Target Audience

Evaluation Questions 4 and 5 plan

4. Who would be the audience for your media project?
5. How did you attract and address your audience?

4. The audience for my media project:

1)
Primary Audience - Teenage Girls
Secondary Audience - Teenage Boys and girls of an older age

2)
AGE
Our original thoughts were teenagers - high school students
In 1015 there was an increase from 26% to 35% in admissions of teenagers (15-24) going to see films
15-24 watch comedy and action most often - bfi

SOCIAL GROUPS
DE - (15-24)
films such as Duracula untold - over the average 25% of 15-24 watch this - bfi

GENDER
Greater female audience if there is a female protagonist - bfi
They can identify with protagonist
What we did on our holiday - daily female - romance
hunger games didn't have a genre difference between male and female due to there being a male and female presence during an action film

SEXUALITY 
Appealing to all sexualities. Mainly female characters therefore many a female audience.

FANS OF HEATHERS AND SCREAM QUEENS
Fans of the film heathers may be interested in Neighbours.Because heathers was filmed in 1988 the fans may be intruguided that there is another ilm of similar variety.

3)
National BBFC rating would suggest that our film is a 12
-mild violence
-suggestions of bad language
-heathers is a 12
-pretty in pink is a 12

4)
Izzy and the two side characters ar wearing pink lipstick - female audience could get the impression and understand that they are girly girls; where as sarah isn't wearing any make up.

5)
Active audience research - filming people on their opinion of themes.

8)
Audience for this back comedy is the audiene for heathers and donnie darko and scream queens.

9)
Nationality of our characters. Working title appeal to USA audiences and UK audiences where as warp focuses on the UK audience. Our film attracts to the British audience by it being set in a typical British school - British females can identify with the characters.

10)
Even though are main audience and characters are females. The violence and ambiguity of the film helps us bring other genres.

12)
secondary audience = the violence and the murders bring in the male audience and the older females - the school atmosphere will bring back memories for the older girls of their past education nd they will be able to relate to the protagonists.

5.  How did you attract and address your audience:

Attracting
We told our friends about the film and what it involved - the fact that other friends were involved in the film attracted people to see their friend in the film.
We posted it on Facebook - a page to attract the general public
Posting it on tube for the work rot see
having a blog - people all around the world can view the blog and find out about the process and the film
Updating the blog about what we ave done every week - more than 8 posts a month

Addressing 

• Portraying the the protagonist and anagonists with some ambiguity 

Sympathtic towards sarah - on her own - not apart of the clique
assuming the clique are the anagonists
However sarah is the antagonsit killing girls
there isn't a protagonist due to the symbolism of everyone having dark secrets in high school.

• Narrative enigma - about sarah; not who you think she is
• Humour - speech going to be sarcastic, overall the situate of how you think that it is all a normal typical high school film with a twist
• For a preferred reading the audience would have to have seen mean girls - or a typical american high school film; also they would have to understand that the girls have had a dark past that is the reasoning to whether is tension
• there is no dialect in the first two minutes; however the accents will be british
• Representations such as the lipstick that the clique wear suggests that the girls are staying together no one can enter or leave their group - tying them together.
• The audience can see more than one character in the first two minutes (privileged prov). We see sarah and izzy. Both are the main antagonists. We also see the remaining clique walking through waking throguh the school and at the graveyard.
• Focusing on the body - the clothing and how it fits the girls body is different i contrasting. showing their different personalties. 
• the genre of music is indie - i used the pop rock guitar 
• Sound is being used to build tension. the music changes when sarah comes into contact with the girls walking into the school - she spots them and then the it goes to a slpit screen and music increases with ease. Eventually the music builds up an there is a tracking shot of sarah following the clique and the music page increases and another sound in added building the tension = feels like more happening.
• The male gaze is brought in by attractive females and there is a suggestion of violence - when sarah crosses of a face on the wall = suggesting murders and more murders to come.

Intertextuality 

We didn't use intertextuality throughout the film however our film is heavily based on the film heathers and Scream queens. 

Things that didn't work that well:

• Sarah was wearing boots in one shot and then trainers in another shot
• some shots are blurred instead of being in focus 

Audience - Ethnicity, socio-economic groups and psychographic profile

Target Audience-

Ethnicity
Our film is based on a teenager girl in a typical high school setting; with a dark past. Our target audience is teenagers of any ethnicity. We are using caucasian females. We chose these actresses due to them bring available; using the opportunities around us.

Socio-economic groups
Socio-economic groups have a large range. They were created to help the government group the population into categories.

A - higher managerial - administrative and powerful jobs, such as; lawyer or surgeon
B -  intermediate managerial - professional and administrative; back manager or teacher
C1 - Supervisory and junior managerial; shop floor supervisor and sales person
C2 - Skilled manual workers, for example carpenter or electrician
D - semi-skilled and unskilled manual workers; assembly line or messenger
E - Casual labourers, the unemployed and pensioners; for example people who live on basic benefits or students

Our film is going to be targeted at the socio-economic group E - students. This is going to be highlighted by the protagonist being a caucasian student girl. This is so that teenage girls can empathise and connect with the protagonist and antagonist of out film. She will be wearing typical girl clothing - clothing brands such as; H&M and topshop.

Psychographic Profile
Psychographic profile fits into groups; much like socio-economic groups. based on personality, beliefs, values, interests and lifestyle choices. The government also uses this grouping to see where different people fit into different categories and compare them. Much like demographic but instead of focusing on the work they do they focus on the behaviour of the audience and their actions.
 For example a group of 16-18 yr olds staying at home and a group of 16-18 yr olds leaving home and having to live for themselves for the first time would be very different audience's. For example if we were aiming the film at a group of 16-18 yr olds that are leaving home, the film could focus on independence.

Age:
Our film is aimed at a teenage audience and a young adult audience, between the ages of 13-22. This is because we believe teens enjoy our genre and theme more , which is teenage murder. As out opening was mostly filmed in a school setting we belie that teenage benefit from this , they can relate and understand the context and setting. Our cast were 16 or 17 and i believe having a cast at the same ages our target audience has benefited our opening , our audience can relate more to our story line, they also feel some kind of connection and relationship as the cast as they have similar features which in this case is age. We used fast pasted editing in our opening , due to the increase in youtube and music videos , fast pasted editing in time with music and beats has become increasingly popular , therefore we used this is some parts of out opening to appeal to our audience , we belive this swill help our opening look up to date. The music we used as a basis for ideas and influences was chosen as its peopler and well known in the younger society. therefore we though basing our music on music that is already popular would give us an advantage and create a more up to date and on trend look to our opening. We would give our opening a rating 12 based on what i read on the BBFC’s website. 

Genre: 
i think the genre of our audience will be fairly split between males and females. Our female actors draw both a female and male audience in but mainly attracting guys due to male gaze. The aspect of violence also attracts a male audience as wifi and horror films are traditionally and stereotypically seen as "male films". The issue of conflict between the girl and the scene in which they get ready draws in a female audience and the aspect of teen conflict also will appeal to a female audience.

Nationality/region:
 Our opening is english that means that our audience will be english speaking. We hope that our audience will become a UK-wide audience and we hope that we would make sales worldwide and over sees.
Our settings include traditional looking english school settings , i think this will appeal to american as it fits the stereotypical image american have on England and i believe that this will appeal to them.
as films such as wild child become very popular due to the english boarding school setting.

Typical audiences for this genre:
Our genre of teenage under and crime is very popular in the movie industry at the moment sue to the break out of series such as scream queens and going back to films such as heathers. The typically audience for the genre such as scream queens is young teens and there is an equal divide between males and females.

Audience I researched
Audience Niamh researched

Target Audience

AGE:

15-24? 15-34? Your lower starting point will be influenced by the notional BBFC rating you ascribe to your work (also compare to similar films)– the BBFC’s website has some very student-friendly features to help you with this. You could reference your work from General Studies of course! There is also a double-DVD-ROM set in the library produced by the BBFC. You may argue your film potentially appeals to younger viewers, increasingly able to circumvent these age restrictions through downloads for example, and motivated to do so by aspiring to be like their older peers (e.g. tweenagers). Are your cast reflective of your target audience age? Do you employ any slang, music or other cultural references which might be primarily familiar to a youth audience? How important is the youth audience to the film industry? (You should be able to find articles which demonstrate that cinema’s target your age group more than any other)

ETHNICITY:

If your product does include non-Caucasian characters, this will help reinforce its appeal to a multi-ethnic audience. However, you should not argue your text specifically targets a narrow Caucasian audience, many mainstream productions continuing to side-line non-Caucasian talent but not commercially suffering for this. As always, think of real-world examples here, especially if you are restricted to an entirely Caucasian cast. There is an interesting flipside to this: a range of low-budget, straight-to-DVD films principally targeted at an African American audience (especially within the horror and crime/gangster genres) produced by and starring the likes of Snoop Dogg. The impact of Asian horror over the past decade (e.g. The Ring), not just through the remakes, might be something to consider.

GENDER:

many genres are seen as gendered: sci-fi, action-adventure and horror as primarily male-oriented, period dramas and rom-coms as female, for example. This is true up to a point

– film producers don’t want to exclude half the available audience! The tough, resourceful female character (‘final girl’) at the centre of many horrors (and sci-fi/horror: Alien’s Ripley) helps to draw in a female audience notwithstanding the

crude, exploitative stereotyping of the invariably topless „scream queens‟. The comedy aspect of rom-coms helps males to overcome their reticence – and in both cases, especially for a youth audience, the movie-as-date factor cannot be overlooked! Do make some explicit

SOCIO-ECONOMIC GROUPINGS:

In crude class terms, ABs are ‘upper class’, C1 upper -middle class, C2 lower-middle class, and DE working-class (see handout for more precise detail).Typically, a complex, challenging text, perhaps relying more on dialogue than action, might be pitched to some part of an ABC1 audience (as are broadsheet newspapers like The Guardian), while a conventional slasher, often with middle-class characters, might target a C2DE audience (somewhat in line with a tabloid like The S*n). If you are employing countertypes within a horror you might argue this would help to draw in the C1s. Some horror films, especially when not centred on teens, gain sufficient critical credibility to draw in that sophisticated ABC1 audience – think of Silence of the Lambs. Plush period dramas typically appeal to ABC1s (the BBC has attracted criticism for super-serving this audience with its high-budget adaptations of the classics), while the typically more basic fare of rom-coms are generally pitched to a less wealthy audience. Again, it is worth commenting on the class profile of your characters.

NATIONALITY/REGION:

Whilst producers will not wish to restrict their potential audience to a particular part of the UK, nonetheless the southern English accent and setting retains something of a hegemonic status. Films featuring northern English, Midlands, Scots, Welsh or Northern Irish accents do face a greater challenge at the box office – although the huge success of Billy Elliot, The Full Monty and others proves this barrier is not insurmountable. This aspect may influence the company you identify as distributor (look at

distributors for Warp, WT, & Film4 productions as examples), but again you should stress you’d hope to tap into a UK-wide audience, whilst perhaps recognising the potential limitations on foreign sales. The contrasting fortunes of the similarly-budgeted films Son of Rambow and Mickybo & Me [a WT film]–  both now in the library – illustrate the commercial advantages of featuring southern English characters, while This is England is more typical of the fate of social realist movies than hits like TFMonty. Once again: address representation – are you stereotyping yourselves?! Using recognisable regional stereotypes could help a film’s prospects beyond the area it reflects.

FANS OF…

Perhaps linking back to your pitch, what existing films would you expect your potential audience to be fans of? If you were designing a promotional poster which film/s might you try and reference to help communicate the idea, but also to derive reflected glory/appeal from?

SEXUALITY:

Just as a typical film will still centre on Caucasian characters, so will heterosexuality be the default mode for any romantic aspects. Again, do not say you are targeting a heterosexual audience, but simply consider if you’re including anything which could help to draw in the ‘pink pound’ – being careful about stereotyping! It’s not uncommon to see token, heavily stereotyped, gay characters, notably the usually very camp gay best friend in many rom-coms.

PSYCHOGRAPHIC PROFILE:

You could also describe a typical would-be punter in terms of wider lifestyle and interests (e.g. a lager-drinking Sky Sports subscriber, S*n-reading Guy Ritchie fan, or a Sky Arts-subscribing, Guardian-reading liberal interested in classic literature and history)

– 

and if you really want to challenge yourself, do a little research on ‘Maslow’s hierarchy of needs’  (there is a fairly good Wiki on this). You could also look at the box-office performance of recent films comparable to your own in terms of genre/narrative.

TYPICAL AUDIENCES FOR THIS GENRE:

Research audiences for your genre. If you can find articles exploring aspects such as age range, typical gender etc., great –  but at the very least have a look into the institutional side of this: box office figures especially. Is yours a currently successful/popular genre? You could try some kind of opinion poll or questionnaire (you could use a blogger gadget for this) to test out whether your supposed target audience is accurate.

Audience groups I'm doing

Feedback - audience

I have had multiple people watching my opening, some people from our target audince and some family members.

Target audience - teenagers // media students
   Rough cut Three

• The music fits well with the timing of the shots.
• I lilke the title of neighbours, where it is placed with the background looks good, it looks like it is under lining it bringing your attention to it.
• The continuity of the shots are well edited.
• Edit the music to have more of a rythmn, gradually building up because at the moment it is quite similar throughout.
• Slow down the beggining shots of Sarah and Isabelle so we can get a good idea of what they look like and who they are.
• The scenes from their bedroom to the school jump quite a bit - there is no connetion. (Because we hadn't shot the scene inbwtween just yet, we have now addded this scene - 12th of Feb).

Target audince - teenagers // friends
   Rough cut Three

• It's good I like it.
• I'd proabably watch it if I new more about it.
• It all flows really well together.
• The music brings it all together really well.
• I like the ending, it sums everything up and leaves you wiyh a sense of mystery.
• The editing of sarah following the girls in the graveyard works really well (the overlapping of the shots - girls walking away from sarah).
• Maybe inprove on the colour scheme - some of the scenes were different colours to the others.