Audience feedback

Now that I had my two ancillary texts and main task completed I went about the process of gathering audience feedback on my productions. I did this by carrying out a likert rating questionnaire with 17 graphic design students for each of my products. Eight of the voters are male and nine voters are female. This is the first questionnaire where females are the higher percentage.


Film poster questionnaire,

For each question please choose a number from one to ten, one being poor and ten being superb.

1.) The layout of the poster overall ( )
2.) The effectiveness of the imagery ( )
3.) The use of text i.e production info, slogan ect ( )
4.) Colour usage ( )
5.) Quality/professionalism of the poster overall, i.e quality of text/images ( )

What genre of poster do you think this is?
Action ( ) Romance ( ) Comedy ( ) Horror ( ) Film Noir ( ) Other ( )

Out of the 20 people who took part in this questionnaire the results from the one to ten rating are as follows:
The average for the layout was 8 out of 10
The average for the imagery effectiveness was 7 out of 10
The use of text scored an average of 8 out of 10
Colour usage scored 10 out of 10 on average
The quality of the production scored 9 out of 10 on average

18 people stated the poster was of the action genre, with two stating it could be of the horror genre.

From these results I can see that the research and design of my poster achieved its desired effect on the target audience for the most part, with the ratings being generally high for each question, and having the genre easily recognized by the majority.



Film Magazine front cover questionnaire,

For each question please choose a number from one to ten, one being poor and ten being superb.

1.) The layout of the cover overall ( )
2.) The effectiveness of the imagery ( )
3.) The use of text i.e headline, plugs ect ( )
4.) Colour usage ( )
5.) Quality/professionalism of the front cover overall, i.e quality of text/images ( )

What genre of film magazine do you think this is?
Action ( ) Romance ( ) Comedy ( ) Horror ( ) Film Noir ( ) Other ( )

Out of the 20 people who took part in this questionnaire the results from the one to ten rating are as follows:

The average for the layout was 9 out of 10
The average for the imagery effectiveness was 8 out of 10
The use of text scored an average of 7 out of 10
Colour usage scored 7 out of 10 on average.
The quality of the production scored 9 out of 10 on average.

20 (all) people stated the magazine was of the action genre, I think this is due to the characters attire and gun being prominent.

From these results I can see that the research and design of my poster achieved its desired effect on the target audience for the most part, with the ratings being generally high for each question, and having the genre easily recognized by everyone. Two weak areas I have found were in the colour usage and use of text in areas of the magazine.

Film trailer questionnaire

For each question please choose a number from one to ten, one being poor and ten being superb.
1. Camera work, i.e. how the shots where used/quality of camera work ( )
2. Quality of the footage taken ( )
3. Setting ( )
4. Use of captions ( )
5. Use of sound ( )
6. Continuity ( )
7. Use of lighting ( )

8. What genre of film poster do you think this is?
Action ( ) Romance ( ) Comedy ( ) Horror ( ) Film Noir ( ) Other ( )

The average for camera work was 9 out of 10
The average for quality was 9 out of 10
The average for setting was 10 out of 10
The average for caption use was 9 out 10
The average for sound was 8 out of 10
The average for continuity was 9 out of 10
The average for lighting was 6 out of 10

20 people out of 20 stated it was of an action genre.

This shows that the audience views my film product positively with a high rating for the most part, although one serious flaw was that of lighting for my trailer.

Summary of medium conventions in my Ancillary Texts

Featured conventions in film posters:

logo of the Production company
Film release date
Film title
Main image
Strapline
Names of main actors
Name of director/producer


Featured conventions in film magazine covers:

Website address(of the magazine)
Free gifts
Competition adverts
Plugs
Price
Barcode
Headline
Sub-headings
Masthead
Strapline
Main image

Main Product

This is the final version of my secondary ancillary text, a Magazine front cover .After researching and analysing existing media texts, along with audience research, I applied the style and conventions of my genre of film to my film magazine in a way that would best reach my target audience.
The process in which I achieved my final design was to create a number of drafts and determine which looked the most suitable and effective. I had previously analysed existing film magazines using the LIIAR technique, this gave me an understanding of the conventions used within a film magazine and what appeals to the viewer.
The masthead for my magazine came about when I was drafting up title ideas in my “silver note book”. I settled on the name “Unlock” as I had developed a strapline “We search, You Discover, Unlock your world” The strapline itself is totally original to me, as I used no references or inspiration when coming up with it. The strapline works in harmony with the title I feel as it supports the message and effect of each to the audience. The font I used for the title was a custom one made by a friend of mine, it was called GW 2.
I added the primary conventions such as the barcode, pricing, issue and date in negative space created in the design, I placed them in such a way that it was easy to see and helped give the magazine a solid unified look.
I did not add advertisements or a website address to my front cover as I wanted to try keeping the cover simplistic in nature. However, I did add plugs to the cover; this was done in the form of subheadings with pictures I had taken, featuring a robot I created, and image from Hull Fair, and me on my travels, each I felt had a dynamic feel to it and would entice the viewer to read more. The subheading under the masthead also helps entice the viewer with the slogan”The magazine that unlocks the film information you want”

I used another custom font from the site Dafont.com, it was called “masterplan” I chose this font as it gave a weathered and worn look suitable for my genre of film. I also used this font in my headline and in some of my other subheadings to give it some unity. The text I used for the headline and strapline give it a feeling of reality and urgency for example “Shields First Contact” and “Interview with the survivor” This is a form of wordplay, that I had taken inspiration from some of the magazine covers I had analyzed. Also I think it’s worth noting that the subheading “Meet the new actor” has been designed in such a way that it is shaped along the main image gun barrel, leading the audience to the main heading.
The main image was chosen out of many trial images taken in the blue room of the media facility. The reasoning behind taking the pictures in this room is that it would allow for the best lighting quality and the background could be easily changed for the picture via Photoshop CS3. I settled on the image on the cover as the visual imagery gives it an almost 3d like quality as if it is coming out of the page and staring/aiming out to the viewer. I positioned it in front of part of the masthead as this is a technique used by many popular magazines that do not need to show their title to be recognized, this also gave it a realistic quality.


I created the whole front cover in Photoshop CS3 using many tools, some examples are the opacity level for the text boxes, transform tool for re-sizing objects, crop and magic wand tools for cutting out images and the text tool.

Drafts

As with the film poster I tried out some hand drawn drafts of ideas I had for a magazine cover, I already had some experiance designing magazine covers in my AS year, so I knew which conventions needed to be placed in the design of the drafts.

I used the Media Studies facility to make use of the blue room for ease of editing the pictures later.( Cutting out the figure of a person or object is much easier when there is a solid contrasting colour behind it, depending on the tolerance of the tool)

I tried to get a varied set of pictures as this would give me a Plethora of possibilities to make use of the images. I even took inspiration from one of the Terminator posters to set up a shot in a similar way!

Audience Research

For my audience research I have created a questionnaire for my target audience, this will help show me what they are mainly interested in, and what content I should work to including when designing my film poster.
I decided to make a questionnaire that could be mass produced to reach a large spectrum of people. The target audience for my trailer is of the 16 to 25 age range, so I chose to try and get those of that age to fill out my questionnaire. I opted out of doing an on line poll as the main audience would be bias towards the media related work I was doing, as they would of found the blogger due to its content. The questionnaire itself features roughly 50% quantitative questions and 50% qualitative questions.
I asked 31 people to do my questionnaire from an As/A2 Photography classes at Wyke College; this as an alternate audience to just randomly asking people and would have a higher probability of being more visually inclined. This would be interesting to see if a trend emerged among these students. Out of the 31 people I gave my questionnaire to 18 of them was Male and 13 Female.
I asked the following quantitative questions; Age, gender, opinion on the most important feature and a choice of poster cover. After I had gathered the completed questionnaires I tallied them up and made them into graphs using the Graph builder on nces.ed.gov/nceskids/createagraph . The questionaire sheet was made in Microsoft Word.

The results show that the 28 out of the 31 people were aged between 16-18, with only 3 aged 19-21. The ratio of males to females is only slightly higher with 18 males to 13 females. The age group that my questionnaire has been undertaken by is the suitable age and mix of gender that I require to get valid research for my production work.

The results of the question “What in your opinion do you think is the most important feature of a film poster” came out very varied. The prominent feature however, was that of imagery, followed by colours and effects, this I will take into account when creating my poster.

The final quantitative question posed to the people who undertook my questionnaire was which poster of the genre I had chosen did they prefer, The 28 days later poster was much more popular then the I am legend one as 23 people picked the 28 days later compared to only 8 picking I am legend. This shows me the style which appeals most to my target audience, and thus I will try to amplify that in my own work.

I also incorporated Qualitive questions into my questionnaire such as “what interests you about a film poster” and “when you see a film poster, what grabs your interest first”. The various comments differed among the people who the questions where posed to, but the most common results were similar to my quantitative results for “What in your opinion do you think is the most important feature of a film poster”

This feedback and the rest of my research I will review on my Questionnaire sheets while in the creating process of my film poster.

Textual Analysis of Existing Products

Although not a Film Magazine , I saw fit to include this magazine as it contains many conventions used in the structuring of a conventional magazine.

The text in this magazine cover contrasts with the pure white background; the masthead for this front cover attracts the attention of the viewer as it is a deep red and stands out among the text. The main head line “Strong and Fit” is in large bold text and is shaped around the shoulder of the famous person Jay-Z. This gives the impressions that the article is about being like an iconic figure Jay-Z. The secondary Heading “Strip Away Stress” is a plug to grab the interest of the audience.

The colour theme for the front cover is mainly black, red and with hints of yellow. The yellow parts highlight the subheading message and also “187 ways to be a better man” an obvious plug for people to the magazine.

The figure is centred almost in the center of the cover, in a pose that suggests power. He is staring directly at the reader as if to engage them.

The strap lines are spaced out with key points/facts larger while the rest of the information is smaller, forcing people to take more time to pay attention to what is on the cover.

This cover goes against the usual conventions of typical film magazine. This can be blatantly seen with graffiti like text daubed over an otherwise conventional cover. Batman is usually stereotyped to be the one in control of things, but this cover says otherwise.

As can be seen the text and image have been twisted from the graffiti portraying him to be the bad guy, this engages the viewer to make sense of it all, and ultimately we see the joker is behind it. This realisation gives the audience a sense of what the film must be like and encourages them to read on.

The plug under the main heading states in large lettering “free sex & spandex” obviously appealing to more a more mature audience.

This cover differs from the first cover that I analysed due to the main picture making part of the background for the front cover. The picture itself has been digitally edited to give a more weathered and prominent effect, it is interesting to note that in my study of film posters and also to some degree magazine covers relating to my chosen genre, the terminator salvation advertising and media coverage uses the same stylistics. The sepia tone and shadows of the back ground highlight the actors face and bring out the magazine title “EMPIRE” .this title can be clearly seen from the quite complex machinery in background as it makes uses of a solid title with a colour that contrasts with the image.

The colour scheme with the text used in this cover is red and white. The cover makes use of a silver background to highlight certain pieces of text. Examples of this are “Free” above the magazine title,

“Bale: The First Interview” above the main heading “Terminator Salvation” and finally at the bottom of the page to go behind the pictures and “plus” information. The usage of this silver background gives the text a uniformed look, makes it easier to read and helps highlight content within the magazine.

The silver also could symbolize metal or artificiality, while the red could symbolize blood or humanity.

The third magazine cover that I looked at was also from the magazine “Empire”. I noted that the Empire magazine has an iconic title that they use for most of their covers, a bold red depiction of the word EMPIRE. This helps the audience locate and recognize the brand of magazine.

The main heading and the subheading follow the curve of the figure, who is the famous person Megan Fox, from what can be determined from this cover of Empire magazine it is an established magazine as it covers its title partially, indicating its audience knows what it is regardless.

Megan Fox appeals mainly to males aged 15 and over, this magazine enforces that belief as it plays on the sexual appeal to men. The image depicts her topless with tight fitting leggings, accentuating her figure. There is small writing on her figure to make the viewers take a closer look at her and thus drawing readers to the magazine.

The background is pure white, in stark contrast to the figure, bringing out the details of both text and form. Key words in the headings are done purposely to grab the attention of people and give an initial impression. An example of this is the words “HOT” and “FOX” at a glance people read these key words and want to know more.

totalfilm.com for magazine cover image.

industryfinest.com for magazine image.

empireonline.com for magazine covers.