Codes and conventions by tamirudd on emaze

Codes and Conventions of film trailers

By Tammy

All trailers are very different but tend to follow the same set of conventions.

Trailers are intended to attract viewers into watching the film. Trailers are screened at the cinema or usually found on YouTube. The most persuasive exhibition platform for a trailer is in - cinema exhibition because viewers are seeing the trailer in exactly the same conditions with the wide screen and Dolby Surround Sound that they will experience in the film itself. Equally the captive audience is likely to be tempted by the genre because the trailer will be screened with films of a similar genre .

Conventions

Film Titles

In every trailer, the film has the title included.

When someone is watching a trailer, the suspense is meant to be high, and it’s all about making someone wanting to watch it. So including the title at the end is essential. The titles of the films are usually themed with colours and text font to match with the whole trailer. With this Jurassic World trailer, the font and colour matches to the whole trailer. The old style writing and a dinosaur in the background obviously relate perfectly to a film all about dinosaurs. Whereas the Minions title is bright, happy and funny which matches with the movie trailer.

Film logos

The Logos of a production company always feature. They usually comes up at the beginning of the trailer. It is an institutional requirement to give credits and they always follow a particular order.

Name Credits

Every trailer will include name captions to show who produced the film, who directed it and some of the main actors names. The more important the actor, the higher up the billing. The directors and production companies also legally need to be shown in the trailer.

mixed media

This is where the trailer will take you to other social media sights that will further promote the film.

URL's are added to the trailer to take you to a specific social media site. (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram) This will then make the viewer more involved in the movie. If one person tweets about the movie more and more will hear about it as this is how viral marketing and social networking works. Hash tags and URL's will appear at the end or in the corner to attract people who have enjoyed the trailer to find out more.

Voice Overs and Music

Music is very important when making a trailer. It often shows the audience what kind of genre the film is, the budget, (so if you had a famous singer playing in the soundtrack you would know its going to be a expensive film) and the pace of the film. Some horror films will be clever and trick the audience with children's music or slow paced happy music, but this is often given away with the colours and content of the trailer that it's not a happy film!

Voice overs function in trailers to tell the audience what is actually happening. The voice over is often delivered by the most important actor in the film, the one whose view point the audience trusts.

Some trailers use dialogue with pull quotes from the film in order to carry forward the narrative by highlighting key moments in the drama