What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

When reviewing what I have learnt from my audience feedback, it is key first of all to identify who my target audience actually where.

Horror as a genre, no matter what sub-genre or if it is hybridised, is a genre that is very highly statisically dominated by males of a teenage to mid 20s disposition, followed by a sub following of girls who are stereotypically accompanying their boyfreinds.

It was thefore a wonderful opportunity that we could not refuse when we were able to display our rough cut version of the trailer (thanks to a digital projector that displayed onto a rather large white board creating a semi-cinematic experience) to a class that is not only perfectly within the standard age range, but is incredibly male dominated.

There were however two different complaints I would make about our target audience on their elligebility as testers themselves. Firstly it could be viewed as a missed opportunity to make a horror film that was more appealing to both genders, however if this would be as successfull in the box offices is a matter of much debate (although this complaint may be more out of a sense of intruige than of actual effectiveness).

Secondly, there was the issue that our members of the audience had experience of analysing trailers as we had all been taught, and would perhaps see it from a very different light to that of someone who has no idea for instance of the work or the different meanings behind certain element of the product (this being a less realistic version of our actual target audience).

When our trailer had been watched, I felt that our trailer was as a whole rather positively thought upon by most members of the audience and was rather pleased with the screening as a whole. This was not to say however that all was perfect and there were indeed several flaws that the audience deemed we change.

To start with the positive elements of the review, a few of the more common positive comments were akin to these examples

1) "I like the use of lighting on the house", "I like the dark blue filter effect"

This was interesting to see due to the fact that we had put quite a lot of effort into our special effects and it was good to see that the audience did indeed respond well to this. We would later decide as a side effect of these criticisms to carry on with our debate to make the whole thing more uniformly dark blue, rather than the "half and half" effect we had going on with some scenes being dark blue whilst others were not.

2) "I like the use of canted Angles"

Whilst this was a good indicative that we had done some good work with the camera and that the audience did indeed respond well to the creepy unnatural angles, rather unfortunatly by this stage in the project there was nothing we could do to expand upon this positive element any futher.

3) "The location was really creepy and worked well"

Whilst like the above this did not provide any directly useful insights to work upon, it did express that which we had been taught in class about how a seemingly ordinary and happy location could be turned be turned into something creepy. This was also a small pat on the back to our group from the fact that nobody seemed to be able to tell that there had been 3 woodland locations used, meaning that we had done a better job of editing than we thought.

Whilst there were posotive examples, there were of course inevitably many negative examples as well that would have greater influence on the next and final version of our trailer.

1) "The font used for the intertitles is too boring and needs to be slowed down", "The intertitles need to be more flashy"

This one I found interesting both from a point of contention and acceptance.

I first of all did very much agree with the fact that the intertitles needed to be slowed down. Whilst we had decided to go for quick snappy intertitles, it was perhaps a side effect of us having made the intertitles and knowing what they said which allowed us to read them first time as opposed to the target audience in which not all members could.

However whilst I agreed with the speed of the intertitles, I entirely disagreed with the the fact that the intertitles were "too boring". Firstly from the point that in other class reviews, intertitles from other groups had been repeatedly criticised for having flashy elements to them, but also because this was highly against the industry standard in which most trailers would display pretty ordinary and "boring" text (e.g. Sorority Row, Orphan and Devil) and was in my oppinion an unneccesary change.

In the end however dispite my protests, we ended up with intertitles which had a strange urban font and a flashy effect that reminded me of something remeniscant of circus lights, ending up as something I was not particularly happy to add to the project.

2) "The scene were George is dragged underneath the bridge needs to be quicker to make it seem more jumpy", "The running shots are on screen too long"

This style of comment about the speed and rhythm of the trailer were both criticisms that I was particularly happy to see as I beleive they drastically improved our trailer to make it feel more fast paced and violent in speed.

When we received those comments, there was no matter of contention or debate as to the fact we needed to make the scenes cut much quicker and speed them up, making a far more acceptable speed considering the more violent nature of the style of horror we had gone for.

3) "The link between how the characters get from the house party to the forest isnt clear"

This was a criticism which, whilst I didnt agree with I didnt neccesarily object to correcting it within the trailer. My problem, as small as it was, with this was that it felt like it was telling too much of the trailer beyond what was normal for a trailer to show (e.g. most would consider it odd if they showed the travelling between locations in each scene of the underworld trailer for instance) as well as it ruining the sense of mystery and character development that the film itself would usually show. Considering there was a fairly even distribution of people both opposed and in favour of that statement when we asked the audience their views, we decided to not to cater for this criticism because a small majority had been of the mindset that it was not a neccesary or wanted change. This was interesting however as it was definitive proof that no matter how much you try to analyse a specific group of people, you cannot make a trailer that will satisfy to all of them.

Whilst I have learned the valuable lesson that often you cannot make a peice of media exactly the way you would like it, the more interesting insight I gathered was from how the audience reacted to the mystery over the gore. Whilst modern talkshow hosts and general media would like to promote this image that teenage boys are obsessed with violence and gore (a fact that is indeed able to be backed up by the success of such films as the Saw franchise), the audience were far more receptive and interested in the idea of the psychological horror and mystery over the idea that the trailer contained any gore. This could either be indicative of an unusual set of male examples within the class, or perhaps an oversight on the parts of modern horror directors.