Mid- Production Questionnaire Responses
We have had a lot of useful feedback for our questionnaire which has helped us in making our film better. Taking feedback from our target audience range not only allows for us to learn what the audience wants from our film, but it also enables feedback from a different perspective, which can highlight aspects previously unseen by us the creators.
We sampled a wide variety of people from our target audience:
We got almost the same percentage of genders which is important as our film is aimed at both genders and so we need a good amount of feedback from them both. This means that any improvements they suggest, will be a mixture of both genders, thus allowing us to hopefully make improvements to please both.
We also got a a wide variety of ages to give us feedback as we are targeting our film at 15+ year old and and young - middle aged adults.This also means any improvements we get suggested will be from a variety of age groups from our target audience, meaning we will hopefully please all.
We asked our respondents what their occupation was as it allows us to get some background information of our audience. Many said they were students, which some had a part time job too (mostly in retail or food), and others were in a skilled profession, as well as some in just an unskilled profession. This in turn has allowed us to get feedback from those in different classes of the population (some are working class and some are middle), along with getting feedback from students who are the most influential for our film. This is because they use social media a lot more. This means that there is a good chance that they will post their opinions of our film on social media which could influence whether or not other people go and see our film. Therefore, any improvements or suggestions that they say, we must take into consideration and try to do them. With this said, we must also take into consideration the improvements that everyone says, however students and young adults are most likely going to have the greatest online influence, and as an independent film, we cannot afford a large amount of marketing and so we highly rely on this.
We also asked our respondents if they understood the film which a large majority said yes. However 16% said they did not and this is quite a significant amount and so we now know that we need to make some changes so the audience understand the story. It was important that we asked this question as the larger percentage of our respondents said no rather than yes then we would know our story line was too confusing and the film would not be a success.
We also asked our audience what they thought of the music. This was because we wanted to make sure it gave off the right portrayal. Majority of the responses said it was "very intense" and "suspenseful". However some said that it was too jumpy in some parts, for example at the end of the title sequence. Others also said it created a build up to the point that they expected something to "jump out" however nothing did and that disappointed them. This means that we now need to go and fix the areas where it ends abruptly and also, create more thrilling scenes (in the grave yard) where it creates a climax but there is nothing that happens.
We also asked our respondents what they liked about our film as we thought positive feedback was significant so we would know what not to change. A lot of people said that they liked the jump cuts and the title sequence, as well as complementing our choice of location for the graveyard as it seemed really "creepy". We also got positive feedback on our choice of shots, saying that they were really effective and one person said that we had "mad good use of close ups". Many people also said that they liked the story line as it was "unique" and "intriguing". Also, although we did receive some negative comments on our music and improvements that could be made to it, quite a few people did say they really liked the music and it was effective in the areas that it worked. This positive feedback was very useful as we now know what aspects worked within our film and therefore this is what we will not change.
We also asked what they disliked about our film as this was significant. Things that they disliked were important as then we could remove them or improve them. One comment we got quite often was that the film was "not really thrilling" and it kind of built up suspense for nothing to happen. Therefore we know that we need to make it more thrilling. Another common dislike we got was that the ending was overall quite "confusing" and they didn't really understand it, therefore we need to make the ending much more clearer. Another common response we got was that there was not enough shots of Amy in the film and so we now know that for our next rough cut, we need to go and film some more shots of Amy. Another dislike was that the scream was "cheesy", however only one person said this and we did find it difficult to find the current screams we have, however we can look into improving this but this is not a priority as it is only a minority opinion. It was also suggested that some of our dialogue was too "quite", for example when Amy walks into the bedroom and the first diary entry. These are easy fixes and so we will be able to do this. Another thing that one of our respondents said was that they disliked the font of the title in the title sequence as they said it was too much like a Western film which seemed a little odd to them.
We thought it was important to ask our audience how they would exhibit their film as YouTube is our distributor. Majority of our responses said that they would most likely watch it at home, on YouTube which is obviously a good thing as YouTube's our distributor. It was also significant as we needed to know how much of our audience would watch it in the cinema so we would know if we had a large demand for a cinema release but since we did not, there is no need to make any plans to release it to cinemas at this point.
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We also asked our respondents to give us any improvements they thought we needed to make. This was important as it was their opportunity to tell us what we needed to change/improve. Majority of the improvements they said were just what they said they disliked, however there were a couple that were not mentioned before. For example, one pointed out that we had a break in continuity in the classroom scene (her hair is up and then the next minute it is down). Another suggestion we had was to have some shots of Amy in the graveyard overlapping shots of Chloe to show that reality and death is coming together/overlapping each other. We thought that this was a really good suggestion and therefore we are going to try and do this. Another suggestion we got was too make the diary entry shorter as it "bored" a few people, just watching Chloe write in her diary, they also suggested to make it louder. Another response said that the POV shot of Chloe walking under the arc needed re doing as it seemed too fast and rushed.
The responses we got were quite critical however helpful. We now know what we need to do to improve our film and to please our audience and make it as good as it possibly can.
