Audience Research: Summary of findings

After conducting our survey on 42 people, we had a large range of conclusive results.

Firstly, and less relevantly, people visit the cinema on average once to twice a month, this means that there is a large chance of our movie being seen if it is released in the cinema. Also, using this information, combined with the results we have from asking our audience about the effectiveness of advertisement, we have came to a conclusion that our film should appeal to cinema goers, which means making it exciting and memorable, as this will increase the popularity of it.

We have also found, from our survey, that a large amount of our interviewees enjoyed Gangster films, as this rated second on our survey, this gives us confidence on choosing our genre, because if we produce Rags to Riches, according to our survey, it will be watched by a large number of people who enjoy this.

These are the results of our question regarding music. As you can see, there is a large number of people that replied RnB, which means that if we are to add a sound track to our piece, it should be rather modern, calm, and appeal to a younger audience. Also, music represents the mood of the film, so our audience would like to see perhaps a cool character, following a cool story line.

The majority of our people who have filled in our questionnaire are students, but we aim to produce our media targeted towards those aged 18-30, and this means that although our results are helpful in determining certain factors of our production, such as music, we should not solely rely on this, as we could end up creating something that is less mature than our target audience would like to see.

This is our responses to 'What would you expect to see in a gangster movie'. We believe that maybe some of our respondents may have misunderstood the question, and focused their answers based on popular 'gang culture' films, such as Kidulthood, Adulthood or Shank. However, these responses, show an informed liking towards the popular conventions of these types of films, and therefore if we include some of them into our media piece, we can use it to our advantage, and appeal to people from a wider range, therefore increasing the likelihood of a larger distribution.

Therefore, we have come to the conclusion upon analysis of our questionnaire, that a modern, localised take on popular films such as The Godfather or Goodfellas, merged with a more sophisticated version of popular youth films, such as Kidulthood & Adulthood, is likely to reap in the largest and widest target audience.

Audience Research: Interviews

This is our interviews that we had conducted on 5 willing candidates.
From this we found that many of our candidates would like to see women with more authority and power in our movie sequence. We also found that a modern, twist, set in london would make a good gangster movie.

TV Drama Analysis - CSI

Title:
Crime Scene Investigation (CSI)
Who made the Show?
Anthony E. Zuiker and originally broadcast on CBS
Who stars in this show?
D.B. Russell (Ted Danson)
Catherine Willows (Marg Helgenberger)
Nicholas (Nick) Stokes (George Eads)
Sara Sidle (Jorja Fox)
Greg Sanders (Eric Szmanda)
Dr. Albert (Al) Robbins (Robert David Hall)
David Hodges (Wallace Langham)
What channel is it on?
Originally CBS but now all the repeats are on channels like 'Living' and 'Reality'
What time is it on?
Depending on the channels, it is normally 9:00pm + because of the nature of the programme.
What is the Genre?
The Genre of CSI is Crime Drama. You can tell by the characters and storylines.
Who is the target audience? 
The target audience is a wide range of people, ranging from young adults to older people.
What is the narrative?
The narrative is the same throughout almost every drama. It follows the theory of Todorov, that all media must start at an equilibreum, then fall into a disequilibreum, then somehow be restored back into an equilibreum. It generally starts with an inside story, about the characters in the drama that appear every week, then as this falls into the disequilibreum, somebody dies and they are required to solve the dilemma. They keep the audience interested in this repetetive storyline by throwing in curveballs and questionable story lines which makes the viewer constantly on their toes to try and guess who commited the murder. As the case unfolds, so does the disequilibreum between the inside characters.
What/who is being represented?
Crimial officers, like the FBI, and also medical proffesionals like doctors and forensic specialists. The criminal subjects in these series of Drama's are different every week and the representations of these vary.

Focus Group Invite

This is our invite/letter we shall be sending to multiple recipients that we intend on inviting to our focus group.

Predicted TA for Focus Group

Our predicted target audience for our opening sequence, is going to be Males between the age of 18-30.
The hobbies of people are likely to be a range of football to socialising.

Audience Profile Research

This is the survey we came up with as a group to create a reliable audience profile;
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/63SLBQ6
These are the questions I contributed to the group;

• What kind of music do you listen to? (Multiple choice)
• How often do you access the internet? (Multiple choice)
• Where do you normally watch films? (Multiple choice)
• Rank these methods of advertisement from 1-5 by how effective they are in promoting their respective films. (Rank order)
• What was the last gangster film you watched? Did you enjoy this film and why? (Open)

We will be sending this survey to roughly 30 people as a group and we intend to use the feedback in order to inform and educate our decisions.

Group 5 Treatment Pitch

This was my groups treatment pitch.

Treatment Pitch Feedback / SWOT analysis

Our group pitched to Mr Lawes and Miss O'Dell, here's the feedback we received;

What went well/Strengths - The idea of our film was well thought out, and would fit to the genre.
The opening sequence was interesting and appealing towards the possible target audience and would be a good piece to do for our coursework. We were told that we researched efficiently and the idea of the monologue, consideration of the 4 key areas, and the separate choices we made about our piece. They also said that the idea of keeping our main character as a mystery throughout the whole second minute of the piece.

What would make it better/Weaknesses - To make our idea better, we should ensure that the Monologue is clarified and polished in order to make sure that the audience is aware of what is happening in the story, and which will not be cringy, cliche or ineffective. They also said that we should consider filming the second part as the style of CCTV so his identity is still kept safe.

Opportunities - The opportunities of our opening sequence, are that our idea could become a strong and appealing opening sequence, as long as the monologue we make is good.

What we should do next/Threats - Next we are going to find out if we will be able to film in central London because of certain laws, also, we are going to find out the availability of a black cab for the final scene. Lastly we need to consider what actor we are going to use as we may need someone that is older than us because he is showing how he got rich and this is not likely to happen to a younger person.

Opo

Treatment Pitch

Treatment Pitch Group 5

Rags To Riches

Rags to Riches

5 Gangster Conventions that will appear in my piece;

- Money Motivation
- Suits
- Busy city
- Black Background / White text
- Respected Character

1 Convention I would change;

- The scene will start with the main character being poor.

Mise-en-Scene

Lighting;
Traditional day lighting
Low key lighting when the man is beside the dumpster
Costume;
Rough, ragged and ripped clothing in the first scene
Fresh crisp suit
Props;
Suitcase
Sunglasses
Black bin bags
Facial Expressions;
Frowning (showing anger and aggression)
Sympathetic cowering

Camera

The aspects and camera shots that will be used are;
Establishing shots to show the scene and the location of the character
Long shots to keep a sense of mystery in the second scene to not reveal the characters face
Extreme close up to show how dirty the characters face is in the first scene
Low angle shots taken from floor level, shot from behind so you can see the character, but so you can’t see his face
Extreme close ups of the characters hands, feet, suit & other props

Sound

The sound aspects of this piece will be;
Busy street noises, occupying the audience, making them realise how busy the scene is (diegetic)
Narrative of the main character describing what’s happening in the main scene (non diegetic)

Editing

There will be mainly covert editing to sequence the clip and to order the main section of the piece.
Overt editing will include the inclusion of the Black Background / White text combinations, and also the narrative of the piece.

Storyline - Blurb
This story is of how a man can go from busking for pennies, to owning a quarter of the countries currency in cocaine and cash.
Plot
A man starts narrating his story, showing before then after he becomes rich in one day, and the film is about how he got there.
He gets there through a highly thought out plan to kill the current leader of the mafia using people he knows inside the operations promising them a cut but planning out each of their demises through killings and imprisonment, inspired by the opening of Batman.
Opening sequence
The opening sequence will start with an establishing shot of London city, then showing shot by shot to reveal the main character sitting by a dumpster. This character will be narrating the outline of the story, and giving the audience information about the current state of the country and what the underground scene is like. It will then fade to black, using the black background and white text feature to show a time change of the next day. Then the camera will show an authorative man walking down the street with a lot of money, a fresh suit and a bulging suitcase. His face will not be revealed until 00:02:00, which will be the very end of the opening sequence we make. The man will be kept secret with a clever use of extreme close ups and blurred long shots. Then he will call a cab, still being secretive and pass a piece of paper to the driver with directions to an unnamed location and a scrunched up pile of 100 dollar bills. The driver will look into the rear view mirror at the main character, and with a perspective shot, you will see the character drop his glasses and the audience will notice that it is the character that was poor the day before, he will then say ‘this is a tale of Rags to Riches and how a man like me got there.

Foundation Portfolio Research

Gangster Presentation

Genre Convention Research: Peer Assessment Feedback

We sat there in a group working together to review each other's homework. This is what I had came up with.

Jack Nickleson is the leader of a well known NYC gang, until he gets accused of something. Everyone turns on him and it is up to him and his insiders to get his respect and reputation back.

5 Things that should be kept the same in the Gangster Genre;
- Guns/Weapons
- Money motivation
- Lead by a sole figure
- Trust/Loyalty reliance
- Clothing; Suits.

1 Convention I would change;
- The Gang would start off without a lot of money

3 Opening sequences to a movie;

Starts with a spotlight on a man being questioned, he is wearing shabby clothes and with several bruises/cuts on his face. It starts off black and white, however the colour is gradually restored but highly polarised. The contrast will also increase which will reveal and exaggerate the injuries he has sustained possibly by those interviewing him. The whole scene will be a close up of his face under low key lighting with a spotlight on his face. He is asked a question and it slowly fades to black as he tells the story.

My second idea started with a man sitting by a dumpster in a crowded city. He begins to narrate his own story, he talks about the current financial state of the country and what the underground scene is like. The first 0-10 seconds are the traditional black background with white text saying the Date, time and location. The scene then fades to black and white text reappears with the same time and location, but the following day. You then see a mysterious man who's face is still not revealed, walking along the street making people cower as he walks past. He is holding a thick bulging suitcase of money and then he calls for a cab. His face is not revealed due to the clever use of shot angle, focus and placement. You see mainly his feet and hands until he gets into the cab. When the cab driver looks in his rear view mirror, we get a point of view shot and you can then notice that the rich man is in fact the man we saw in the first scene. It goes black and he says the words, "This is the story of how i got there".

My third scene was an action scene. It starts with an office which has been torn apart, occupied by two rivalling gangs, each member firing random shots at the other side, we see a lot of shots through a low average shot duration sequence to increase the tempo and excitement created. A car then appears outside the office, with a change of focus from the action to the background which allows us to see the car is of importance. A mid shot of an authoritative figure walking in changes the mood of the scene. A walk and talk shot is used to show that the mood is slowed down and the scene goes silent. The authoritative figure is then shot by a sniper in a nearby building.

The group I was with told me that my second idea was the best because of the original and creative idea that I came up with. The focus I used on the genre conventions was apparently a strong point and they believed the way that I considered the revealing of the characters was clever and effective. They said that I could improve my idea by including more specific shot details to allow a clearer mental image to be created.

Evaluation of the Prelim

We made our prelim very basic in order to meet all aspects of the brief. The members of our group were more confident in different areas. I took a more forward role in the editing as i believe that this is the my strongest area. For the filming, I watched over the set, and reviewed any recording clips to check that they were up to standard, and mentioned any improvements I thought the group could make to a shot. During the editing process, I sat in the editors chair for the majority of the time but was open to other members of the group's input and allowed them to make any changes they felt necessary. I created the rushes (rough cut) and also did most of the sequencing and transitioning. I believe I made a significant contribution to the group and made sure my ideas were heard.

Our group wanted to make sure that we meeting the specific requirements in the brief, in our planning process, we noted camera positioning in order to stick to the 180 degree rule. We did this by cutting from one over the shoulder shot to the other matching shoulder, in order to not cross the line.

This also works for meeting the brief specification of using a 'shot reverse shot'.

We also met put in Match on Match action by recording our main characters point of view of her opening a door.

We exceeded on the 30 second limit of the brief so we should of perhaps read the brief more carefully.

Our group worked well in creating a professional feel to our task. We planned well, which allowed us to get straight into the recording, which took little time because we already knew where we was going to place the camera. Damian and Ryan took charge of the recording and camera work, which was effective as they both knew what they were doing. Me controlling the editing was also effective as I already knew how to do most of the techniques we wanted to add, and this allowed us more time at the end to finalise anything and make any last minute changes before publishing. I learned a lot from this task, for example, the importance of planning, and the fact that storyboarding makes everything much easier. I also learned that filming a short piece of film still requires consideration to all small things and takes time to get the clips how you want them to be. In terms of editing, i learned that you can easily over complicate your sequence, and precision is what counts.

Prelim Task