Emma learned several important things from gathering audience feedback during the production of her horror film trailer and ancillary products: 1) Her audience provided honest feedback about what they wanted to see in terms of genre conventions and were eager to participate in the pre-production process. 2) Incorporating the audience's ideas and opinions helped ensure the final products would appeal to and be supported by the target viewers. 3) Continuous feedback during the editing process allowed for helpful adjustments before the products were finalized.

1. Evaluation
Question 3:
What have you
learned from
your audience
feedback?
Emma Thomson

2. https://youtu.be/sJ7USCO1-r4

3. Throughout the production process I was encouraged to get
feedback from my audience to produce my trailer and my
ancillary products, so that I was producing a product that they
wanted. If it was to be released, it would have more chance
of success as a product because it is made solemnly with my
target audience in mind and I have taken their input seriously
throughout the whole production process, so the audience
can feel involved in the production and final product itself.

4. At the beginning of the process I had to establish who my target
audience were to gain their feedback. It made sense to establish my
target audience so that I was getting relevant feedback from a fan of
the genre, so that I was adapting it to their needs from a horror film
trailer. It means that the audience I am choosing to connect with are
active in helping me succeed with the production of my products. It is
all about the uses and gratifications theory and what my consumer
needs from the products being produced. I believe that those who
choose to watch the horror genre in the first place are seeking a
diversion from their day to day life, as mentioned by Bulmer and Katz
in 1974. If they are seeking a diversion and a form of escapism, it is
my job as a prosumer (a consumer and a producer of media) to give
the audience what they want, which is why overall their input is key
to the products success because I need to ensure that I am giving
them the right amount of escapism to allow them to feel scared and
engaged in the trailer.

5. Prior to producing the trailer and the ancillary product I
had produced a questionnaire to gain my target
audience’s opinions as to what they wanted to see from
my products. These questions consisted of a variety of
open questions, with multi-choice answers, as well as
the option to have their own input as a ‘other’ option.
They responded with the overall idea that they wanted
a female leading psychological horror, based in the
woods that is going to be distributed on social medias
(primarily Youtube) on a typical date such as Friday 13th
Or Halloween. This was important to see what my
target wanted as it not only gives you ideas as a
producer to be able to adapt these simplistic broad
ideas into something that can be scary and engaging.
I learned from asking for my
audience’s feedback is that they
are very honest and forward as
to what they want to see in the
market, and when asking people
to fill out my questionnaire in the
first place on Survey Monkey
they were eager to do so, and it
wasn’t a problem or a hassle for
them to do so. It shows me that
people do like to be involved in
the pre-production process, so
they will be more supportive of
the outcome if you are able to
incorporate the ideas that they
had into your final product.

6. After producing my questionnaire, I opted for producing a storyboard to
gain more feedback from my target audience. It meant that I printed out
my storyboard and stuck it on sugar paper and allowed a variety of
people from not only my class, but peers in my year to comment and
write on my work and voice their opinions. Some of the feedback is
mainly just supportive of my product, but there are some distinct
comments that show areas that I can work on which I took on board.
Although this is my trailer that I am producing, it must always be with the
target audience in mind, as I have learned through researching horror
genre products, they stick to the main conventions of the genre itself
which the audience do acknowledge and look for, as presented to me in
the feedback I received where it was mentioned that I needed to refer to
more conventions of the horror genre to make it evident that my trailer
was going to belong to that genre.

7. For my trailer, whilst editing and producing drafts I was consistently asking my peers what
they thought of my trailer and what I could do to adapt it to make it more appealing and
scary as they too are my audience. This helped me to make adaptions whilst going through
the production stage, instead of having to wait until I had finished my product, because
then once I had incorporated elements of music and transactions, it is a lot harder to edit
as it adjusts the pace if you are to delete and crop footage as such. Alongside this, once I
had 30 seconds worth of edited footage, as well as majority of my trailer completed and
edited to what I believed to be a satisfactory standard I uploaded the trailers to my
Youtube. This meant that I was then able to extend my range of feedback and allow my
family to watch the trailer and voice their opinions on my editing and how I had put
together the footage. My family were again supportive of my trailer after watching it, and
admittedly said that they would watch the trailer despite not being huge fans of the horror
genre itself. It shows me by asking for the feedback that I not only feel a sense of
achievement because I am producing a product that people appear to like and support, but
it also improves my own personal qualities in the fact that I am able to react effectively to
constructive feedback.

8. Straying away from my trailer, when producing both my ancillary products,
I used the same concept to produce them. When producing the magazine
front cover, and the poster I decided to ask for feedback at the same time,
so I printed off the flat plans that I had digitally produced and I again stuck
them onto paper and allowed people to annotate them and comment on
which one they preferred or what I could adjust and change about them
both. The responses showed that there were two designs that dominantly
people preferred in comparison to the others that I had produced so I
went with what my target audience wanted from my products as they are
the ones who need to consume it and allow others to become aware of it
through word of mouth and sharing the products on social medias so it
needs to appeal to them and be eye catchy.

9. I also uploaded my drafts of both my magazine front cover, to see how
the colour scheme and the image I had chosen worked with what my
target audience expected from me in regards to me following the codes
and conventions of what is expected from the horror genre, and I didn’t
get any negative feedback for my colour scheme – which is black and
green as it is very vivid and eye catchy and this is what my audience
seemed to really like about the product. I had edited the image on the
magazine of my main actor, Jake, since it wasn’t relating very well to the
genre. So, from this I worked with the idea of distorting his face, so I
began using burning tools to burn away at his facial features and then
adjusted the colour schemes to distort his face to work better in
representing the horror genre. It creates an original design that is eye
catchy and represents the genre, so it is acknowledged by the target
audience and appreciated for the efforts to get it to link in the first place.

10. I have learnt that audience feedback is key to the success of
the products and that you should always work with what your
audience wants and needs to gain from your products, to
create a successful product. I have learnt that they can offer
you additional ideas to your product to improve the overall
outcome as a whole, as these are factors that you may not
have considered yourself within the production process.