Question 3 Evaluation

“What have you learned from your audience feedback?”

To create my music video myself and Erica Hall had to at least come up with a focus group or a questionnaire that people could full in and feedback to us with. Erica Hall and myself decided to go with the focus group session and a questionnaire. We decided that we wanted to do both this is because for our focus group we wanted to mainly sit down and discuss opinions with people we wanted to aim our music video at for instance girls in their teens. Furthermore that allowed us to go a little wider with the age range for the questionnaires.

We mainly focused on the focus group because it allowed us to explore and have fun. We were given the opportunity to sell the song off to the target audience and see their full reactions to the liking of the song. Erica Hall and myself immediately took a liking to the song when we heard it and being at the same age range we thought it was quite interesting. We had a sit down and discussion session about certain things these target audience members would like to see within our music video. Also what they thought of the song and how it made them feel.

All this information that we gathered was very important to us because it allowed us to narrow down to the right path for our music video. The feedback that was given within our focus group allowed us to actually find inspiration from other artists. in the focus group Kate said "It reminds me of summer or friendship" this helped because it allowed us to base our story line along this theme. We found out that our actual song had hints of "Eliza Doolittle" style within it because this is what the focus group also told us. This helped us find an inspiration source for our music video and to pick up different tips along the way to the planning stage of the music video.

 Having this kind of feedback helped us learn that our style of song had to have an upbeat happy atmosphere furthermore a lot of the people that listened to the song actually ended up saying the exact same thing as myself and Erica did which is great because we pictured the video being fun and quirky. Our main aim when we heard the song was to really make it a summer time vibe and give it the perks of friendship. This is great because a lot of the feedback that was given matched our ideas and themes throughout the music video. Furthermore the questions we asked our focus group would be what kind of artist were similar. This is good because when the feedback we got was Eliza Doolittle this helped a lot when researching into songs. When watching Eliza Doolittle music videos and looking at the different codes and conventions within her music videos we realised that this is the kind of theme we wanted to go for and also target our audience at to.

We decided on a questionnaire too; however we linked this in with our focus group when we did an audience reacting to the song we picked. It felt very professional to do both also reading our questions on camera meant that they had to give out proper answers which was great because we didn’t get any silly comments or fake answers it was just their thoughts and general opinions on the songs and some ideas we had already selected. They're many advantages and disadvantages when it comes to questionnaires. This is because people sometimes don't give the honest answers, they'll just full it in with alot of false answers that aren't what the question says. Sometimes people cannot be bothered to fill them in which means its left to marking whatever they feel randomly. Sometimes people can lie the whole time. This could actually effect our final outcome to a music video by aiming it at the wrong target audience or by selecting certain aspects which didn't suit the codes and conventions. Furthermore the advantages to this would be we could have a wider range audience, including boys and girls, maybe older people. People can be blunt and straight to the point whereas having a focus group people could become camera shy and clam up not knowing what to say. However doing a focus group would be perfect because you get expressions/ facial reactions to the song, honest answers because its like hot seating. 

When filming, we took on everything that was given to us from the feedback. To make sure it suited our target audience’s needs. This is good because when planning the storyline we wanted to make it match what the audience wanted this is because we wanted to have the audience participation which would make them want to watch the music video in the final product. The feedback given from this wide selection of the audience helped us narrow down our findings and helped move and direct us into making the music video.

In addition to this it wasn’t just feedback from random people that helped us with the overall outcome to our music video. Fellow members within our class helped us too because when we first did the edit of the music video we had a lot of negative feedback's of room for improvements. A lot of the feedback that was given was great because it meant that there was room for improvement and it would allow us to move up higher within the marking band too. When asking our actually media class they were very critical but in a positive way. We played the music video to then when we finished playing the video to the audience the feedback that we got was:

• The glare of the sun was distracting and this meant we lose concentration on what’s actually happening in the video”
• “Some of the footage was the same, this isn’t bad but I think it would be better if everything was different”
• “two people lip-syncing and only one voice “
• It’s enjoyable and funny to watch
• The mood/vibe in your video comes across very good

After the feedback that was given Erica Hall and I discussed the negatives and positives and decided that the best thing to do would be to re-film the music video again making the improvements that the rest of the class gave for our feedback. The good thing is that we didn’t have to change the theme, narrative or story line in our music video. This is because the class watching the music video actually found it enjoyable too watch. They laughed and caught onto the song which meant the music video and the lyrics were catchy to sing along too. It made an impact on them because watching their facial reactions they were all smiling along and laughing at how funny it was or how enjoyable it is.

We decided to re-film for the benefit of our footage. The footage that we had taken was actually okay however it could be a lot better facing a different way so they’re aren’t the constant sun glares reflecting across the screen. This made it uncomfortable for the viewers which meant it was harder to see the footage that we had taken. This is negative towards our overall first out come to the music video because it means people watching wouldn’t have bothered to want to watch the rest of the music video if they know it already looks like this way It could become a bit annoying and upsetting for the audience to watch because it’s constantly in the middle of the screen making it harder to see.

When re filming the footage we made sure that we checked the angle of the camera making sure we wouldn’t get any reflections/sun glares. We also made the improvements of not letting Erica sing in the end clips… She found this hard to do so we had to actually block movement so she would forget about lip syncing. This is because only one voice is heard throughout the whole song. It actually did make a lot more sense if only one person sang it.

We also tried to come up with a lot more footage then we already had because before the footage was kind off the same which makes it more boring for the viewers to watch because it becomes very repetitive. Which isn’t fair because the mood of our video needs to be upbeat, cheesy, smiley.

The feedback that was given after we edited the footage we took was this:

• Was funny and enjoyable to watch due to the mood being positive made us feel the same way”
• “ the fact that it is sunny and the glare has gone adds to the warm mood”
• “The lip-syncing is spot on”
• “one part was a little jumpy but this could be because it’s not exported yet”
• Made me feel happy and wanted to smile throughout the whole thing
• facial expressions were big cheesy grins
• it makes you want to get up and sing or dance around with them.

This is exactly the kind of feedback we wanted. I think when we re-filmed the music video it made a lot more of a difference. This was due to the fact that everything the audience had said from the feedback given we applied to our actual final outcome. We wanted it to match up with what they wanted. This is because it would make them enjoy the music video a lot more, due to the fact they had their own opinions and feedback which they wanted to see in the video.

I have learnt from my audience feedback that it’s always important to ask suggestions such as gathering a focus group before you start to film.. Asking them questions. With a focus group there’s more chance that these target audiences would give a honest answer because they have to speak. Whereas having a questionnaire there’s always the problem of them answering with silly comments. We focused a lot more on the focus group then the questionnaire, because you can actually gather the target age and gender you’re thinking more off and see their facial reactions and hear their views.

 Without the feedback we had been given I think we would still be stuck with the first footage of our music video. Whereas we wouldn’t have these improvements or better comments if we would still be using our original take of the music video.

Furthermore when we were asking for feedback on the ancillary text’s it seemed that everybody mainly did like the digi-pak and advert. Comments made on the poster and advert were:

·         It looks very slick and professional

·         Synergy used throughout all 3 – music video, Digipak and advert

·         The colours are bold and it stands out

·         You can see what target audience it targets at

·         The codes and conventions of your theme come across strong

·         The photos are good quality and good focal point

·         Maybe think about the text bubbles.

This is great feedback for the ancillary part of the course because it means were editing in the right ways the only things we need to think about improving would be the text and speech bubbles we had used.  People in the class said it looked okay however maybe it was a bit to much because it was effecting the pictures we had used.

This meant re editing the Digipak/advert because we used both on each… We decided that we would change the opaque/opacity using the Photoshop tools. This makes it fade into a see-through object instead of a massive glow. This is good because when we changed it and asked for more feedback one person said that “It looked like clouds” – This is great because it matches the summer feeling that we wanted.

After we had completed everything. We uploaded the video to YouTube, Shared it on Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr. This is great because a lot of the target audience that we aimed our music video at were teenagers. Teenagers are the main people that these sites target at. Its good because we got a lot of feedback likes, retweets, favourites from all the posts that we put out. This is good because it meant that we were advertising it right and sending it to people to get more views. Advertising it this way allows us to have that interacting with the active participants commenting back and forth. Its good because it allows us to see how many people actually enjoyed our overall outcome. It allowed us to actually speak with people from the internet to get their honest views and opinions which it seems like most of the people that watched generally enjoyed our video by the feedback that has been given over social network sites.

Twitter Interaction 

Facebook Interaction

Overall I feel without this kind of feedback we wouldn’t have this kind of improvements that has been made for our work. It helped improved I feel and make it better. I feel like our re film looked a lot better. Without the feedback at the start with the focus group/Questionnaire we would never know what stuff to plan or what to add into our music video. I’ve learnt that audience feedback is very important when you are making films or music videos. This is because if you don’t listen to what Theyre saying then you could eventually get the wrong outcome to what the audiences wanted to see.