A Soap Opera Poster/Billboard

Through research, I have gathered that Soap Operas do not have poster's or billboards which advertise their programme. Through research also, more of the TV channels that involve dramas like 'E4 or Channel 4' advertise their programmes. Therefore, I got ideas for the billboard poster I am designing by researching their posters/billboards.

I have gathered that these billboards/posters are very plan and only include the E4 logo, title and the date it will be broadcasted. Even though they are very plain, the images that are used are quite effective due to the type of image used. The images are also very eye-catching due to the actions taking place and even in some the colours. Having a very plain poster like the 'phoneshop' one, really creates suspicion to the audience so it will make them want to watch the programme so they can find out what is going to happen. This is a good way to persuade the audience. Also linking the colour of the poster in with the words, shows the creative side on what the creators are trying to do.

Our inspiration on how to design our Soap Opera magazine front cover

Myself and Hannah decided to do some more research on Soap Opera TV magazine front covers so we could get inspiration on how to design our own. We decided to focus on a specific front cover which is the magazine 'What's On TV'. We were inspired by this specific magazine because it is a very successful magazine and always involve the up and coming storylines. Therefore, we gathered that this would be the most appropriate to relate to our own magazine front cover.


I like how these magazines have a certain layout and genre and are always very eye-catching. This is because of the striking image and clashing of colours.These elements are a good way to really catch the audience eye and make them want to read more of the drama thats going to happen in the series within the next week. The tag line/title is always big and bold to give the audience the 'gossip' of what is going to happen. The text is also a use of persuasive language which draws the audience's attention more along with it being a clashy colour that stands out more than the rest of the text on the cover.

Soap Opera Planning

As a pair, hannah and I researched many Soap Opera TV trailers so we could get inspiration in creating our own. We found many creative trailers so we were inspired by making our own very creative and interesting. We came up with an idea of basing our TV trailer on five themes. We chose themes that would target our target audience and even a wider audience due to the way we are going to produce our trailer. We have decided to only show a small glimpse of each theme we are going to include so it really teases the audience.
The themes we have decided to include are:

• Love
• Betrayal
• Hate
• Mistakes
• Death

throughout the trailer, we have decided to only capture a few moments of the themes so we don't give too much away to our audience. By doing this, hopefully we will be able to get a broader audience as no one will know what is going to happen in the TV programme. Each theme will be shown as very eye-catching.
Only showing a small glimpse of the drama that is going to be happening in the programme itself, really shows that we have researched and watched how TV drama trailers are shown. Watching TV trailers of TV dramas has really helped us as they tease the audience a lot and really leave the audience wanting to know more. Therefore, the dramas will be gain more of an audience during the week.

We wrote down in note form some brief ideas of what we would like to for each theme in the trailer.

• Love- We have decided to involve a male and female holding hands in public or sharing a affectionate kiss in public on the cheek.
• Betrayal- Will feature a character walking into a bedroom seeing their friend with her boyfriend/partner. We decided to add certain camera shots in this theme to create more of a dramatic affect. We decided to create a close-up of the character's hand opening to door of the bedroom and then a zoom onto the piles of clothes on the floor. As the theme we have chosen is a bit 'too close for comfort' we figured we could use any figures in the bed, as If we were to add a male and female in a bed together and show faces, it would be hard to find people who would want to act this out for us, so we decided to just put anyone in the bed as long as it shows clearly two figures and show no faces. We have planned to shoot this at my house as we are going to take it in turns at each other's houses.
• Hate- Even though many dramas include violence, we have decided not to do this so we are going to film Hannah's sister Gemma throwing a photograph of her best friend or boyfriend into a fireplace. We decided to add another close up in this theme on the photographs burning in the fire. We have planned to do this at Hannah's house as we are using her sister for this theme. 
• Mistakes- We thought it would be hard to come up with an idea for this theme as we can't really film a mistake. So we have decided to keep it simple and film a girl sitting on a toilet looking upset, distraught and angry with herself.
• Death-For this final theme, again we didn't want to show anything violent so we have decided to film two characters (possibly siblings) to stand in front of a grave stone in a graveyard staring blankly and showing a little saddness.

Research and analysis for a soap opera poster

What is a poster?The point of having posters is to mainly advertise something like a product. This is a good way to make the product look better than it actually is to gain more of an audience. For example, cosmetics or clothing. A poster could also be created to maybe get a point across, an example of this would be a stop bullying poster/campaign so people can relate to these posters and seek help. In this case we will be creating a poster which will be advertising a new TV programme which is going to be a soap opera. Posters are cheap to produce and easy to present as they can just be stuck in shop windows or can easily be given to volunteers to hand out for you. Posters can vary in different sizes depending on what location or where they're going to be shown, so that's an advantage for producing posters.
Different types of promotional posters are:
- Flyers and brochures- may be seen as a type of a promotional poster even though it may not hang up on a wall, it is still an advertisement.
-Promotional banners/billboards- Large posters are more likely to be expensive, but the advantage would be that they are very eye-catching. Towns and Cities are most likely to use these as they are very large and can be any size. They are very popular to advertise something temporary for a new film, cosmetic or a community festival. You would see these on the sides of buildings. For example, supermarkets, fitness centers or local colleges/universities etc.. To sum this up, they are more than likely to be seen on a community area where most people will see them.
-Motivational poster-it is a wall hanging decorative poster which is designed to inspire and motivate people in a certain setting. They are common in work places as well as in a school/college/university to inspire young people.They contain positive texts and images which help send off a good message to young students. It is known that the two most common imagery on motivational posters are athletes and animals for young children. An example of this would be a message saying "hang in there" with a picture of a cat holding onto a tree to motivate, images like this are also commin in a classroom of children at a young age. The athlete image is most likely to be used for older students or in work places. This is to encourage people to work hard or to keep trying. The athletes which are included are usually a professional or maybe an athlete with a challenge or disability so that these images can inspire the people who are having a difficult time. These posters usually include nice quotes or a religious phrase but could also have a made up quote by the person who creates the poster.

Soap Opera poster analysis:

These three posters all contain many similarities. They don't all contain a lot of detail and don't give any clues to what is going to happen in the programmes/films apart from maybe the poster on the top left. This is because of the image shown and the tag line "every parent's nightmare". This being the tag line shows that some stress is going to happen in the programme and the girl in the poster is going to go 'off the rails'. The top right poster doesn't give us any clue on what is going to happen in the fllm. The only clue we get is that it is a comedy due to the quote being "Flat-out funny". The imagery on the poster represents the funny side due to the facial expressions of the man and the image altogether being quite surreal and abnormal. It is a picture that you cannot take seriously.
The bottom poster gives off different impressions but still doesn't give us as the audience any clue of what is going to happen in this programme/film. The first impressions I got were that it is going to be a horror. As me and my partner have decided to create a billboard, we gathered that they have to be very striking and eye catching. Researching different types of posters has helped us come up with an idea for our own. By research, it is shown that the image is the most eye catching on the posters so the image has to be very interesting. As for the rest of the poster itself, hardly any text is added and when there is, the text is very persuading. The reason for this is because the billboards are mostly viewed by people travelling by cars so won't have time to read text on the posters, so most billboard posters only show a tag line or the if the programme/film has been advertised a lot else where, the poster will only contain the title of the programme/film as people would automatically know what the programme/film is about because it has been advertised well.

Channel 4.We found that Channel four are very good at advertising their new up and coming TV programmes. They have a good use of colour scheme and only little text and each billboardposter are very interesting and eye-catching. Having a bright color scheme like this billboard shows us as the audience a hint of what is going to happen in the next few series of Hollyoaks. The tag line also gives us a massive hint as by including fire in the image and saying "A week that will change Hollyoaks forever" clearly shows that something bad is going to happen as fire is a symbol of danger and warning. That is why it will be very eye-catching for its audience. Having a plain black background really brings out the imagery as it is a contrast colour to the orange and yellows.

Using this as inspiration, made us want to create our billboard poster like this as it clearly states some hints of what is going to happen in the up and coming series.