Website Development.

When designing my website, I began to play around and ended up creating my idea quite easily and simply, maintaining some of my original ideas and replacing others. As my project quickly became more solely based around a solo male protagonist, the original sketches of both girl and boy were discarded and I was left with posters and images that I would use as my default gallery for the home page. Here is some of my work:

I started off with a blank white page and tried to put on my semi-circle for the navbar, but it all looked too clean. So I cloned the background I used for the Butterfly posters giving a rough paper look onto the background. 

I began shaping up the images from the stencil I had created  through my sketches, with the navbar on the left and the image in a stip in the centre. 

I then added the title, text and slogan, as well as film credits at the bottom. Once finishing this basic home page design I sat back and analysed it. The colours worked well together, the subtle, dirty paper background gave a rustic and authentic feel to the page, and worked well with the light blue navbar, which was clear, easy to see and read and stood out well, without overpowering the image. I swapped the image with the other poster images from the trio I previously named 'Protagonist'.

My idea for this home page was to have a fixed background, but allow the single strip to constantly change picture going through all of my three creative poster schemes including 'Protagonist', 'Butterfly' and 'Text'. Here is an example of the transitions:

I was felt happy with this home page as it was clear, tidy, easy to navigate around and stylish. The gentle slideshow was easy to watch and not confusing. I felt as though with the homepage I had taken the pros of the Cosmopolitan website which I had liked but personalised it with my own ideas. At this point I felt I could add a bit more character to the design, possibly through filling in the white spaces, aligning the credits better at the bottom. 

I really like the use of the film awards from film festivals, which gives a better sense of how good the film is. I also added in the production company logos as they would never go missing on advertisements. 

Moving onto other pages, I began to make pages for About, Trailer, Cast & Crew and Gallery.

For the home page I used an increase in point size and indentation for the page name in the navbar to indicate it has been chosen. Then I created a black rectangle overlay and changed the opacity in order for the picture behind to still be faintly seen. I kept the 'Colour of Autumn' font for the heading but used a more formal font of 'cambria' for the content as its clearer and easier to read, and contrasts well with the recognisable font of the film. 

The rest of the pages all follow the same theme in terms of the page header in the navbar and also with the dark overlay on top of whatever picture is present underneath at whatever time. For the gallery (below) there was a smile rotation system. I decided to change to this in the gallery, rather than use the fade like on the home screen as I think it is more interactive and the user gets to flick through voluntarily, rather than simply watch.

Further, I created a small platform for a tablet view. Although I think the semi-circle navbar works well for the landscape views that are commonly found on laptops and computers, for tablets and phones a straight and fixed navbar appeared much more efficient and effective. Easy to access, and always see. 

Website Ideas.

Along with my poster designs, I had also created some early sketch ideas for my website. After some extensive research into existing products, I wanted to make sure that my website was easy to navigate on and that it was clear, that was key. I also wanted to make sure it was colourful and attractive. But not overwhelming. Here are some of my early ideas:

I initially sketched out this outline (above) as a basic stencil for my website; the semi-circle would provide a transparent space for a navigation bar, and the six square spaces would provide space for pictures that would change within each page. I began testing this stencil out by filling in the gaps.

I enjoyed playing with the different blocks as space for images. It reminded me of my original poster research into the genre of teen romance and teen drama through the posters of Garden State and (500) Days of Summer. I wondered if the semi-circle navbar would be distracting and if an overhead bar would be more appropriate so tested out both. I also worried that the fixed space would replicate the one-dimensional, boring style of the Cosmopolis website, so decided to test out new concepts.

I eventually began to draw up a coloured design of side navbar and middle picture, which would switch as the pages changed. I liked how it looked, it was simple and effective. But I concluded that it was too boring and lacked expression and adventure. I found it difficult to express my ideas through constant sketches and decided to play around with my imagination on photoshop.

Teaser Trailer

After shooting all my footage I spent the following day editing a six minute 'prologue' for the film, which simply shows the subject on a journey through Leicester from a quiet and idyllic spot, to his front door. The video has no dialogue, but simply is a combination of romantic camera work and a charming journey. Although there isn't so much to gather from this six minutes, I wanted to create something ambitious, random, and interesting. Something that is thought-provoking and leads onto the feature length film. I felt my short prologue did this, but it certainly wasn't a trailer, but more of an opening.

I encountered a major problem in exporting my video. Even after deleting enough files to make sufficient space, or moving the file through drop box to a university Mac computer to try, the file wouldn't export. I really feel as though the six minute opening has a humble and charming nature to it, even in its simplicity and silence. But I knew I had to create a real trailer, regardless. I began to re-edit on iMovie and made some drastic changes, the main one being in the backing track. In the first six minute film I used a track called Tiderays by a band called Volcano Choir, featuring the dulcet tones of Bon Iver (Justin Vernon). This track created a sullen tone for the flick, identifying the protagonist as thoughtful, lonely and somewhat down in the dumps. I decided I wanted to excite and maybe create an air of freedom and independence in the trailer, rather than encourage a feeling of negativity. I changed the track to Baba O'Reily by the famous and popular british band The Who, which changed the tone of the feature immensely, securing the expression of freedom and thirst for life that I was hoping for.

Here is my teaser trailer:

Those Who Wander Trailer from Alex Georgiades on Vimeo.

Social Media.

After checking off filming, photographing and poster design from the checklist, I began to investigate other means of marketing. I found that in contemporary film marketing, almost every film has either a twitter account or a Facebook page. I thought a Facebook page would be a great way to gain feedback on my work and to showcase and raise awareness for the film. So I created a page.

In this page I was able to post pictures of location, along with fake interviews with directors and actors and even post a teaser trailer. The page is so useful as, more so than a website, it is interactive with easy access to feedback through likes, sharing and comments. Furthermore, its on an already super-popular social site, where pages can be shared, and invited to and recommended, and is easily accessible anywhere. Here is some snaps from the page, which can be found at www.facebook.com/thosewhowandermovie 

Here are the pictures from the 'Location, Location, Location' folder on the page: