is a jump cut to it further away but shot from the same place as the last clip, as if an observer is filming this car go past but cuts out the part in the middle when it turns the corner and starts to go up the hill. The same very mysterious melody is playing in the background as the very loud guitar riff overpowers the rest of the music and is the main thing we can hear which really sets the tone.

Another loud drum sound can be heard but a lot louder and a much harder hit this time as we get a three shot of these silhouettes walking, the editor puts the clip in slow motion so that the shot is much more powerful and makes the main antagonists seem much more powerful and threatening. The clip fades out again so we know that we are about to see the protagonist and his family as the trailer follows patterns throughout so that the viewer can follow and understand it easier while still keep the mysterious feel to the trailer.

As the next shot fades in the dialogue "Welcome to Istanbul" can be heard from the main character as we start to see a medium close up of him as he says his line. The editor then cuts to a couple shots of the rest of the family in the hotel room as they say how "beautiful" the city is. The daughter of the protagonist opens the window and we get another establishing shot from the point of view of the actress.

The final part of this introduction to the characters and the setting of the film is how the editor shows clips of the family together on their holiday and more establishing shots of the city in order to back the point that he is the protagonist in this film and this he is a family man and is very loving and caring and not the monster he was originally made out to be. There are lots of quick cuts and some of the most important shots are signified with the loud drum beat which starts to become more regularly as the trailer progresses towards the point where they are all in danger. The last shot of this introduction to the characters, which is a bird's eye view shot of a monument in Istanbul, fades out to show how atmosphere change and the change of location back to the hotel; also, the return of the antagonists in the next shot means that again a fade has to be used to keep the patterns going.

Next we get the start of the main plot in the film as we see what we now know to be the antagonists of the film on the phone saying the line "He's here." as if they are observing him. We also see a shot of the observers holding and looking at a photo of our main character. The editor cuts between multiple shots of our main character and the antagonists observing him, all of the camera angles are either from an observer's point of view, the camera is never close to the actor; the pace in which the shots happen starts to pick up a little as we get towards the action and large drum beat sounds continue to be heard as the editor cuts between the clips.

Then we get to see the first conflict between the protagonists and the antagonists and the tension in the trailer starts to build as we see the characters in a Mexican stand off and the editor cuts around the scene using different shots to build this tension. A high pitched whine can be heard fading in and starting to get louder at this point which does also build the tension. The guitar riff that stood out during the start of the trailer starts to disappear as the whining sound starts to come in and this shows the change in mood to the trailer. There is a cut away from the action as we see the main antagonist on the phone saying "I want all three of them. Alive.", which reveals their intentions to us to kid nap them. Once his line is done there is a loud boom sound again and it cuts back to the stand off.

Then we get told more about the plot as the characters are still in a mexican stand off and the main protagonist calls his daughter and tells her that her mother is going to be taken. Some parallel editing is used as the editor cuts to a shot of the daughter on the phone as she listens to her father and you see how her emotion changes from happy to shocked. Then there are some loud boom sounds as we see clips of the mother being put into a van, there are lots of jump cuts on the beat of these sounds and on the last clip it cuts to black.

The editor then fades in and we see the protagonist in close up as he tells his daughter that people are going to come for her too. She asks the question "What are you going to do?" which sets up the main protagonists epic one liner later on that is a convention of action/thriller trailers. The next couple seconds are taken up with lots of loud drum beat sounds as we see a man with a gun walking through a room and then this daughter character climbs out of a window and allow the edge of a very tall building as she tries to escape. The use of these sound effects and editing style is to build tension and to put me as a viewer on edge and extracting these emotions from me and giving me this small insight into the plot really makes me interested and engage with the trailer more.

There is then a cut to black and all audio seems to stop as well, the editor then fades back to the close up of our protagonist on the phone and we hear the main line of the trailer which is really meant to grab our attention. We hear the dialogue "What I do best!", which at first is an enigma but then the music starts to fade back in and the editor starts to cut to some action clips.

The action starts with a couple clips of how the protagonist escapes from the situation he was in, the overall screen of each clip drops significantly now as there are about 2 or 3 clips per second and the editing is very faced paced as we see these fighting clips. The audio has a lot more drum beat sounds and the clips are cut as a drum beat sound can be heard and as someone is punched or hit and a sound effect for that can be heard too.

Next we get multiple clips of a shoot out to show that guns will play a big role in the film, this section of the trailer is just about showing the action and the multiple aspects of action that will be important to the film. Again, there are lots of drum beat sounds and lots of quick cuts but this time there are gunshots instead of fighting sound effects. The gunshot scene lasts a little longer that the fighting action but that's because the editor allows time for the viewer to understand the scenario and what is going on. The antagonist falling through the middle of the building while firing his gun is added in to really interest and wow the viewer of the trailer as the purpose of a trailer is to get people to watch the film and so by adding this extreme violence and action, people will be more interested.

While this action is taking place, the editor creates an enigma in order to get me thinking and he does this by showing the mother with the bag that was put on her head earlier on being removed in a dark room and then our main antagonist appears from a doorway in the same room. This gets us thinking as to where the mother could have been taken, again the action is cut quickly to keep the pace of the trailer but these clips are slightly slower as they are much more important to the plot. Just in case we weren't asking ourselves this question after seeing those clips, the editor cuts to a couple of much fast clips of our protagonist in a close quarters fight/gun fight with one of the antagonists and we hear the dialogue "where is she?" which again gets me thinking and more involved with the trailer. At this point it is clear that our protagonist is the privileged character as he has the most screen time throughout this trailer.

These gun shot clips end with a man reloading a shotgun, this clip is used to show just how dangerous these antagonists are and how powerful they are, which makes us much more interested as to what happens. This is because we only see from the trailer a family man who seems to be able to fight well as a protagonist and he is up against this high fire power, large numbers group who seem to also be well trained, so I am intrigued to see what kind of situations he get into in the film. This clips is also used as a setup for the next couple clips as this guy is preparing to chase the daughter of the protagonist, which is shown in the next couple clips.

The action slows for a couple seconds as we start to get slightly longer clips again as the editing slows but is still very fast paced. At this point the editor has cut to a long shot of the daughter running along the rooftops of Istanbul being chased by two antagonists, which again continues with this part of the trailer as we are being shown some of the most exciting points. There are no drum beat sounds around these couple shots but this high pitched whine starts to build which usually indicates that something big or epic is about to happen in action/thriller trailers. After this first long shot the editor cuts to a shot just behind the daughter as she begins to jump, we don't really get a sense of scale until the shot after, which is shot on street level, as we see her very high up jumping through the air between buildings. This leap of faith is again something which is a convention of action/thriller trailers and is used to put the audience on edge and to make their emotions go wild again so that they become attached to the trailer again and want to see the protagonists succeed with their objective.

The use of cars is introduced to us in the trailer as the editor cuts to a clip of a car doing a handbrake turn and the cinematographer arcs the camera around the car as it is sliding. It is meant to show more of the action that is in the film and the range of props that were used in order to make the film in order to raise the viewer of the trailers interest so that they go and watch the film. The use of guns and this involvement with cars and the protagonist is made clear to us as the editor cuts to a medium shot of the main character of the film with his gun pointed out the window of the car just after it has spun. To end this sequence of taxi clips we see shot that is composed with his gun close up in the left side of the screen and our protagonist in a medium shot in the right  side of the screen, the shot cuts as the muzzle flash and gunshots go off; the sound of an explosion can start to be heard also.

The fast paced action sequence section of the trailer ends with and exploding car being pushed along the train tracks by a train. There are lots of loud explosion sound effects that can be heard alongside the music which at this point has reached its climax and its very loud with lots of high pitched noises as it reaches it pinnacle. The editor shows multiple angles of the train explodes to place the viewer of the train within that situation and make their immersion in the trailer a much more real experience. The shots of the train glitches to black as the audio stops and starts and visuals cut into and out from black rapidly before eventually cutting to black and the audio becomes very quiet and fades out on a black screen.

After about 2 to 3 seconds the next shot is faded in slowly by the editor and we see the daughter of the protagonist down on her knees as one of the henchmen of this group that have kidnapped her mother is pointing a gun at her. There is no audio apart from the slight sound of the music from the action part of the trailer still fading out. we also see another shot from in front of her that is slightly arcing around her again as we can see that she is begging and pleading with him, the shot is put in to show her emotion and to build up our emotional attachment with her early on, before the film's release. Both shots that are shown are in slow motion to make them much more dramatic and to make them have a much larger impact on us and the lack of audio supports this.

The next and only other text graphic during the main body of the trailer is then shown which shows the main actor's name is large bold lettering. The text fades in and while it is fading in it starts of which lots of blur covering the letters but then as the letters are almost completely faded in the blur starts to disappear much quicker until the text is completely visible and readable. There is a loud drum, beat sound effect again when the text starts to appear on the screen to make it have much more of an impact. While the text is on screen the text slowly becomes smaller, the shrinking happens much faster while the text is fading in but then becomes very slow at the point where I am actually reading it. The text graphic fades out while another shot fades in.

The shot that fades in while the text fades out is a shot of the actor whose name has just appeared on screen so we can put the name to a face, which is a convention of film trailers to do that. The clip that is shown does not give me a complete view of the actor as he is silhouetted but it gives me enough of a view to see that Liam Neeson is playing the protagonist of the film. Slow motion again is used again, with subtlety, to make the clip have much more of an impact and the screen time of the clips have increased greatly over the action section of the trailer so I get much more time to take in what is happening in each shot. The shot fades out and there is still no audio while this shot is showing.

Next, the editor shows the rivalry between the protagonist and the antagonist by fading in to a close up of the main villain talking to Neeson's character on the phone. He uses the line "You have 13 minutes" showing that this is all a game to him and that 13 is meant to be considered an unlucky number for most, which shows how powerful and bad he is as he can joke about like this and has all this time to leave his much time. Neeson counters this however with his line "This is not a game" and we see a similar shot of Neeson as he is also on the phone. However, the antagonist is sitting in a comfy chair on the phone whereas Neeson is all dirtied up running through some tunnels which shows their difference in position. Both characters start to have equal screen time during this rivalry stage to show how they are both as powerful as each other. The high pitched whine that was playing earlier in the trailer starts to build up again but this time it is on its own with no other music playing.

Another large drum beat sound can be heard over the top of the whining and another establishing shot is cut in once the drum beat hits. The establishing shot is used as it uses artistic camerawork and a very interesting colour palette, which keeps drawing my attention in because audiences all have a natural attraction to beautiful locations and so it is used by the editor to keep the attention of the viewer the entire way through the trailer.

The establishing shot fades out as another shot of the antagonist fades in, this time he is standing up and again is on the phone but is framed in a long shot so that we can see all his body movements. The whining sound is still there but becomes quieter so that the dialogue from Neeson's character playing over the top can be heard saying, "I'll finish this thing" which in itself its quite epic and tough and is used to build interest; but again, it is used to setup another one liner that can be used to build the protagonists tough image up. Not audio from this shot of the antagonist can be heard, only the whine and the dialogue.

Another fade transition is used by the editor as it reflects the slow pace of the trailer at this point. We see the shot of Neeson's character as he is saying the line that can be heard in the previous shot, he is in the same location as the last time he was on screen but this time the shot is shown to build up his character's tough persona. We hear the dialogue "You'll just have to die", which again is supposed to be one of his tough lines, which was also used earlier on in the trailer. Alongside building up his persona the editor continues to build up this rivalry and show of power between the two characters, as we see the antagonist's riches but the protagonist's will and strength to find his wife.

Briefly we get lots of action clips that are cut together using gunshot sound effects and more drum beat sound effects that signal when a cut is happening. In this short sequence we see lots of killing as this final theme of death is introduced in Neeson's last line that we hear and this theme is visualized for us. This section is again used to draw in the viewer's attention one last time before the trailer ends and the use of an artistic close-up of the bullets as they hit the ground is an effective way of doing this and it has a much larger impact on the viewer as we see this slow motioned close up of this killer. Plus the use of an interesting shot, one that is completely different from anything we've seen before sparks our interest immediately as a viewer and so makes us much more involved with the trailer and in turn makes us want to go and watch the full length feature when it is released.

The final live action clip that is seen in the trailer is a shot of the protagonist walking through a set of double doors that he slowly opens and walks through. This shot has a much longer screen time than any other clip as it is used in order to build suspense and show that the trailer is for a thriller/action film. This sense that the film is also a thriller is backed up by the audio as a whining sound can be heard slowly getting louder as he opens the doors and walks through more and more. Suddenly the editor cuts to black and cuts out all audio and leaves us on a black screen, which again is something that is seen as a convention for thriller or even horror trailers in order to build suspense so it fits with the genre of the film that it is portraying.

A rumbling sound can be heard as the main title of the film transitions in so that I know what to get a ticket to go and see when I go to the cinema next. The style of transition that is used is very similar to a thriller and action film as the style of text is very grimey and almost has these war torn qualities about it. Each letter of the word "TAKEN" fades in randomly, they don't fade with any order also they are all blurred when they start to fade and become clearer once the letter is nearly done fading in just like the two other text graphics that appeared on screen earlier, they also share the same font. One last similarity and property that the title shares with other text graphics is that the text starts of large and then gets a lot smaller while the text is fading in but then goes much slower once the text i readable. The "2" behind this text transitions in just the same as the other text but does not change in size at all and there are obvious differences such as the use of the colour red, which is a common thriller and action colour due to the violence and bloodshed. The title fades out together with no special sound effects.

The same rumbling sound effect can be heard again and this time all the information about the film appears. This involves the date of the release, the actors/actresses, the director, the film's website and the production companies with their copyright ownership statement.The graphic appears suddenly as the audio of the rumbling sound is heard and there is no animations for the text other than the words "Coming Soon" in the middle of the screen which gets smaller over time just like the other text. All the graphics still share the same font.

While the rumbling sound is fading out three text graphics appear on screen quickly one after the other that run through who produced the film, directed it, distributed it, the main actor, produced it and wrote it. This is a convention for film trailers to at the end give some graphics that have a very short screen time that, for legal reasons usually, show the main people and companies involved with the production of the film. The font is still the same and on the last graphic the website for the film and the copyright information with the logos for the production/distribution companies are shown again in the same layout as in the last screenshot.

The very last thing that we see in the trailer is the copyright information for the distributor of the film, Twentieth Century Fox. The text cuts in and out and is placed quite small in the middle of the screen, also, this text graphic does not have the same font as the rest of the trailer, it has the font that is conventional for that company to use for their brand and not the brand of the film.