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Titanic

The film poster clearly shows the two main characters and the so called ‘unsinkable’ ship largely on the cover. The two contrasting each other shows there will be some conflict between both.

Spectre

Having a full body shot of Daniel Craig aka. James Bond presents him as the main character and the gun shows there will be violence and action informing us of the genre of the film just by the front cover.

Star Wars

The way the poster only shows half the character shows potential mystery and power. The unknowing causes you to be intrigued and want to know what will happen next.

Black Swan

The huge black swan with a women’s delicate position in the middle with red stripes on the wings tells you there is fatality as the red means blood and they way she is captured as falling also giving you more suspicion.

Twighlight

The three main characters at the top are captured close up and the villains and their army are in a smaller shot beneath them showing how they have less power leading you to believe there is a reason as to why that is. The colours are quite dark meaning it could potentially be an ominous movie.

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Euphoria	The clear sign is a close up of the main actress. It has some sort of galaxy/trippy filter to it, giving off the idea that she is hallucinating, which could be a major part to the plot. The logo of the streaming platform it is found on is clearly shown at the top of the page. The signifier (title) ‘Euphoria’ tells the audience what the movie is going to be about. The tears are an iconic sign as it provides extra information about the show.
Jumanji	The sign in this poster is the group standing in some sort of cave. The way in which they are smaller than the background tells us that they are less significant than the forest, suggesting that they are to conquer it. The movie title ‘Jumanji’ is the main signifier as it tells you what it will be about. The jungle vines are an iconic sign as they allow the audience to gain extra knowledge about the movie.
Palm Springs	The sign in this movie poster is the two main characters in a pool. The way in which the pool is never ending, connoting that it has a lot to do with the meaning of the movie. The main signifier ‘Palm Springs’ suggests that a key part of the movie will be set in or about Palm Springs, allowing the reader to have a clearer understanding of it. The blow up pool rings are iconic signs as it has links to a part in the film and is giving the audience extra information.
The Story of Castlerock	The sign is a close up shot of the main character with grey/eerie makeup and hair, denoting that it is a horror movie. The title ‘The story of castlerock’ is a signifier as it allows the audience to have an understanding of what it will be about. Having the thing on the girl’s forehead alludes to the fact that it has a key part of the movie, which is an iconic sign.
Dora and The Lost City of Gold	The sign in this is the main character standing back to the camera to show off her bag. This denotes to the fact that her bag and the monkey has some significance to the plot. The main signifier in this movie poster is the title as it alludes to what may happen in the film. The iconic sign in this movie poster is the monkey and the backpack. This is because it links to the story/plot and gives off extra information about it.

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Hunger Games: This poster contains Katniss alone in the centre of the poster aiming her bow towards whoever is looking at it, behind her is the mockingjay symbol – a symbolic sign for Katniss. Katniss aiming her bow signifies aggression towards someone or something – that she is ready to kill if needed.

Baby Driver: This poster is very minimalistic, it contains a gun “shooting” a car that is driving away. The gun and car are symbolic signs for what the plot of the film is. This poster is quite radical due to its minimalistic design, something not commonly seen in film posters.

Bohemian Rhapsody: This poster contains Freddy Mercury alone on the left side of the poster

Ferdinand De Saussure promoted the idea of ‘semiology’ in Course in General Linguistics (1915): he saw language as a cultural creation, rather than something innate; a social system
governed by a set of identifiable rules/codes.

Saussure coined the term ‘semiology’: ‘a science which studies the life of signs at the heart of social life’.

Dr Sassuer would say this poster is a sign, as it made of the two layers/key components; the signifier (the printed poster itself/physical existence) and something signified (the idea that this is a scarier more thrilling film compared to others, elaborated on with the use of comparisons.)

Some arbitrary/symbolic signs used in this poster are the run down walls and chickened floor- to which we could associate to run down clown scenery, further amplified in the fact the clown would usually be a symbolic sound of happiness and children however looking deeper into it and analysing the poster we can infer that it is an indexical sign to death (blood on gloves) and horror. Lots of red/dark tones to represent blood and shadows- associated with darkness and fear.

Some symbolic signs are the rosary and the nun both representing the religion of Christianity, however indexical signs are more apparent in this poster; light at the end of the corridor has strong connotations to either freedom, or death (light at the end of the tunnel.) The rosary and nun can also be an indexical sign to combat or opposing forces as it seems like the rosary is being used as a protection against the nun/spirit. Once again the majority of this poster is deep and dark tones with some blue- connoting the sadness and darkness showing the audience how deep the story will dive.

This poster takes advantage of indexical signs quite a lot and thrives off of us trying to analyse it instead of it being given to us in the forms of symbolic signs, for example a beehive represents bees, worker bees, but looking deeper into it- beehives are all function around the leader- the queen bee, we can now make the observation that a beehive connotes to/is an indexical sign to a cult which works in a similar way (the title of series 7). The lady also could be seen as brainless- natural way of life replaced by a bee/cult like lifestyle. Her skin is washed down and pale and the only form of colour on her face is red, red is an indexical sign to danger, love, anger, or death (blood) we can suggests that a lot of these categories will be included in this season while the white skin also doubles as a way to show how brainwashed the character is. The syntagm of signs working together to produce a cult idea is finalised by the anchorage title “cult”

Another poster for the series above which cleverly acts in the same way that the season 7 poster did- relying on indexical symbols to incise viewers and make them engage the curiosity into watching the series. The indexical symbol or connotation of white shows purity which also links in with the symbolic sign of a nun which represents purity or religion, this is harshly juxtaposed against the leaking black ink coming from the eyes, eyes have a connotation or indexical sign as to being the windows of the soul, therefore this harsh dark liquid compared to the purity of the nun could represent the purity of the nun becoming corrupted from the soul, corruption of the soul could also infer to possession or demonic ideas- which also links in with the nun theme and the plot of the season which involves possession.

The language of moving image suggests that there is a grammar or convention or set of rules. It deals with the aesthetic concepts of shape and size.

One of the most important camera tools in a movie is focus and depth of field. The focus is used to direct the audience’s eyes and prioritise the elements in a shot to present certain information.

Editing:

process of putting together/ stitching different shits and pieces

But the key question is WHEN TO EDIT ie when is it best to move from one shot to another? The answer is usually found in the following list:

1. EDIT ON ACTION
2. EDIT ON A MATCHING SHAPE, COLOUR, THEME
3. EDIT ON A LOOK, A GLANCE, EYELINE
4. EDIT ON A SOUND BRIDGE
5. EDIT ON A CHANGE OF SHOT SIZE
6. EDIT ON A CHANGE OF SHOT CAMERA POSITION (+30′)

Shot Sequencing 1: Parallel Editing

The use of sequential editing (editing one clip to another) allows for a number of key concepts to be produced:

parallel editing: two events editing together – so that they may be happening at the same time, or not?

flashback / flash-forward – allowing time to shift

Shot Sequencing 3: Invisible Editing / Continuity Editing

Continuity editing can be seen as the opposite of montage editing as the main aim is to create a sense of realism or ‘believability’ known as verisimilitude and has it’s own structure of rules where shots are edited together at particular times or on particular shots, as previously highlighted above.

Shot sequencing 4: Shot progression

Conventional shot progression – to create VERISIMILITUDE (ie realism, believability) usually involves the following shots (although not always in the same order).

establishing shot / ES, moving to

wide shot / WS,

to medium shot / MS,

to close up / CU,

to big close up / BCU;

and then back out again

Shot Sequencing 5: Shot / Reverse Shot

The Shot / Reverse Shot a really good starting point for students to both think about and produce moving image products. The basic sequence runs from a wide angle master shot that is at a 90′ angle to (usually) two characters. This sets up the visual space and allows the film-maker to to then shoot separate close-ups, that if connected through an eye-line match are able to give the impression that they are opposite each other talking. The shots are usually over the shoulder.