You MUST NOT create a poster from a screen shot of the production footage. You should carefully consider how your poster will communicate ideas about your film's themes, genre, narrative, characters and style.
Take this poster (click it for higher quality version):
Essentially you should analyse the poster's media langauge to offer an interpretation of how it communicates. The media language consists of:
Image (shot size, composition, mise en scene, colour correction and effects)
Title (typeface, font size and effects)
Tagline (typeface and font size - also enigmatic relationship to title)
Billing block (institutional info and logos)
Other textual information may include:
Release date
Actor's/Director's/Producer's names
Awards and nominations
Affiliations (eg Quentin Tarantino Presents...)
Quotes/Blurbs (eg "AMAZING!!!" - The Daily Mail)
So in this poster the main image is a big close up of a ceramic human face with a blank (almost dead) expression. It is lying on a tarmac ground, broken, with shards of ceramic scattered about. The realistic human hair gives the image an unsettling atmosphere, and the breakage hints at themes of the fragility of human existance.
The title 'Still Life' appears in a clean, modern, sans serif font and is relatively small compared to the main image. It appears in white and red, both of which have long-standing cultural significance including connotations such as purity and passion... but in this case, along with the broken human face they call to mind the red and white of blood and bandages signified by symbols such as the red cross or the barber's candy-striped pole.
The tagline, "Not everything appears as it seems" has at least two layers of enigmatic resonance. Firstly as it hints at a deeper meaning behind the broken human face - perhaps this replica is more than it seems - but on on closer examination the word 'appears' might have more than one sense to it. Really, the line ought to read "Not everything IS as it seems". The use of the word "appears" adds an additional ambiguity. Secondly the use of 'Not everything' instead of 'Nothing' suggests some things do 'appear as they seem'.
The billing block is overlaid on a red-tinted background which continues to blood theme.
This analysis could go further to decipher how the combination of all the above communicates ideas of genre and narrative. How the style reflects the style of cinematography of the film. How it appeals to its target audience. Etc.
You should analyse at least two posters before starting to design your own. When you design your own, sketch out two or three potential designs so you know how to pose your actors and how to compose your shots. You should take at least 20 different shots to give you options when it comes to sitting down in front of Photoshop and designing your poster.
