Quesrtion 3

Quesrtion 3

• 1.
  What have youlearned from your audience feedback? Question 3
• 2.
  The First FeedbackGathered: Target Audience Survey • After completing my target audience profile I decided that I wanted more information on the audience I wanted to gain and to focus on. In order to do this I sent a survey out to those who I thought would be in my audience and also left the survey online for others to complete. In total I had 10 people participating in the survey. From the first question of what gender participants were, I proved my instincts right that most of my target audience would be females as 8 out of 10 participants were; I expected there to be a couple of male participants but not many as female country stars commonly have female viewers who aspire to be like them. This helped me with the details of my tasks as I made sure the video would appeal to females more than a male audience. • I had a similar result with the age of the audience with most being 14-17 and 10-13. I was careful not to make my star too sexy in order to keep to this age demographic. • One thing I found surprising about my results was the fact that when asked ‘What is the main thing you look for in a country music video?’ a romance element only got 2 votes, I was expecting more as country music songs, especially ones by female stars, tend to feature a love element within the lyrics. These results caused me to re-consider my narrative to make sure it wasn’t based on romance; I was originally planning to feature flashbacks of the singer and her old boyfriend being loving and having a good time together; instead of this I still featured flashbacks but ones that showed the relationship to be dysfunctional and made audiences sympathise with and support the singer. This question really helped open my eyes to what a viewer would want in a music video ensuring a better narrative in the video. As ‘a good narrative’ got the most votes in my video I think that having a corrupted relationship really helped create an interesting video.
• 3.
  Storyboard Feedback. • Aftercompleting my storyboard I decided to gather audience feedback on how well people liked the narrative and my ideas within it. After filming a video with a member of my target audience I felt that it really helped me improve my ideas. • The member of my audience really liked my narrative and how the shots where cut to the beat, she also liked how some of the shots went from a point of view shot to a medium shot or long shot of the singer. • One thing she commented after filming the video to improve it would be to add in more layering into the video when it came to editing the real thing. I took this on board and decided to add this in when I started the editing process. I felt that this made the shots look far more interesting compared to solid cuts, I felt that they improved the pace of the narrative. • From this I learnt that my ideas where on target to fit the target audience; she said that I managed to fit the target audience well as the narrative fit in with girls who are around 11+ and are beginning to get boyfriends themselves.
• 4.
  Rough Cut Feedback. •I decided to do an audience feedback on a rough cut of my music video in order to see what parts of my video could be improved from other people’s opinions. • One person said how the narrative was easy to follow because of the point of views shots I used at certain points, I was very pleased to hear this as that is what I was aiming for, I wanted a clear and easy to follow narrative as the younger audience which I was aiming for stereotypically want a video that doesn’t make you think too much about the meaning of the narrative. • As an improvement the other person said how more lip syncing could be added through-out the video, something I took on board and definitely tried to add in as I felt showing the star singing was an important factor to have in my music video as it is common to many country music videos. They also said to add in more interesting shots, I wasn’t fully sure what type of shots she was looking for to improve the video but decided to edit in some more styles of cutting and I also used a fade to black whenever a flashback was coming up in order to make it more obvious that it was a flashback and to create a more dynamic video. • From this audience feedback I discovered and learnt that my narrative was easy to follow which I was happy to hear; I also learnt that although dynamic and interestingly edited shots; like layering two clips; don’t tend to feature in country music videos, audiences wanted this style of shots to create a more interesting video, something I changed accordingly and was surprised to learn.
• 5.
  Feedback to AncillaryTasks. • I decided to get another member of my audience answering a questionnaire talking about my ancillary tasks which asked them ‘what they liked’, ‘if the tasks had a brand identity/house style’ and ‘what could be improved’. • From this I learnt that my tasks where successful in maintaining a house style between all three aspects of my ancillary tasks. Looking back retrospectively I should have added in a social media network sign such as Twitter and/or Facebook (as my audience member said) as I know how important social networking is to my young target audience as I mentioned in my research tasks, however when it came to creating the magazine advert I felt that the signs didn’t really fit in and made the advert look cluttered which was something I didn’t want. I did however, feature a QR code which a viewer could scan with their iPhone which the majority have, using their technology.
• 6.
  Audience Feedback tothe finished video. • After finishing my music video, I invited a group of four students to come in and watch the video, the people I selected where those I thought would fit into Miranda Lambert’s target audience group. • I then asked them to fill in a questionnaire I made asking them questions on the music video. • The questionnaire I gave them is shown here on the right.
• 7.
  Rate the videoon a scale of 1-5 by circling the number (1 being poor 5 being good) • Out of 4 people two voted my video as a 4/5 and two 5/5. I am happy with the results I have gained as I feel it means that my video has been successful with the target audience. 4 out of 5 5 out of 5
• 8.
  What do youlike about my video and why? • This question was really helpful in telling me what I did right about the video and some of the reasons why they liked it. • I got very mixed answers with each individual liking different things about the video ranging from locations, editing techniques, props used and the narrative itself. • I think that this is very successful information as it shows that my target audience like more than one aspect of my video, showing that my video is something that would appeal to many of my viewers. • I decided to scan in results as it was qualitative data, also so you can see for yourself what my audience wrote themselves.
• 9.
  Do you understandthe narrative? If the answer is no why? • It was very important to ask my audience whether they understood the narrative as this is a common convention of country and one of the most important aspects in a music video to keep the viewer involved and interested in watching. All of my participants said they understood the narrative which is something I am really pleased with as it shows I have portrayed the narrative clearly. Did you understand the narrative? Yes
• 10.
  In what waysdoes it reflect the country genre? • I got a lot of feedback on this question, all of the participants said something about why it reflects the country genre some had the same or similar reasons and others had different reasons none of the others said; showing I have been successful in mimicking the conventions of the country genre. The answers were all things I expected to hear like the styling, the outdoor location and the star playing the guitar. • I am happy with these results as I planned and researched all the conventions of country in order to stick to conventions, it shows that research was correct and helpful for me to have done.
• 11.
  What could beimproved? • I had different suggestions for improving the music video from each of my target audience, they all appeared to be quite minor things and not massive changes to the video which is good as it shows my video was quite successful. One person even said they couldn’t ‘think of anything to be improved’ which was really nice to hear. • One participant said about having more black and white bits in the video, If I were to re-do some of my video I don’t think I would feature more black and white bits as it isn’t something that is common to the country genre and I broke some conventions by adding in some black and white bits already. • Another participant said how they wanted more guitar playing in the video, I might have added a bit more guitar playing in if I had the chance but only a couple more shots as I felt that I didn’t want to distract from the narrative too much and felt it was more important to feature the star walking outdoors as this demonstrates the ‘natural’ stereotype surrounding the country genre. • The last suggestion of improvement I had was to feature some more lip syncing in the video from the star. I felt that I had enough singing moments in my music video for the country genre. I made sure I featured my star frequently, if not nearly all of time in the video to keep the focus on her; from getting this response from an audience member I feel I may have added in a few more shots of the star singing but felt that I featured a good amount and so wouldn’t add in a huge amount more.
• 12.
  Overall… • Overall Ilearnt that my video was successful for my target audience. I also learnt that my audience saw brand identity and house style in all three of my tasks. • I also learnt that some of the ideas I had were wrong and changed them accordingly because of the feedback, which helped me appeal to my target audience.