1. What have you learnt from audience
feedback?
Througout the process I have constanlty referred to audience feedback and research to
make the products relevant to our target audience. I found the best
way to question the public was through an online survey creator
called “survey monkey” it allowed you to publish the survey via
email, social media and online to allow a large sample of answer.
Also through the analysis by showing the results on a graph it
allowed a quicker undertsanding of the most popular view.
The first survey was to determine the target audience. For this helped to produce the style
and themes for the products. Through the questions I
determined the gender and age of my audience but also
what attracts them to a new song, how they view female
artists and where
they watch music
videos. From these
results determined
that the majority of
people who watch Pop music are Women aged 16-25.
They also like artist who are powerful and strong and
attractive, this helped to understand what image to
create our star into, instead of the conventional provocative image female stars are shown
in. Using this information we have found we will
be able to advertise to attract this target
audience and presenting the figure of the artist in
the light which will attract this form of female. In
advertising today it is important to narrow down
your selected audience as attracting a market is
vital to sell albums as people can easily illegally
download music, but if you receive the high
attention through a good advertising campaign
the people who enjoy the artist will be willing to
pay to listen. Also due to this being the audience of our age group we can use our own
knowledge of what we like and find appealing to draw in others.
For this target audience social media is a huge presence in their lives, so by placing adverts
on twitter and Facebook, we can make the presence of our artist seen. Other ideas that
have been influential, such as the recreation of "Happy" videos is allowing the public to
recreate the video and post it for the world to see, as fame is seen highly in society and
recognition of your work is always strived for, So creating a competition for the best videos
to be posted to a website each month can encourage interest in the songs and the artist.
2. Next I needed to decide the plot line, through this I
sent a questionnaire via our school email systemto
pupils aged 16 and above so that the answers fit the
target audience. For the video we had a basic
understanding of our theme, being that gender is a
performance, however I still wanted to question the
target audience to guarantee the type of video they
would prefer to watch. One question which was
really important was “what do they expect to see in
a music video?” Narrative came out as the most
important
element but
also dancing
and lip sync , although our music didn’t lend itself to
provocative dancing common in Pop videos, we
considered using a different dancing style. This is why
the question asking the type of dance that suits pop so
that we know what the audience will enjoy and will fit
into the genre, this showed how popular ballet would
being the pop video as well as showing the grace and
beauty of the dance while also emphasising femininity
which is present in the theme of our video. Creating the
narrative for the plot was important and the interactions
between characters, I chose to follow Levi-Strauss’ narrative
theory of constant conflicts between opposites, with the
audience deciding they’d prefer a conflict of passive versus
active. Without these pointers at the beginning of the
process it could have ended in a piece of text that didn’t
draw in our intended audience.
After I decided my song choice and target audience I
had to create the image which will become the star
that the product will be based around. I knew from
the survey that my target audience were wanting a
female who was aged 16-25 who was viewed as
“Strong” and a true representative for feminism.
Now that the personality was determined I needed
to decide upon a name, I began with Stella. This was
perfect when we had decided upon using a Chinese girl with short, gelled hair as it fit her
appearance well, however, when she could no longer partake one of our team had to stand
in. The name no longer fit, so I conducted a survey asking which name each person would
prefer with an attached picture of the star. The most popular choice was “Maiya” it is
different to other names of artists around so no confusion over the identity of the artist
3. would occur. Also after creating font for my digipak the
sharp bold lines of "MAIYA" lend itself to describing the
strong, bold woman who is breaking the conventions to
portray her own form of beauty that may go against
what society think.
During the process of making the video after the end of
each rough cut we asked people of their views of how
they view the video so far. After the first rough was
posted we conducted a discussion group of teachers involved in creative subjects at our
school to attain where needs
improvements, by choosing this age
group and profession of people we
should get more technical and detailed
answers. Through this we learnt that;
they did understood the message but it
was not immediately obvious, this
meant I needed to rework the video to
make the message clearer, although due
to the reception theory that we are
allowing them to not be passive to the
text so the message can be created within the relationship between the text and the reader.
They also confused the dancer with the character doing the lip sync this was an aspect due
to how involved in the video we didn’t notice but do to the similar clothing colours and
actions they did appear the same. We needed to shorten some of the lip sync shots as they
were too long and not adhering to the 2.5 second MTV rule. They found the application of
makeup scene too long as well as the dancing scene being too long on each clip.
From this feedback being of an older age range than our
intended audience we conducted a questionnaire designed for
girls 16 and above to determine is this was a similar view held
by our target audience. We found that they shared views that
the video should be tried in black and white to see if the
transition between scenes is made more seamless. Also that
there is a need
for more close
ups, both
teachers and
target audience stated how they enjoyed the
dancing and the close up but they felt there
needed to be more instead of more distanced
shots of
dancing.
The target audience also was confused who the dancer
was with many thinking they were the same person, to
alter this we added a split screen of both he dancer and
the star doing the same motion instead of the actions
4. being followed by another. This gave the appearance of both the actions in unison making it
seem more unrealistic that they are the same person.
One main concern brought up by the questionnaire
was the view of the bridge sequence. In this scene we
had used an alternate location by the beach, however
this wasn’t viewed positively by either group who
found it “confusing” this is the opposite of the desired
outcome as we want to allow the audience to feel
absorbed into the narrative and confusion only will
alienate them. This confusion was sue to the short
nature of the scene being shown but also the
irrelevance to the location. So from this first audience
feedback we learnt that we needed to remove specific
scene, film more footage for close ups and to create a
new way for our message to be clearer.
After these changes were made we reposted the same questionnaire with a few alterations,
by using very similar questions it means that I can directly compare the result to view
improvement. These final group of questions associated with the video hope to achieve a
majority of the audience to understand the themes of the video intended and to have
produced an enjoyable product. From the rough cut we; added a split screen, placed the
footage in black and white, removed the bridge scene footage, filmed extreme close ups of
the dancer and cut down some of the lip sync.
The questions we asked were:
1. How much did you enjoy the music video?
This is one of the most important questions to ask as videos are watched for enjoyment so
are produced to advertise the song. A video
that is not well received by the public will
not be shared to friends and won’t be
repeatedly watched. Overall the video when
viewed was enjoyed by over 50%, this is
positive feedback. By having nearly 20%
very much enjoying it, it shows that we have
created a video that fits to the particular
audience well. Our video, as we know, isn't a
conventional Pop video as it is not fast
paced so we understood in advance it
wouldn't be to everyone's style so by only having less than 10% disliking the video it was a
success in our view, as no video can be enjoyed by everyone.
5. 2. Did it hold your attention?
This follows on from the previous question as with
no video do you want to find yourself bored. This
is why we tried to keep the action constantly
changing and engaging with the dancing, the
narrative of the star and the lip sync. Once the
results were analysed with nearly 75% being
engaged shows that the imagery obviously kept
their interest. However the people who lost
attention we can only assume it may have been
down to the slower type of song or the dancing
instead of the typical, fun Pop video.
3. How do you rate the camera work?
For the footage we need to use a variety of camera angles but maintain a sense of
continuity by the use of match on action.
By doing this it will make the action seem
interesting and varied rather than sticking
to one type of shot throughout. So by
asking how the camera work is rated, it
reveals how the shots flow together and
the changing views of an image are viewed
by the spectator positively. We found that
the majority of viewers viewed the camera
work positively with around 88% thinking
the camera work was average or above.
This shows that on average the changing
camera angles are liked by our audience
which is vital in the video as if the camera shots were sporadic it could become confusing.
4. How do you rate the editing?
For the editing we wanted to keep it simple to still
provide a sense of continuity by mostly using match on
action changing shots during the same scene. So
through this we are wanting to see how the audience
think the video is flowing and if they believe it is jolting
between different images. The results show most
people found the video flowed due to the high ratings
in editing. This links to other music videos which all
flow smoothly fitting conventions of having a sense of
continuity.
5. Would you watch the video again?
6. Watching a video repeated times is how music today
can be boosted into the charts. This is why it is
important to gather is the video is viewed positively
enough for repeated viewing. With over 90% saying
"yes" that they would watch the video again it shows
the video was viewed well offering the chance of
success with the album.
6. Does the video reflect the style of Pop?
This questions answer is vital as to draw in a Pop
audience you need to display a product that they will
enjoy so to include similar genre conventions of Pop. As
our video is very different to other forms of pop video
due to its slower tempo, lack of colour, a powerful
women star who isn't being displayed for a male gaze and
no group dancing, we had to clarify that the viewers of
this genre would still consider the video Pop. Our video
was successfully viewed as Pop so we know that we will be producing our video for the right
target audience.
7. On a scale of 1-5 with 5 being the highest, how would you rate the video?
Due to our investment in the video we cannot tell
how it is rated by an external viewer. So this duration
allows us, as a whole to grasp how our work was
taken by the audience. With a majority rating of 4 we
were thrilled, this shows that audience highly viewed
the video and with no one rating it a "1" we feel this
was a great success. However, due to the participants
being people we knew it could be biased as they may
not have wanted to be negative about our work.
8. Who do you think the dancer is?
This is a question I asked in previous surveys, for our piece we are wanting the message of
the dancer and the star to be separate but
from previous feedback we have found that
the audience became confused and thought
they were the same person. So from that
feedback we have altered the footage adding
a split screen of both the character to
hopefully make this clearer. From these
changes they have made a significant
difference with over 60% understanding our
idea of the characters being separate.
However, due to different representations we cannot make everyone see the same message
so to have a majority is great.
9. What is the messagebehind the video?
7. For messages portrayed in the video, this was
also asked in previous surveys, we cannot
guarantee one message will be the only thing
portrayed, however our main message was
that gender has no limitations and that
women don't have to be conventionally
feminine. The majority of answers understood
the main message we were portraying with
gender being a performance and the
understanding of diversity. However with a
small proportion thinking it meant to be "more like men" it could be due to the original
meaning of the song being transferred to our video.
10. What do you think of the dance footage?
Out of the footage taken, my favourite and I believe most
effective clips were during the dancing sections. So
through this question we can see whether this footage,
as although different to other videos, is viewed positively
as well. The footage was mostly viewed well with it being
seen as interesting with clear footage and causing the
footage to appear fast paced which is effective for our
video due to the slow tempo of the song.
From the results of our survey it made us come to the
conclusion that the video was complete, after a
discussion the only method for a larger success would be to film yet more footage and due
to time restriction this wouldn’t be possible. However, from the overall audience research
throughout I have learnt the useful tool it can be for audience feedback as they can help
with suggestions while offering constructive criticismon issue you may not have noticed
yourself in the work.
Even though the video was our main product I still found a huge need for audience feedback
and involvement in the designing and production of both my ancillary products. This is
because for an album to sell they need a good advertising campaign to attract the audience
and giving the information for the new album.
I started with the digipak, we started by
posting a message to our Facebook
friends asking what they look at in a
digipak most, by picking this form of
distribution it will go to people of our target audience
and allowed us results quickly. From their replies we
learnt that the main thing viewed is the main images
which they like to be creative, this means this will
become the main focus. At first the images from the
footage shot for the video became the main images for
the digipak. I also used some colour and effects to give
8. the images a glamourous, patterned effect. An
important aspect I think for a digipak is how the
images blend disjointed and won’t create one
clean product. From the findings with the
majority voting no, this made me need to
reconsider my images and take another photo
shoot for better images. Through the feedback
on
social
media we learnt the importance of the images,
therefore the images of a digipak had to work well
together but
also be strong on
their own. They
needed to be
clear and look
professional for
a digipak to sell. However, I have found my digipak was
viewed as unprofessional and the pictures were pixelated,
this is the opposite of the desired view so I needed to change the images instead of using
screen grabs from the video. My overall first digipak was unsuccessful with the main
concept being to help sell albums, however, the view was that they would not buy the
album showed the digipak needed drastically changing.
From this feedback I began the next photo
shoot keeping in mind the idea of getting
creative, clear photos with an element of
synergy so all
the images
flow together
well. After the
shoot I realised
this research
should have been
something I had done
before the first digipak
design to allow the time not to have been lost. Once the
second digipak was complete I created a new
questionnaire which was then published. I used the same
questions so that the
answers were directly
comparable so I could
see if there was an
improvement. With
over half voting for the images blending well it shows
that there is a strong continuity between the images
showing and improvement from the previous digipak. The images were nearly viewed as by
9. nearly 90% of people as clear and professional which is
the main aspect needed in the digipak. Also the
chance of purchasing the album is extremely
successful showing the design is appealing and offers
promise of a good album to the customer. Finally with
a high agreement in the synergy of the product is an
improvement from previously. Overall the audience
feedback helped create a more effective digipak that would appeal to the target audience.
My final product was my advert. My advert used the main
image from my digipak but with a reflective effect. Like my
other products the audience feedback is vital to work out if a
prospective audience
would be interested by
the advert. The theme
of black, white and
gold is used through
both my ancillary tasks
so the audience liking
this theme would be
vital to sales, with 80% liking the colours it gives a
good representative that the majority of our target
audience would also like the theme so would be more
interested in the product. The overall view of the image
was that it looked
professional and clear,
however, the view that
is was unprofessional
and pixelated was still
high, therefore along with the feedback that audiences
expect at least 2
different
advertisements
for an album I
chose to create another advert. However, this
advert was still viewed well as it ranked 3 out of 5
making it viewed as average with a strong sense
of synergy.
10. For my second advert I chose to use the same
image but to edit the image to give the message of
diversity and how in a postmodern society our
image has been produced from other before us.
After it was produced I used the same survey for
the advert to
determine
what the
consensus
was. I used
the same questionnaire as the questions still apply to
the new advert. Although the colours of black, white
and gold are less vivid the audiences view is still highly
rated. The image is viewed as clear and professional,
which is really successful. The small number of votes
that it is unprofessional are most likely to do with the
effect as by laying multiple faces it is unusual. From the
audience feedback I learnt that the second advert was much
more positively viewed with a high rating of 4, showing that
this advert would be effective without target audience due to
the high praise. Finally the synergy I think is less obvious with
this advert due to the colours not being present as clearly,
however, the public still see the link between the products
which is important and both the adverts used together will
provide a strong link to the album. I feel that the advert was successful so would attract the
target audience well.
Therefore from my audience research I have learnt what an audience may expect from the
Pop genre. From their feedback I was able to tailor the products to directly influence women
aged 16-25.With their opinions I was able to improve all my work and now I think that all
would be effective in the sales of the album.
