creating our poster: behind the scenes

readership profile

this is the readership profile i came up with for our target audience

Short film Questionnaire

We created a short film questionnaire to conduct some audience research.

1. Have you ever watched a short film?

2. Would you ever consider watching a short film?

3. What are your initial thoughts when you hear the word “short film”?

4. What is your favourite genre of film? Why do you like this genre?

5. What’s the most recent film you have seen?

6. Are you interested in DVD extras?

7. Where would you watch a short film?

8. What radio station do you listen to?

9. Do you read any film magazines? If so which?

10. Is there any particular film poster that sticks in your mind? And why?

examples of short films

if this video doesnt play heres the link:
http://futurestates.tv/episodes/fallout

what struck me about this film was its use of only three colours black, white and only introduced at the end green.

My short film review

My task is to write two mock up film review of 150 words:

Audience 1: Film academics/ enthusiasts interested in style, technique, etc/ cultured audience 25+
Audience 2: Blockbuster/ multiplex/ mainstream/ 15-25 audience.

Film Magazine and review writing

List of film review magazines:

· Empire

· Esquire

· DVD review

· Sight and sound

· Total film

Our two magazines that we are comparing are Total film and sight and sound.

Total film has far more visual content where as sight and sound still have images but has much more written material. The overall tone of sight and sound is much more formal. It has an exclusive impersonal style; also it lists all the credits. Both magazines use an iconic masthead.

Sight and sound reviews are longer and more in-depth, they often contrast the films they are reviewing with other films and do not use a rating system. They also do the rare thing of giving a synopsis this maybe so the audience doesn’t concentrate on narrative but the films direction, visual qualities or acting ability.

Empire has an exclusive style it is very personal. The reviews focus more on the story line and focus on the mainstream elements narrative, genre and performance. It is extremely visually enticing with the images; cell lines and pulled out quotes in the article. Its more of a dip in magazine easy to extract bits of content that appeal to you.

What do we think makes a successful film review first of all something that stood out was the lack of rating in sight and sound we decided that this was one of the biggest and easiest ways to see if a film was good or not and made comparing it to other films simple and quick.

Also visual aids are always more appealing astatically and to give you n idea of the style of the film. Also if the film is an animation being able to see how realistic and detailed the drawings is would also be a good indication the time gone into the film and its overall quality.

The films age recommendation and the level of violent and sexual content is extremely important so the potential audience know if it may cause them some offence or frighten them or if it is recommendable for children.

It is important to know who is starring in the film or who has a cameo role as this can given an indication of the performance quality also if the actors have a preference or are often associated with a certain genre it helps the audience decided if the film would fit the type of films that appeal to them.

audience demographic/ target audience

Almost every media production that is made relies on audience research prior to production and during production.

Fatal attraction famously changed its ending following a test run with a pilot.
http://fanedit.org/8486/

Snakes on a plane famously involved their target audience by allowing them to make decisions about music, dialogue, etc.
http://boston.com/ae/movies/articles/2006/08/13/camptastic/

We need to understand our target audience- and plan to create something that appeals to them. We mus therefor in our groups conduct audience research throughout the production process of our film.

We could do this in the form of video vox-pops, audio vox-pops, we could set up online questionnaires or surveys.

Who is our target audience? we need to create a detailed profile (age, gender, interests, tastes, region, career, etc).

Example: NME reader profile:
http://getememedia.com/DB/market-insight/cinema.html

Once we've don't this we need to look at them in more detail. Like there:

• film viewing habits
• what genres they prefer and why
• what films they saw most recently/ their favorite films
• whether they watch short films (if they don't, why don't they?) remind them about virals which can often be short films, DVD extras, youtube films, animations, etc.
• where they watch them (i they do watch them)
• sow them examples of short films and posters and ask them to say what they like and dislike about them
• can they tell you about any posters that stood out to them
• what radio stations do they listen to- or film magazines do they read.