Research Into Horror Posters

The visual and written code used in this poster is the sword and the mask. This shows that the man is trying to hide his appearances and at the same time trying to protect himself – this is a cliché horror film, which relates to audience, which tends to be young people.
The name ‘Friday The 13th’ is a type iconography because instinctively when you see the name you know it’s a horror movie.
A catching slogan to describe the film more would be ideal in this poster, as most horror film poster tend to have this. This could be a way to go against typical horror clichés .This poster creates enigma through the mask as the man is full covered up and we do not now who or what he is. The phrase ‘Welcome to Crystal Lake’ makes you wonder what goes on in crystal lake and why the man is there – this is another sense of enigma
The film producers are trying to create a sense of danger and equilibrium by showing a man in the middle of a forest with a mask and a weapon in his hands, this creates a sense of fantasy in which you wouldn’t see in real life.
You can instinctively tell that this film belongs to a horror genre, this is shown through the iconography of the masked man and the setting around him.

The visual written code used in this poster is woods on the poster. This shows that it is set in a misty place and also the written codes on the poster gives an insight into the storyline and what to expect , rather than having to guess for yourself.The poster provides more information than a normal poster would or should provide. This poster has a picture, title all the normal things a poster should have. However it does have a contain a mini synopsis which most films do not have, this could make the poster stand out more.
I would have expected to see a release date on the poster, most poster have a realise date. Maybe this was done to keep the audience in suspense or to make the audience search for when it’s actually realised, this could show that the audience actually wants to watch it since they went out of their way to search for it. This poster creates enigma through not having a main picture, this make you as an audience rely on other things like the title and words to find out what the film is about. The film producers are trying to create a sense of danger and equilibrium by showing the misty black and white forest, this is something you wouldn’t see in real life, and it gives you that sense of fantasy. Once again instinctively you would know this film belongs to a horror genre. It has all the conventions that a horror poster should have.

The visual and written codes used in this poster is the lift that is the centre of the picture, also the upside crucifies. This shows what kind of film it is going to be my looking at the visual iconography.

The visual image in this poster which is the lift and the upside crucifies, gives us the information about what the film contains and an idea of who would be in it e.g. devil related people
For a typical horror poster, this poster has all the conventions of a poster so all the information is there, however there is no picture to show us a concrete idea, so it relies on guessing.
This poster creates enigma because as i said before , it has no picture to show us who is in it and what there role is in the film.

The film procedures are trying to create a sense of danger and equilibrium by showing a closed lift with a red line in the middle of it, you do not know who is in the lift and what will happen if they come out. So the equilibrium comes from that.

From looking at these poster , it has help me understand what a typical horror poster consist of , and whether I'd like to go with the typical horror poster style or go against it. I now know what needs to be done on our poster to draw our target audience in without giving too much away of the story line.