Radio Trailer Research

Research into Radio Trailers

A common perception of advertising is related to solicitation, or encouraging consumers to purchase the goods and services of a company or organisation. Advertising can be found in the form of print advertisements in newspapers and magazines, billboards, telephone directories, fliers, and mailers, or in electronic media such as the Internet, radio, and television. 

Gravity- 2013

Not only did Gravity do billboard advertising they did radio advertising across many radio channels. As Gravity was an award winning movie, we looked into the main features of radio advertising to analyse what we need to make successful advertising over many media forms.

Script:
Mission Control in Houston: Explorer, this is Houston.
Voiceover: Critics call it a cinematic masterpiece
Dr. Ryan Stone: Matt, tell me what you see.
Voiceover: Gloriously realised 3D
Sound effects from film
Voice over: Nerve shredding suspense.
Lieutenant Matt Kowalski: (sound effects) we have to go we have to go go go!
Voiceover: Film of the year.
Mission control in Houston: Astronaut is of structure (Sound Effects)
Voiceover: From director Alfonso Cuaron, Warner Brothers Pictures presents Gravity
Dr Ryan Stone: I'm really scared.
Voiceover: Starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney
Lieutenant Matt Kowalski: You're going to make it Ryan.
Voiceover: Gravity. See it in 3D in cinemas now.

By copying out the script of the radio advertising for Gravity has gave us a stable clear structure of how to produce a radio trailer. We have analysed that the actors, the distributor and the director is often mentioned in the radio, also the line of 'In cinemas now' or 'in a cinema near you' is often a regular feature at the end of the advertisement. After analysing the features we have found other radio trailers and most of the radio trailers are similar in the basis of structure and framework.

When researching into other radio advertisements, some included competitions etc at the end of the radio advertisement to engage the audiences attention or they include a website etc. We thought this was a good idea as they are including and emerging other media platforms together through advertising. This was shown in the radio trailer for 'Pacific Rim', which not only advertised the film but also included a 'chance to win an epic football experience' which was featured on Facebook. This includes media convergence by using social networking sites and advertisements.

The Conjuring (2013)

As The Conjuring is a horror film, I thought it would have more features of which we could use as our film is or a sub genre of horror, as our genre is a psychological thriller. We thought using the same process of analysing the language features would help us get a detailed framework and specific features which could be included in our radio trailer.

Script:
Voiceover: From the director of Saw and Incidious, comes the horror event of the year!
Lorraine Warren: I can see the dark entity in that haunts your house
Voiceover: Critics call it a master class in absolute terror
Lorraine Warren: In here, we have something inhuman
Voiceover: Genuinely frightening, sensationally entertaining.
Lorraine Warren: And its feeding off you.
Voiceover: Stomach knot-tingly tense
Carolyn Perron: (sound effects) Look what she made me do.
Voiceover: The Conjuring, In cinemas now, Rated 15.

By looking at multiple radio trailers we decided on a few traditional features of radio trailers which we wanted to keep, such as the male voice-over and the 'in cinemas now' (or something similar)
however we looked at the features we could also include just by looking at about 4 different radio trailers which provide different and alternate features:

List of features which may be included in radio trailers:

• Names of main Actors and Actresses
• Name of Director
• Name of Distributor
• Release Date
• Competitions
• Age Certificate
• Audio clips from the film
• Sound Effects from the film
• Reviews
• Nominated awards etc
• Mention of digital technology for example 3D or IMAX
• Music features
• Description of film, including adjectives
• mention of other films - for example The Great Gatsby radio advertisement, it also mentions 'from the visionary director of Romeo and Juliet and Moulin Rouge.

Often the radio trailers include specific slogans from the film which is also often featured on the Film Poster, this then interlinks the film through all media platforms. We want to include some main features of radio trailers and look at the similarities that most radio trailers and film posters have linked between them.