Evaluation Question Three: Audience Feedback

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Different ways in which we received audience feedback….

• Before we had even begun making our trailer, one thing we sat down and thought about was the ways in which we could make our trailer available to a wider range of people in order to receive some audience feedback, as we knew like with all products, we needed to make sure our trailer completely appealed to the needs and demands of our target audience

• To do this we mainly focused on social websites as a way of gaining audience feedback, due to the fact our target audience ranges from 15-25 year olds, in which social networking websites are popular with that particular group

• We also used video sharing websites such as YouTube, also popular with our target audience.

• As well as this, we also really wanted the views of someone who had actual experience in the film industry, in which Film’s Cool gave us the perfect opportunity to get some feedback from industry professionals like Mat Wakeham and Hugh Spurghling.

Social Networking Sites: FaceBookDue to the fact FaceBook would be very popular with

members of our target audience, we saw the website as a perfect opportunity to get some much needed feedback for our actual target audience. As you can see the feedback received was very positive, with 20 people ‘liking’ our trailer, as well as various positive comments including one saying that “I can really recognise the genre as horror” and another “this is really good, really clever how you have put this together, good story”. This was very beneficial as in the feedback we had previously received, one of the main things pointed out was that the story of our movie was hard to figure out from looking at the trailer. So the fact we have now received feedback from our target audience, telling us that the genre and story is now easily recognisable is very relieving and highlights the importance of using social networking sites, in this modern era where digital media has grown massively in importance, in order to further our product and also to help interact with our target audience, in order to receive feedback and tips on how we should make a trailer/ movie that fits in with their needs.

Video Sharing Websites: YouTubeAnother website we knew would be popular with

our target audience was ‘YouTube’, and so we took it upon ourselves to also upload our trailer to YouTube, in order to see what kind of response we would see on there. Although we didn’t promote our trailer on YouTube as much as we had done on FaceBook, we have still managed to receive one like and no dislikes so far, and with our trailer only being up for less than a week we see this as being very positive. We also managed to accumulate 150 views in less than 24 hours, and it has been steadily increasing since highlighting how well received our trailer has been with our target audience. Video Sharing websites like YouTube have proved to be a very effective way in gaining publicity towards your product (trailer), with a lot of peoples work going viral and even going into production just solely due to the good response it has received on YouTube, this is why I believe using YouTube for feedback was a excellent decision, as it not only allows us to receive feedback, it also makes our trailer available to a wider range of people, therefore giving our movie more publicity.

YouTube (Continued)If you look to the left you can see the viewing stats for our

trailer taken from YouTube, what’s most intriguing about this is that it shows that people have actually been searching in ‘A2 media studies: the examined’ on YouTube in order to try and find our trailer, which shows that not only our people watching it from the link we have placed on FaceBook, but there is also a certain few people who have perhaps head good things about our trailer and so are searching for it on YouTube, highlighting the positive feedback we seem to be getting from our audience, who seem to be mostly very happy with the plot and horror aspect of our trailer.

Also if you look at the gender and age of our audience, not only is it popular with our target audience of males and females aged 15-25. It seems to also be very popular with older females aged 45-54, as well as some of a younger age 13-15. We have been told by those people that this is because they feel our theme of Success vs. Failure, and the general concept of ‘how far would go to succeed?’ Is a universal theme/ concept that all people can identify and relate with, and so because of that they have said that even though they think it’s clear that our movie is not mainly targeted at them, they still feel that they’re able to really relate to it and so find it very compelling to watch.Our trailer even has views from people living in America!

Blackberry Messenger I also used Blackberry messenger as a way

of receiving feedback from my target audience, mainly because I noticed how popular it is amongst our target audience, and so knew it would be a good opportunity to get some feedback from them.

On you left you can see two examples of what two people aged 21 and 22 have said about our trailer, both expressing the fact that they like it and that they feel it was “scary”, and so very much resembled a horror trailer.

Industry ProfessionalsBeing a part of ‘Film’s Cool’ has benefitted us greatly, as we

have been able to receive advice from industry professionals, the picture on the left shows some of the advice they gave us after seeing our trailer (this was before we edited it and posted it on FaceBook again). They made it very clear that although they believed we had the recipe for a really good and effective trailer, which they believed could even be made into a real trailer due to our story, they still felt that the story and themes of our movie wasn’t being made clear in our trailer, which as a result was really letting down our trailer as we could’ve produced something much better. They got a piece of paper (left) and wrote down some tips they had which they felt would help improve our final product, these tips included showing; ‘a decision to cheat’, ‘bullying’, ‘girl killing herself’, ‘shot of a clock’, as well as some other tips. Hearing this advice we decided to film some more shots with this advice in mind, which I personally feel, and from looking at the feedback we’ve received on FaceBook and YouTube, has helped enhance the quality of our trailers greatly, and has done now done exactly what they’ve told us to do, tell the story and themes of our movie well. For this I am very grateful towards those industry professionals at Film’s cool who have given us some superb feedback which has helped us greatly.

Industry Professionals (Continued

Furthermore, we had a award ceremony at Channel 4 studios where we had industry professionals (Anna Higgs, Georgia Caufman, Femi Oyeniran, Christine Blundell, Ade Rawcliffe and Matt Wakeham give us their professional view on our trailer, and judged it in various different areas, giving out awards for each. The Examined came away with one award, which was best trailer, which I feel highlights just how well received our trailer has been not only with our target audience, but with real industry professionals as well.

Anna Higgs’ view

Anna Higgs, Head of Film4.0, rated us as excellent in the majority of areas which included shooting material, editing and sound, and also felt we had a “nice idea” and nice use of quotes in our trailer. As well as this, she also says that are film genre was very clear, our emotional hook was good for our target audience, and also that this trailer makes her want to see the film, and that we had the most original use of sound. The fact someone in such a high position, has given us such good feedback highlights the fantastic points of our trailer, and shows that we have created a very good idea that contains all the elements necessary to be a very good horror trailer that builds anticipation towards the film, something all trailers focus on doing.

Georgia Kaufman’s view

Georgia Caufman, head of marketing at Lions Gate Films (one of the biggest film companies in the world), rated us as either having the ‘wow factor’ or being ‘excellent’ in the majority of areas, which coming from the head of marketing at one of the biggest film companies in the world is excellent feedback to hear. Furthermore, she made it clear that she fully understood our film’s plot by our trailer, that the film’s genre was clear, that the emotional hook was ‘spot on’, and that this is one film that she would really want to see. As well as this, she also rated our trailer as being the best in the show, and also having the best marketing campaign which coming from the head of marketing at Lions Gate Films, is excellent to hear as she would have a vast amount of experience in marketing some of the biggest films in the world, so to hear that she feels our marketing campaign was good is very nice to hear.

Femi Oyeniran

Continued..Femi Oyeniran, star of critically acclaimed films KidultHood and AdultHood and a grime musician,

also gave us positive feedback rating The Examined as a ‘excellent’ in all areas, which I feel highlights the fact that we have made sure that we have covered every area in creating this trailer in order to produce the best trailer possible. He has also made it extremely clear that he understands the plot of our movie from looking at our trailer, that the genre of our movie is very clear and so our trailer contains all the conventions of horror movies, that our emotional hook is correct for our target audience, and that he would very much want to see this film. Most of all, he has rated our trailer as the best one in the show, which means a lot coming from him as a lot of the films he has been featured in, has a very similar target audience to ours, and also he himself comes from a urban London background and so would be one of the people we are looking to target, so the fact he feels we have done well in appealing to our target audience is great news to hear.

Christine Blundell

Christine Blundell, Oscar winning make-up artist, is the only person so far to give us some negative feedback. She rated as being ‘proficient’ in most areas, and ‘basic’ and ‘excellent’ in a further two. She also felt the genre wasn’t made as clear as it could be, our emotional hook wasn’t too appropriate for our target audience, and that she wouldn’t want to see or film. In response to this feedback, I feel maybe we could have built up our theme of Success vs. Failure better at the start of the trailer in order to make it more clear, and also tried to create a wider range of audience as our trailer might not have appealed to the needs and wants of Chistine Blundell. However, she has still rated us as having the best use of titling and after-effects, which is something we’re happy about as we put a lot of effort into creating the right titles that would help help and advance the plot of our movie even more.

Ade Rawcliffe

Ade Rawcliffe, part of the Creative Diversity team at Channel 4, is another one of the judges who rated our trailer as being ‘excellent’ in all areas, again highlighting me and my groups ability to cover all areas of production in order to make a very good trailer. She also highlighted the uniqueness of our trailer, by the fact that she’s ‘never seen a horror film set in an exam room’ which highlights our ability to not only adhere to conventions, but also to challenge them. She’s also made it clear that our trailer was one of her favorites, which is excellent feedback to hear from someone who’s in such a high position at one of the biggest television networks in Britain. Seeing as she’s also creative director, I think that in itself highlights the creativity that’s gone into making this trailer.

Matt Wakeham

Matt Wakeham, writer, producer and one of the creators of ‘The Gorrilaz’, is the second judge to not only rate our trailer as ‘excellent’, but to also regard it as having the ‘wow factor’. He’s also given us feedback telling us that he understands the film’s plot clearly, that the emotional hook is clear and appropriate for our target audience, and that this film has the potential to be a commercially successful product. As well as this, he’s also credited us as having the best trailer,

OVERALL…

Overall, I feel the feedback given to us has helped us greatly in producing our trailer. With the advice of industry professionals in mind, we have been able to construct a trailer that really fits in well with the needs and wants of our target audience due to the fact we have used conventions of horror movies in our trailer to excellent use, and also told the story, themes and emotional hook of our movie well. This was all confirmed in the audience feedback we were given by our target audience and secondary audience on YouTube, Blackberry Messenger and FaceBook, who confirmed that the story and themes of our movie came across well, and that from the trailer they would definitely want to watch our movie, which was very good news for us to hear, as it confirms that we have managed to produce a product that fits in well with our target audiences wants and needs. As well as this, we had the privilege of getting even more feedback from industry professionals who all had very positive things to say, all rating our trailer as excellent, and even felt it was the ‘best trailer’ at the ‘Film’s Cool’ award ceremony. The fact this has come from people who have a vast amount of experience in the film industry is very nice to hear, and further validates the amount of effort we have put into creating a trailer that has been very well received.