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Audience Research 

11th February 2015

Interviews

Grace and I decided that the best way to produce our audience research was to conduct a number of interviews with the majority of our target audience. To start with, we created a list of questions that we could ask our interviewees once we had collected them. We thought it was inportant to include a range of questions of the genre, the elements included in our rough cut, such as the soundtrack, and their overall opinions as it important to us that our target audience enjoys what we have produced. Once we had created our questions, we went and asked for volunteers willing to be interviewed questions on our rough cut. The participants we collected were:

 

  • Katie Greenwood

  • Ryan Thompson and Josh Obisanya

  • Lewis Hyanes and Ross Beart

  • Chris and Karen

 

We thought these people would be perfect for our audience research as there was a mixture of females and males, and although Katie, Ryan, Josh, Lewis and Ross  are all around the same age group of 16-17 year olds. Chris and Karen were able to give us their perspective from a slightly older view. 

Analysis

Katie Greenwood:

 

1. Really good and really enjoyed it.

2. Good setting and really creepy.

3. When the clown kills Emily (the main female character) and then the face appares on the camera on the end shot.

4. They're clear and split up in the right places.

5. Really like it, really good.

6. It could go many ways, perhaps back in time or go ahead in time, maybe kill someone else.

7. Defintely really suits it.

8. No improvement.

 

Overall, Katie thoroughly enjoyed our thrileer opening, and couldn't find anything to fault with it. She did not have any improvements for us, which shows us that in her opinion, the thriller opening resembled one in which could be considered professional. However, we felt that we should look into more peoples opinions as we had already thought of some improvements we could make as a group, therefore we wanted to see if anyone else noticed them as well. 

 

 

Questions used in our interviews

Ryan Thompson and Josh obisanya:

 

1. Ryan: quite good and scary

Josh: Sent chills down his spine and it was surprisingly good.

2. Josh: Yes it does fit the genre and the whole mood fits the genre

Ryan: The lighting and soundtrack allow it to fit the genre

3.Ryan: The ending when you see the shoes standing by the victim and then the clown face appearing on the camera prop and Josh agreed this

4. Josh: The credits were the highlight for Josh and it was edited brilliantly.

Ryan: The font and colour were appropriate.

5. Ryan: The Soundtrack made a massive impact

Josh: Eiry and it was more of an instrumental piece as opposed to a soundtrack.

6. Josh: clearly a very mischevious character and there is clearly going to be more deaths in the future.

7. Ryan and Josh both said it was very dark and a good setting which means that our original audience research was good.

8. Josh said that he would like to see more because it was quite captivating and really attracted his attention.

 

Overall, Josh and Ryan seemed to like our thriller opening. They thought it fit the key conventions on a psycho-thriller genre. They thought the credits were designed well and josh liked the way they appeared. They also both understood where the story was going, which shows that we portrayed it well.

 

Karen and Chris

 

1. Karen and Chris both said that is was very atmospheric and spooky

2. Both agreed that our thriller opening does fit the genre

3. Chris' favourite part of the opening was when the clown appears whereas Karen's was when the establishing shot took place (the filming of the trees horizontally)

4. Chris said she found the credits slightly distracting but then once she understood that they had to be there, she didn't find them distracting. Karen didn't find them distracting.

5. Both Karen and Chris liked the soundtrack

6. The girl which gets seperated from the rest of the group is the main target however there are murders to follow.

7. Both Chris and Karen thought that setting was appropriate.

8. Neither of them thought there were any improvements to be made.

 

Overall, Chris and Karen thought our thriller opening was quite spooky, however Karen appeared to really like it. They both agreed that it fit the genre and although Chris mistunderstood why the credits were there but she eventually understood there purpose. 

 

Lewis Haynes and Ross Beart

 

1. Ross found our thriller opening very suspenseful and nerveracking and Lewis found it good too.

2. Ross said that the clown character fit the genre therefore the whole opening did too.

3. Ross said that his favourite part of the thriller opening was when the clown appeared behind the trees whereas Lewis said he enjoyed the part where the clowns face was on the camera.

4. Ross thought they were very appropriate at the beginning as well as throughout the opening scene.

5. They said that the soundtrack added to the suspense of the opening.

6. Ross said that the clown clearly killed the girl but Lewis thought that the clown was on the run from the girls.

7. Ross said yes because the woods fits the genre because its scary.

8. Ross said that perhaps the final shot should be an extreme close up of Josh's clown face and this will scare the audience.

 

Ross and Lewis both found our thriller opening good. They both gave some good feedback, however most of it was to do with the shots of the film. Which will be difficult to change now as we are currently in editing, as are filming is complete. However we will take into consideration there comments and try to do the best we can to make our audience like our thriller opening. 

 

 

 

 

Focus Group

For our second piece of audience feedback, Grace, Tommy and I thought a focus group would be a good way of getting some more opinions from our target audience. Since we were in sixth form during the time we filmed our focus group, we were only able to get people from our target audience of an age range of 16-18 year olds. However we felt that they could give us constructive advice on how to improve. Therefore we went around and asked a mixture of males and females if they could take part. The poeple in our focus group were: 

 

  • Joshua Smith (17 years old)

  • Billie Krauss (18 years old)

  • Niamh Sarson (17 years old)

  • Ben Watts (16 years old) 

  • Elliot Green (16 years old)

 

When we asked everyone in our focus group if they liked our thriller opening, they all said they did except Billie who said she didnt. However we learnt that this was because Billie has a fear of clowns, and found the clip extra scary. However, although it was not enjoyable for Billie, it means that we have managed to fit the key conventions of a physco-thriller genre by making some of the target audience feel anxious. When asked what they liked about the opening, Niamh said the music as it made her feel scared, the others then agreed with her comments. We then asked what they would change about our thriller opening if they had the chance to and they all replied with the fact that they would make it longer. However for us, this did not really help as all of our filming had already been completed which meant that 

 

 

making it longer would not really be a possibility content wise. They were then asked question 5, which regarded the soundtrack and we discovered that it made the majority of our focus group feel scared, however Elliot said that he thought it could be "tenser". Therefore we will take this into consideration when making our final cut. Elliot also said that when we were building up to thw more tense areas in the clip, perhaps we should make the soundtrack faster as this could help with the tension. Overall, our focus group was a success and we recevied some helpful advice on how to improve our thriller opening.    

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