Online Audience Survey - 8/11/11

In previous posts, I have shown my mass audience questionnaire to people aged 12+, as just a general analysis of what people look for in the genre of Horror/Thriller, as at that stage, the genre was the basic thing that we were most certain on. However, it's been a few weeks since then and we have finished most of our planning and preparation for the entire product, so I decided that making another survey, but this time for our niche audience, which is people aged 15-25, to answer, and via the popular social networking site of Facebook.

I chose Facebook because that's one of the most popular sites our niche audience uses to communicate on, and I knew that I would get the right answers that I am looking for on there. I created a 10 question survey, some questions similar to the ones asked previously, but this one focussing more on the actual aspects we're using in our opening. For example, I asked them questions about our own Institution we created, about our own film title 'Necrophobia', about our whole idea of having a 'back story' and their opinion on film openings altogether. I thought this was a good idea because my other questionnaire was just an average look on the genre, whereas now this one is much more detailed and can give me more precise answers as to what my target audience is looking for.

Here is the picture showing me first asking the survey to a group of 5 friends:

1. I asked this question because I wanted to know the popularity of the genre's within this selected audience, and see whether it varied from my other questionnaire.

2. This is the same question from before, but again I wanted to see if it made a difference with a specific audience.

3 & 4. The purpose of this was to find out what type of horror and thriller films our target audience are most interested in and are watching at the moment, so we can find out what conventions that use to engage the same audience, and use it to improve ours.

5. This was a personal question, added specifically to find out the effect of our title we have decided on, and whether the audience found it appealing.

6. This again was another personal question to find out if our own Institution would be successful within our audience, and what impressions the name gave off to see whether they matched the reasons for us calling it that.

7. I included this same question in this as before because I wanted to see if the results varied again.

8. This question was to see whether our target audience's decision was affected by the actors that star in it, so that if we felt we needed to, we could change or adapt which famous actors we're including in our credits.

9. Our own film opening is going to be a backstory to the entire rest of the film, so finding out whether this would be effective to our audience was definitely important to determine our success.

10. This final question was just to see how powerful the opening of a film is towards an audience, and so that the results can determine how important our opening would be.

After the people I contacted had all answered my small survey, I managed to gather the results and come to another conclusion. Here is a picture of the results that I got:

In basic terms, you can tell that they all have extremely similar responses, so analysing them and picking out differences would be quite difficult. However, we did recieve the results that we were looking for with this survey about our title and our institution. I recieved all exactly the same results for question no. 5 which was about the name of our title, 'Necrophobia', and it was that 'Yes' it would appeal to them and attract them to watching or buying our movie. One person also commented that it was very 'catchy' which is just what we were hoping for from our niche audience, because it shows this was a good decision and it would pay off with our audience. For the question about our institution, responses would be different as it was an open question, but most of the answers we got were positive and that it was 'friendly' 'creates high quality movies' 'unique' and is 'important'. These answers are again exactly what we were hoping when asking this question, and they are all the reasons why we called our institution this name. This shows that this decision of 'Legend Productions' was also another good one and will hopefully boost our film reputation.

Some other points that I picked up on from asking this questionnaire were:

• the actors are important and judge whether the audience watches the film
• the opening is vital to be engaging as this forms their decision whether to watch the rest of the film
• the idea of having a backstory is good
• the horror/thriller genre is popular amongst our audience, and we must try our best to create a film that stands out against the best in this genre already

Taking all of these points into consideration, we are going to try and use every single answer and response from our niche audience to the best that we can, and eventually create exactly the opening of a film they would all be willing to watch.

My other group member Laura Jeffreson - http://laurajeffreson.blogspot.com/ - also created an online survey for friends to answer, and she got some interesting and well worthwhile answers too.

WHY HAVE I DONE THIS?

At first, asking my mass audience was important for a general overview on the genre, but then it was also key for me to ask my niche audience (15-25) similar but more specific questions so that I can create a film that will be popular and successful in the market that we are selling to.

Costumes - 7/11/11

In order for us to tell our actors what they need to wear for this Saturday (12th) when we begin filming, I have planned a basic outline of the outfits they are going to wear and why.



The main character: This is going to be played by our friend Conor Willis (also another Media student) - http://thatone-conorwastleyasmedia.blogspot.com/ - as he best fits our description of tall, broad and is a good actor. The main character of our film (Steven Turner) is an insane, pyschopathic killer who murders the entire village within the opening of the film, so his clothing isn't going to be anything less than...

• a black coat/jumper
• a black hood/hat
• black shoes
• black trousers

The reason we have decided that he is going to be wearing ALL BLACK is because he's an extremely mysterious character, as we never once see his face in the opening, which leaves it all to the imagination of the audience. Also, the black refers to the overpowering, powerful and evil sense that he has about him.

The other characters: As the other characters in our film aren't specified, we have just chosen a few of our friends to play them, and this could be anyone because they aren't a main person. So, the clothes of these characters will be pale, lightish colours and be quite old and boring to represent their insignificance to the plot, and to the main character. The light clothing also suggests to the audience that they're the victims, and if we dress them in white's then they will seem quite innocent and pure.

WHY HAVE I DONE THIS?I decided to figure out what each person was wearing so I could tell each actor ahead of time, so they're prepared for when we film. I also wanted to do this to show my justification for everything, and show that I have put a lot of thought into even the smallest detail of their costumes.

Our Script - 7/11/11

As well as making a detailed Storyboard, we have made a Script that we are going to follow when we film too. This is similar to the storyboard, minus the image of what it will look like, and this is a very intellectual, written piece of everything we are going to include.

This is what it looks like:



In basic terms, the script is sectioned into 7 different parts of the table -
The scene and shot number, the description, the time, the camera shot, the camera angle, the dialogue, and the sound.

WHY HAVE WE DONE THIS?We will be carrying this with us as well as our storyboard when we film, and even though each of them are similar, it means we will have had lots of planning about what we're going to do, and at the time we will have lots of information to help us get through it successfully.

Our Title Design - 'Necrophobia' - 7/11/11

A few days ago, after spending an hour or so on various photo editting websites, we came up with the final design on Pixlr - www.pixlr.com - of our Title Logo. This will appear at the end of our film opening and last for about 3 seconds against a plain white background.

This is what it looks like:

Denotation: Black and red colours
Connotation: Powerful, opposite colours. The black is dark and mysterious which suggests a lot about the main character and the whole scariness of the plot. The red is quite an emotionally intense colour, meaning it makes the audience's heartbeat faster and breathing increase, which is exactly the effect we want. The red against the black also attracts attention, which is what we want as it will increase our film appeal.

Denotation: Against white background
Connotation: White is sometimes used to symbolise innocence, however it works well with the black and red font colour as it enables them to stand out more. The colour white also suggests a slight insane characteristic, which is perfect for our main character.

Denotation: Sharp, jagged edges of font
Connotation: This suggests some of the weapons that the main character uses - knives, axes, shovels - and the strength and danger that he has about him.

Denotation: Red colour dripping off
Connotation: This symbolises the blood, gore and torture that all the victims will face, and the deliberate pool of blood under the first letter tells the audience there is a lot of death in this film for there to be that much blood all at once.

WHY HAVE WE DONE THIS?It's important for us to come up with a successful Title Logo for our film, and it was important that we crafted it exactly right so that it suits the film we are creating and the wants of the target audience. We wanted it to give off the right impression of what the film is about, and from this we believe it does that.

Storyboard - 7/11/11

Me and my group member Laura Jeffreson - http://laurajeffreson.blogspot.com/ - have finished the Storyboard of our entire opening of the film we are going to create. We spent about 2 hours today drawing out each shot, focussing on the camera angles and types, and the detail of the description behind each one.
Here is our final storyboard:


1. This is our Institutional Logo that we created, called 'Legend Productions'. It lasts about 6 seconds long and is our first shot.
2. This is our second Institution, called 'Twisted Pictures'. This lasts about 11 seconds altogether.
3. This is our first, establishing shot of our main characters house, shown with on-screen text.
4. This is the first action the audience see's - of the main character ripping up pieces of paper which are vital to the storyline.

1. This is of our main character throwing the pieces of paper into the fire we will create.
2. This shot shows the main character walking away slowly in the background, with the fire being the main focus to represent the characters anger and overwhelmingness.
3. This is of the main character sharpening a knife on a knife-sharpener, with the screeching noise heard loudly, to put the audience at edge.
4. With the screeching noise still playing, the character will run his hand along a set of weapons.

1. This is showing the first victims front door, slowly zooming in slightly, immitating the point of view in which the main character will have.
2. This is another establishing shot of the inside of the victims house - the girl on the sofa acting normal, with the doorbell ringing in background.
3. This is a slight over the shoulder shot at eye-level to show what the girl is about to see, but cutting off before the audience has been revealed the character.
4. Point of view shot from the main character standing outside, leaves audience in mystery as they still don't know what he looks like. Shot ends with girl screaming in fear.



1. This is the beginning of the fast cuts we are including, and this one being of a victim's feet running. The onscreen text will be of one of the actors names.
2. This is similar to the shot before, however the victim is running in opposite direction and onscreen text is different. This is to show the rapid pace and franticness of the characters, that they are escaping in all directions.
3. Shows a character being dragged out from under the bed, focussing on their facial expression. With onscreen text again.
4. A character being thrown against a wall inside a house, onscreen text of an actor. 



1. This is another shot of the fire we have created, but it taking up most of the screen now, with the onscreen text continuing again.
2. A bird-eye-view type shot on this one, looking down from a very high angle above the stairs as the victims run up.
3. The door of the bedroom being shut dramatically, with the faint sobbing sound of the panicked victims.
4. All 3 victims hurrying into the wardrobe, trying to hide from main character.

1. Focussing on the inside of the door, listening to the footsteps of the main character as they get closer up the stairs. This will build the pace of the whole scene and scare audience.
2. This is of the door handle being rattled and eventually turned, panicked victims trying to hold back screams.
3. Another establishing, master shot of the scene. The door is slowly beginning to open on left as characters are still in wardrobe, on right.
4. An overview shot of some of the village that our film is set in, zooming out as if the main character is now leaving.

1. This is our last shot and is of our title 'Necrophobia' that we have designed especially for our genre and message we want to get to our target audience.





WHY HAVE WE DONE THIS?

Storyboarding is a great way to ensure that you have something to follow by when you are filming, and that's exactly the reason why we created a storyboard today. We made it clear and detailed so that on Saturday 12th when we begin filming, we'll know everything we want for each shot/scene so that we'll make no mistakes and work well.

Planning Assessment Examples - 7/11/11

In small groups within our  Media class today, we were given 4 examples of previous Media A Level coursework, exactly the same as what we're doing, and were asked to evaluate their blogs to prepare us for when we get asssessed on Wednesday. I was in a group with Jon Champion - http://jonasmediacoursework.blogspot.com/ - Iran and Adam Sarginson - http://jonasmediacoursework.blogspot.com/, and we had to fill out a form of the 5 different sections that our blogs are going to be marked on.
The 5 sections were:

• Research/Target Audience - shown some background research into the genre, other films and completed target audience analysis (questionnaires, surveys)
• Organisation - how they have organised they're actors, locations, costumes and props
• The Practical - storyboards/shotlists/animatics/scripting
• Presentation - shown some care in the layout of research and planning
• Time Management - how many blogs per week, altogether, etc.

Here are some pictures of the sheets we worked on today:

There was a variety of different grades of each of the examples we looked at, but I think our group managed to analyse and award the grade's correctly to what each example deserved, which shows we do have a good undertstanding of what's expected of us. I have seen that some of the things the examples did well were their practical parts of it - storyboarding, scripts, actors, costumes - and some of the things they could have improved on were their audience research and time management. I have learnt from completing this task that I need to concentrate more on the audience as it's the most important aspect that is looked at, and I need to continue  keeping myself well organised and keep my time management to a high standard.

From what I have learnt, in this weeks action plan I have made sure I am going to create another questionnaire/survey for my target audience - but this time virtually through Facebook, which is a popular social networking site for the audience we have chosen.

Week 6 Action Plan

This is going to be our last action plan before we begin filming this Saturday (12th), so these are the last few planning preparations we need to make:

• Create a storyboard of our shots
• Blog the script that we have created
• Create an individual virtual questionnaire/survey for our target audience to answer
• Choose some pieces of music
• Blog about our Title logo - 'Necrophobia'
• Finish our Props - letters
• Sort out the costumes each character will be wearing

For this weeks action plan, I have blogged from my friends (Nicola Ho - http://nicolaastleyasmedia.blogspot.com/) Mobile Phone to show the different ways of media that I can access my Blogger account.

Here are some pictures as evidence:

They are slightly blurry due to my rubbish camera on my phone, but they show the basic image of me blogging on the Mobile Phone!