My Initial Feedback
Throughout my project I have used a mixture of verbal feedback and online feedback from all aspects of my work from members of my target audience. This has been extremely useful in helping me to develop my work and skills both in video editing and in photo editing.
Target Audience
-Who is my target audience?
After having done some detailed research into music genre and choosing pop music as my chosen music genre I discovered that it would be appropriate to aim my project towards teenagers and young adults. By choosing this target audience I was able to easily and regularly receive audience feedback from my friends who were part of my target audience.
I didn't want my products to be tailored to a specific gender group but instead I wanted it to be relatable to all sexes within my chosen age range.
-What specific techniques did I use to appeal to my target audience?
I included specific elements within my music video and ancillary products that I thought would appeal to members of my target audience and that would be relatable to teenagers to further build the relationship between the artist and the audience. These included elements such as:
-Using teenage actors- by having my actors of the same age as my target audience I thought that it would maker my video more realistic for my younger audience. Girls would be able to relate to the girlfriend character if they had ever been through a bad breakup and boys would be able to relate to my leading male if they have ever been through a hard time and turned to using bad coping mechanism to be able to get through it.
- The theme of young love- most teenagers tend to experience a few relationships during their teen years and this theme can be appealing to them as they can understand the complexities of the situations and can connect and empathize with one or both parties involved.
-The inclusion of alcohol- this element applies to some but not all of my target audience. There is a strong inclusion of alcohol throughout my video which can be appealing to some of the older members of my target audience who enjoy drinking or who have had any experiences with turning to alcohol to be able to deal with there own problems.
-The close up shots of my artist in my ancillary products- By including close up shots of my artists head this has enhanced Mulvey's theory of male gaze and the attraction of members of my target audience who were female. I specifically asked my artist to use a smoldering facial expression to make him appear more sexualized, and enhanced this further by using bright lights to highlight his features. This technique was aimed more at my female target audience rather than the males, but could also be applied to men to.
Use of focus groups
-How did I use focus groups?
I decided to use focus groups in a number of ways in order to receive feedback on my work. I found focus groups to be a particularly useful way of receiving group feedback from my target audience in a quick and easy way. I gathered together groups of audience members that were both part of my target audience and in some cases of a slightly older demographic- just to get another fresh perspective on my work. I did this at different stages of my work (at the beginning, during the middle stages and at the end) so that I could constantly develop my ideas and ensure that my product was appealing to the right group of people. I found focus groups easy to set up and I was able to use many of my friends to form these, knowing they would give me honest opinons and constructive criticism.
-What have I learnt from focus groups?
By using focus groups I have learnt that sometimes your intentions as a director aren't always as clear as you think they're going to be to the audience. For example, at the ending of my music video I have a range of shots leading up to a final close up shot of my actor overdosing. A few members of my target audience received this differently and had thought that he had just fallen asleep rather than overdosed. This feedback made me think a lot about how I could have made my intentions clearer through some of my shots but I also quite liked that my audience were able to make up there own minds about what was happening to my main character. I have also learnt from conducting focus groups that it is important to get a second opinion on some of the decisions you are thinking about making. I showed my focus groups images and designs of my two ancillary products and asked them for opinions on colour schemes and the style of images that I should use for both products. They agreed with my that the colour scheme should be bold and stand out so that it is eye-catching. They also agreed with my choice of close up shot of my artist as the main image that I should use on both my album and my advert. They liked that this built up a connection between the artist and the audience and immediately engaged them in the product.
-Using the feedback I received from my focus groups and if I were to re-do my project what would I change?
If I was to re-do my project I would make the narrative of my video more overtly obvious, as this was clearly a hazy area for some members of my target audience. I would also work more closely on my editing of my performance footage so that the lip-syncing elements were tighter and more in time. This was another area that was picked up by some members of my target audience and something I identify as an area of weakness within my video. I would certainly hope to develop my skills both within production and post-production stages of the performance element to improve my video overall. I would also perhaps experiment more with playing around with the pace and timing of some of my shots within the video, particularly towards the beginning. I chose to make the pace slower at this moment so to build up to the dramatic peak of the video later on, however some of my target audience commented that a quicker pace would also have a similar effect on the video and build up the tension further.
Examples of feedback I have received
-Here are some examples of the different ways in which I have received feedback for my work apart from just my focus groups.
-Here is some evidence of feedback I have received on my blog from my media teacher. These screenshots have been taken from my first and second last rough cuts of my video. This was a particularly useful method of feedback as it was constructive, detailed and specific to different elements of my work.
-Here is evidence from a blog post where I have responded to verbal feedback in a discussion I had with my media teacher about the ways in which I could resolve some formatting issues I was having with my ancillary products
-In conclusion, the feedback I have received from both members of my target audience (teenagers and young adults) and audience members such as my parents and teacher has been extremely useful in helping me develop my ideas and designs. My target audience in particular have given me feedback that has allowed me to design and create a video and set of ancillary products that are tailored to their needs and tastes. I believe that I have been successful overall in my attempts to produce products that have been targeted at the pop music genre and young audience as I have received an overall positive response both verbally, written and through my survey. However, I have learnt that it may have been useful to use audience feed even more frequently that I did, as they became the most useful way to be able to improve my work and correct my mistakes. However, my products were made with my target audience in mind throughout the whole process, which has allowed me to create products that will appeal to them whilst reaching their expectations as to what they can expect from the pop music genre.
It might be helpful to include links to some of the posts you reference as well as screengrabs. If possible, you could drop in screengrabs (or even gifs) of some of the relevant moments from your products which were influenced by audience feedback.
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