The document discusses the importance of gathering audience feedback at various stages of creating a film or other product. It provides examples from the film "28 Days Later" where negative feedback improved the ending. The author's group created a horror film trailer and gathered feedback from surveys, test screenings with other students and non-students, which helped them improve the pacing, add necessary elements like titles, and decide not to reveal too much of the plot. The feedback was overall positive and helped strengthen the scary and suspenseful elements of the trailer.

1. Question 3
WHAT HAVE YOU LEARNT
FROM YOUR AUDIENCE
FEEDBACK?

2.  Audience feedback is extremely important when making any
product, especially films as it acts as a test run before the
product is released. This allows the creators to receive honest
criticism, which could then help improve the product further.
 In addition to this, it allows the producers of the product to see if
it fits the target audience and if it appeals to them, plus possibly
a larger audience. This gives an accurate representation of how
the film would be perceived on the actual release. If the
feedback is negative, it allows the producers to then change
parts of the product which would then appeal to the audience.
 For example, ‘28 Days Later’ was screened and the audience
didn’t approve of the ending and described it being ‘too bleak’
because Jim ends up dying, whilst his female rescuers go off to
fight the zombie apocalypse. However, after negative feedback
the ending was changed so that Jim survived and the zombie’s
starved to death. The film went on to being described as ‘The
best purely British horror/science-fiction film in decades. And
the first great apocalypse movie of the new millennium’
IMPORTANCE OF AUDIENCE FEEDBACK

3.  Before we started filming we
conducted an online survey which was
completed by a range of people,
primarily aged 17 and 18. This gave us
our main target audience age as well
as gender. In addition to this, we were
able to find out what sub-genre of
horror was most favourable of our
target audience. We also gave a brief
synopsis of an idea we had for a horror
trailer (we further developed this idea)
the results of this showed us that this
idea would be a success amongst this
target audience.
GATHERING OUR FEEDBACK

4.  After we filmed and started to edit we screened a rough cut of
our trailer to the rest of our A2 media class. This enabled us
to gather positive comments about our trailer as well as
constructive criticism from students who understand the
conventions of a horror trailer and who are also in our prime
target audience. This gave us a realistic view of what people
think, letting us improve on the trailer to get the best
outcome possible.
 As a group we also screened our trailer to friends who are not
media students to see what the general public would think.
This also gave us insight to what points were good and what
we needed to improve on.
GATHERING OUR FEEDBACK

5.  We took the negative/constructive criticism on board and wanted to make
sure our trailer appealed to our audience. One point people made was
that our equilibrium was too long, because of this our group agreed that
we could cut it down a little bit as we realised it was quite long. This
made a big difference and allowed the trailer to flow smoother than
before.
 Due to the trailer not being fully finished when we screened it, it meant
we had not been able to include everything. One point people made was
that there were no titles. We knew this was necessary and included them
after we had decided on effective fonts. Alongside this, it was suggested
we add more sound effects in certain places. Once we watched the trailer
over, we agreed with the feedback; especially when we added a cinematic
bass sound effective over our jump scare. This made it a lot more
effective.
 Another improvement that was suggested to us was to explain the
narrative a bit more in the trailer, and show who the killer was. However,
as a group we decided against this because we purposely wanted to keep
the killer a secret and for the trailer to be confusing as this would entice
viewers. We wanted the trailer to play on the audiences minds and their
fear of the unknown. I think we were able to do this through challenging
the narrative structure, which in turn, made it a successful trailer.
OUR FEEDBACK - NEGATIVES

6.  From our feedback we found there were many positive points of
our trailer which made it successful. Our group agreed with this,
as these were the main parts we worked extremely hard on and
also thought were positive points of the trailer. The majority of
people said that we had good shots; this is something we had
paid close attention to throughout the filming and editing. There
were two main shots in particular that people commented on, the
under water shot and the ‘head bang’ shot. Both of these took a
great deal of time and planning, so we were especially please
that people liked these.
 Many people also commented on the fact our trailer picked up
pace in the right places, which was complemented by the
crescendo of music; this made the trailer more intense and built
suspense.
 Another positive was that people thought the trailer was scary,
which is something we obviously wanted to achieve seeing it is a
horror trailer. Alongside this, there were comments that we didn’t
give away much of the story line, which again is something we
worked hard on as we wanted to make it confusing and play on
the audiences minds’.
OUR FEEDBACK- POSITIVES

7. MAGAZINE FEEDBACK
The feedback I received for my poster was firstly to include another colour. This is something I agreed with and once
I added another colour it made the magazine more eye-catching. As well as this, I changed the layout of some texts,
which again improved the aesthetic of the magazine.
Draft Final Design

8. POSTER FEEDBACK
I started with the first draft as my poster, however I received feedback
that the girl didn't look vulnerable but instead looked like she had the
power, due to direct mod of address. I then changed the image to
something that made the girl look scared and in trouble. The feed back
I received on this draft was to make certain text stand out ‘coming
soon’ and I added a drop shadow and a second layer to the title to
make it the most prominent text on the page. I also decided to add
more text which would intrigue the audience ‘a betrayal of friendship’.
Final Design
Draft 1 Draft 2

9.  Overall our group took on the improvements we were given.
Although, most of these changes we made were minor they
made a big difference overall and helped our trailer more
successful. If it wasn’t for this feedback, our trailer might
not have appealed to our intended target audience.
 Throughout this presentation, I have outlined why we made
these changes and how it effected our trailer. The main
points we needed to improve on was the jump scare and the
inter-titles. We changed this, and it made a big impact on
our trailer and improved it massively.
OVERALL…