What have you learned from your audience feedback?

For our audience feedback we wanted to target our target audience as they will be the people who will be watching our film the most, so therefor their feedback will be invaluable. Our target audience is males aged from 18 – 30 as we feel the sci-fi side to our film will appeal to them. Furthermore, we wanted a romantic element to our film so it would appeal to females as well. Additionally, we thought we would target a working class audience as we have an element of the poor against the rich in our film which could appeal to a working class audience. So we decided to get feedback off both males and females, so we could get a balanced view. Target audience feedback It is hugely important for media producers to get feedback on their films from their target audience because they are the biggest part of your audience. Media producers take ages deciding what their target audience is going to be and they particularly target them when it comes to promotion and marketing. So getting their feedback is vital because they can see what worked well and what did not work so well. The producers can then use this constructive criticism to make the film better when it is eventually released.

Ways of getting target audience feedback One of the most popular ways of getting target audience feedback is through pre screenings. An audience is chosen to watch the film and complete a questionnaire about it. This method has been extremely helpful for many films, who changed a lot of things after the test screening. For example at the pre screening of Shaun of the dead the audience thought the ending was a bit abrupt and lame. After this feedback the producers decided to add an extra 15 seconds to the ending. There are many other ways media producers can get feedback from their target audience. From social media, questionnaires, reviews, forums and many more. It has become easier for producers to get feedback now there is social media because it is so much easier for producers to access their audience. Through the likes of twitter, Facebook and YouTube they can instantly receive feedback on their film.

Interim feedback Our first piece of interim feedback was the pitch. We did this to all our class mates and our teacher and we got feedback on our pitch. One important piece of feedback we received was thinking about how our hero was unconventional. So when it came to our trailer we wanted to clearly show he was a unconventional hero. Quack blog is also a great way to receive feedback from our teachers as you can post comments on the posts. For example there has been occasions where my teachers have commented on my posts if something is not quite right with the film. Our teachers also give us feedback throughout the process on our trailers. For example in our trailer when the voiceover spoke about Luna there was no image of her so the audience could not relate to her. So we added this image above the sea when the voiceover speaks about her and really improved our trailer.

Why we used a questionnaire to get feedback on our trailer In our questionnaire we handed out we wanted to have both quantitative and qualitative feedback. Our sample group was 15 people between the ages of This was a slight limitation as our target audience age range was between We wanted to use both open and closed questions to give us a variety of data to analyse. With open questions the data can be a lot harder to collate and analyse. However, the feedback can be a lot better as it gives you the opinions and feelings which can be invaluable. Closed questions are also very good and can be very effective when collecting feedback as they give you solid facts and statistics that are easy to analyse.

Rough Suggestions for Questions 1.Which of the following genre categories do you think the film trailer belongs to: Crime Thriller British Gangster Other (Please specify)_______ 2.How would you rate the film: Very Good Good Average Poor Very Poor 3.How would you rate the following elements of the film trailer: a. Narrative (Storyline): Intriguing Obvious Confusing Comment_______________________ b. Camera work: Exciting Appropriate Uninspiring Comment________________________ c. Editing: Clever Suitable Unsuitable Comment________________________ d. Soundtrack/music Fully complimentary suitable unsuitable Comment__________________________ 4.Which film certification do you think is most appropriate for the film trailer: A 12 5.What kind of audience do you think would like the film trailer: a. Male or Female or both Comment_________________ b. Mainstream or Alternative/Cult or Both Comment_____________________ c. Middle class or working class or Both Comment_____________________ 6.Why do you think they would like the film trailer? _______________________________________ 7. What did you like most about the film trailer? _____________________________________ 8. What did you like least about the film trailer? _______________________________________ 9. How do you think the film trailer could be improved? _________________________________________ 10. Would you go and see this type of film? Yes No Maybe Don’t Know Comment_______________________________ This is the questionnaire we used. We handed it out to our focus group.

The feedback from the questionnaire Question 1: From question 1, we found out that most people did in fact believe it was a dystopian film. However we did get a wide range of answers. Question 2: From question 2, we found most people found are film average, however some also found it good and even some very goods. Question 3a: Most participants found are narrative intriguing, although there were also about less than half who said it was obvious. Question 3b: In general, most participants found the camerawork appropriate. Question 3c: It was clear in this question that most of our participants found our editing suitable. Question 3d : For our soundtrack, the participants the majority found it suitable, however there was a fair few who thought it was fully complimentary. Question 4: Most participants found that our film was the certificate 12. Question 5a: A majority of the participants thought that both males and females would enjoy our trailer. Question 5b: Most participants believed our trailer was suited for a mainstream audience. Question 5c: From question 5c we discovered most participants thought it would suit both an middle and upper class audience.

Qualitative feedback From question 6 we did not get a lot of great answers as this question was unclear to some people. However we still received a decent amount of feedback. However we did get some answers, such as ‘ they would have liked it’. Although, we did not get lots of feedback on this question, it did show that if we did it again this question would need to be restructured. So, even though we did not get a lot of feedback, we received feedback on the questionnaire and how we could change it in the future. From question 7 we got a lot of good feedback, here are some quotes: 'editing and sound worked well’, ‘the dramatic rooftop shots were good’ and “Not knowing the ending”. From question 8 we received vital feedback about how we could improve our trailer, this is some of the feedback: "Different scenery to expand ideas”, “Bit more narrative” and “Different variety of shots”. For The last question it went back to a closed question so the data was quantitative. We discovered that most of the participants would maybe or yes go to see our film when it is released.

What we learned from questionnaire From our questionnaire we learnt a lot about our trailer and the way our target audience viewed it. One main thing we learned from the feedback was that we needed more locations in our trailer, because a lot of people found it quite simple. Overall, I think our target audience did understand our intentions with our film, as most people thought the target audience was what it should be. Additionally, a lot of people saw that our film was mainstream which was a big element we were trying to get across in our trailer. The positive answers we received helped us with reinforcing our intentions for our trailer. For example when people enjoyed the soundtrack, it made us realise we had made a good decision and were in fact right to add that soundtrack to our piece even though we were unsure about it at first. Furthermore, a lot of people enjoyed the rooftop shots in our trailer which reinforced our intention to use high points looking over the city to show how rundown it was. As well as positive feedback there was also constructive criticism which was just as useful. The main reason it was useful was because it allowed us to improve on anything in the future. For example, some people did not think there was a variety of shots, so we knew it was something we needed to change if we did it again in the future. Additionally, it seemed some people were unclear about our genre, so for our poster and magazine we wanted to clearly show that our film was a dystopian sci fi film. As a result of our feedback we could use the data to improve the actual film. This feedback was for the trailer of the film, so we could use this feedback to improve the film. In the future, to use audience feedback better, I would choose a wider age group and a bigger variety of questions. Furthermore, I would allow a lot more time for audience feedback, as feedback on social media can take a lot of time to collate.

Other ways to get feedback There are many other ways to receive audience feedback. One effective way in particular is using social media. From sites such as YouTube, Twitter and Facebook you gain feedback from hundreds of people at click of a button. Particularly on YouTube you can gain instant feedback when you upload your trailer. Both qualitative and quantitative data can be gained from YouTube, for example in the comment section people will share their opinions and there is also a like button people can press so you can use that to calculate how many liked or disliked your film. We added our trailer to YouTube to gain this kind of feedback. Additionally, we wanted our film to go on movie blogs to gain feedback. One major benefit of blogs is that it allows all sorts of opinions and there is room for debate. This is excellent when collating qualitative data as there will be a vast amount of opinions on your film.