My Own Research

I decided to do some research for the YouTube evaluation, i looked for a few more videos on youtube which can relate to our final product.

I found- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UjnQGsGKS4

They use the idea of words an questions to the audiences aswell involving the audience and gaining more of their attention.


I also found one of Hollyoaks trailer that involved an annonymous note similar to our notes,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PzJc7TIsbO8&feature=related Letters were cut out of paper and magazines to spell the word "Murderer"

Evaluation Three - (c) What Have You Learnt From Your Audience Feedback?

Our Focus Groups:

At the very start of production, as a group we carried out a pilot focus group consisting of our class mates, this enabled us to gain a brief understanding of how a successful focus group should be. It also gave us the opportunity to prepare our model questions in order to ensure they were wide enough for our target audience to refer to. This also aided us in making sure our pitch and treatment was clear and understandable.

We then carried out our first official focus group. We randomly selected a group made up of both genders aged between 17 and 18. These people fit directly into our main target audience. However, it was unfortunate that the results we received didn't provide us with the answers we were hoping for which could have helped us improve our soap storyline and character ideas. Positively, there were no criticisms of our product, which could show that we succesfully appealed to their age group.

Once our trailer was finished, we decided on creating another focus group. We chose the most beneficial way was to set up the trailer in a room with an audience of our target group. We then filmed them watching it and then their responses to it straight afterwards. This turned out to be very successful we received positive feedback on things that worked well and nothing was pin-pointed that didn't work well, people enjoyed working out the mystery and found the characters easy to relate to. We then edited it and it can be seen on out soap website.

We also created a questionnaire which we gave to people of our target audience. This was to help us to find out what soaps they prefer to watch and why these particular soaps appeal to them. We concluded that most people enjoyed the good, mysterious story-lines, and found different characters they could relate to. This helped us to incorporate more beneficial ideas into our product.

Our soaps website was also shown to a group of similarly aged people from our target group. This enabled us to identify whether or not we was successful in targeting our chosen age group. Many believed the wide variation of pages and the basic layout was easy to use but at the same time attractive and interesting to read and there was a wide variation of information that would appeal to different teenage types.

I presented my TV guide front cover to a group of random people of various genders and ages to see what they thought of it. Many commented on the use of colour and the designs, many also commented on the use of fonts in order to portray the more important information. They agreed that it would be the sort of TV guide they would happily purchase and read.

Facebook:

We uploaded our trailer onto Facebook in order to receive even more positive and negative feedback, many people commented with positive feedback, mentioning the music, the use of fades to create more tension and the camera angles which created suspicion. Someone said it would have worked better with more of how the girl was killed, but after a debate with other audience members they agreed on it then giving away too much.The people who had access to watch our trailer fit into our target audience.

Evaluation Two - How effective is the combination of your product and your ancillary text?

Trailer

The main strengths in our trailer are the effective use of fades and dissolves. i believe they help create the eery and confusing mood we are trying to create. I believe the music also best benefited our storyline aswell, it helped the storyline progress keeping the audience interested.

The main weaknesses for our trailer would be the length, it is slightly too long for an ordinary trailer but with it being our first and only trailer for our soap we made it long. Also, we created quite a difficult storyline to follow so we explained everything atleast once breifly in our trailer.

Overall i believe that we have learnt many things along the way during the experience we have had in making the trailer.
From day one filming where we where extremely unorganised, even though we had created plans they was no where near as detailed as they should have been, looking back to the filming day one all of the footage we shot hasnt been used, that really shows the unprofessional approach we began with. However, we learnt from our mistakes and began planning properly, we word processed everything leaving it to be easily edited and corrected.
Despite our trailer not being an exact follow from the plan, it still created a basic structure for us to follow giving us room to expand on ideas and our knowledge of the camera work/skills. If i could re-do the coursework my main priority from the beggining would be the planning.

Website

The main strengths regarding our website would be the planning, i believe without the planning as a group we would of run out of time and forgotten some of the good ideas we came up with. I also think we was creative with design and colours attracting the right audience types. We also have character pages and due to the type of software we used we were unable to create drop down menus meaning each character profile would come up as a page at the top, so we put full stops instead and hyperlinked the pages.





The main weaknesses about our webpage is that we could of had things that appealed to other target groups, we mainly focused on youth that surf the web, and this could work against us.



Overall, from just learning how to use iWeb this year im very proud of my success within helping to create a website for our soap, with all of our combined creativity we was able to create a unique web page which best represents our soap and targets its specified audience. With the bright colours and big shapes and writing we have targetted it at an age range of 16-25.

We showed the trailer to a number of teenagers and recorded their feedback, this is also uplaoded onto the website for other teenagers to see what others think about it. If i had the opportunity to re-do the trailer i would make sure we have even more different shots, despite us having different camera work for the same shot i believe it would also benefit if we had more creative shots.

Front Cover

I learnt how to use photoshop recently, i used youtube to get onto step by step guides on how to use photoshop. i also bought a Photoshop starters manual aswell, and so i began structuring and designing my Television magazine front cover. i researched other magazinge guides and i decided to stick to the more sophisticated and modern front cover, despite our audinece being youths i still felt that with students they like to handle things they would never usually buy.

The main strengths of my front cover is the creative use of a black and white backround with the characters in colour and the colour red highlighted, drawing in attention. I also like the panel at the bottom which says IV on it, it makes it look proffesional which appeal to different audiences.

On a negative point the weaknesses in my front cover could be the idea that i dont advertise any other dramas or soaps and only IV, this could leave people to buy other guides which give out more.

If i had the chance to do this again i think i would change the layout and add other things like maybe a competition, for example "WIN a holiday!" drawing in more readers that would read the IV summary and watch it every week.

Evaluation Three (b) - YouTube annotations

We researched other soap trailers as inspiration and to back up our ideas. For example,

Eastenders:

This is the Eastenders trailer of Archie and Peggy's wedding. This supports our idea for having a single storyline, leaving it unconventional.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDHBOfalY84

Hollyoaks:

This is a trailer from Hollyoaks supporting the questions to the audience in order to involve them more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UjnQGsGKS4

The trailer below uses the idea of anonymous notes to help create suspicion and confusion regarding the audience, all similar to our ideas with the IV trailer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PzJc7TIsbO8&feature=related

Evaluation Three - (a) How Does Your Media Product Represent Particular Social Groups?

Andreas, 18

- He is seen as a comfortable member of the middle class. He lives in North London and aspires to become an architect. He enjoys a regular game of football, currently studying Alevels. Enjoys his evening relaxing in front of the TV, watching documentaries and is a fan of Skins. He is in with the recent fashion trends. He plays guitar and enjoys all sorts of styles of music from Rock to R&B. He enjoys having friends over competing on Xbox and Wii.
Favourite genre of film is comedy and thriller. He is a regular reader of the Sun Newspaper as well as Car magazines and enjoys Art. He enjoys watching Friends and other American sitcoms.


-I definitely believe our soap would appeal to him, especially with our current murder storyline working with his liking towards thrillers. I also think that with many of our other concurrent storyline's his liking of Skins will definitely attract him more, with the young, good looking characters with dramatised lives and problems. His liking towards the more gossip based newspaper could prove his interest in our magazine and website.




Anna, 15


-Lives in the North of London and is also seen as a member of the middle class. She is a young, bubbly girl into fashion and music. Listens to mainly R&B and Pop. Favourite films are Mean girls, St Trinians and Pretty Woman. She's into her pink and fluffy and loves to shop. She has a close group of girl best friends and enjoys sleepovers eating chocolate and sweets. Frequent veiwer of Hollyoaks and Eastenders. She reads gossip magazines weekly and visits style websites and shops online.


- I think our soap will appeal to Anna because shes into the young, bad girl type films like mean girls based around a group of popular girls as is St Trinians. She can relate to the idea of close friends and fashion aswell as the wide range of music styles. Also, positively our main inspiration was Hollyoaks so she would be able to find interest in soaps similar such as IV. Our TV magazine front cover will appeal to her with the young fashionable girls at the front. She would also enjoy the website which is bright and full of gossip and information about each character.



Andrea, 20


-Andrea is in the older range of target audience. She is currently in university studying social sciences, she fits in under a working class background and has been a worker since the age of 10 during her paper round. She likes partying and getting drunk. She has a big friend group but doesn't do "best friends". She listens to mainly Rock and loves a good holiday. Favoroutes Thrillers and Action film over Comedy and Chick Flicks. She isnt one for gossip magazines however enjoys browsing the internet.


-Although Andrea is an opposite character in terms of the target viewers so far i think that with IV's follow of a mysterious murder it will attract her in trying to work out who did what and why. This risky start to the soap would work to benefit us if viewers such as Andrea tuned in. The website is full of time enduring and interesting information and i am confident she would enjoy browsing through it.



Elena, 17


- Is currently an Alevel student, she is moving on to university soon and is seen as a working class constituent. She enjoys shopping and watching soaps like Eastenders, Hollyoaks and Coronation street. Favourite films are Sex and the City, Wild Child and Adulthood. A fan of Skins, Material Girl and Waterloo road. Prefers to listen to classical music but enjoys R&B. She enjoys reading gossip magazines and loves chocolate.


-I feel confident with Elena's interest in IV. Her strong liking towards soaps, films and dramas such as above stated will definitely attract her towards this soap. The soaps friendship conflict, relationship and school storyline's work with people in order to help them relate and feel a part of the soap. Her strong interest in gossip will also benefit from the gossip friendships present in IV. I feel Elena will definitely fit within this category.




Anthony, 18



-Anthony comes under the middle class category, he is at his first year at college he is doing a BTEC course in media. He is a very big football fan and likes going out with his friends. Enjoys watching the occasional soap and loves Waterloo road and Skins. Favourite films are Scar Face, You Got Served, and Rush hour.


- Similarly to Andreas he enjoys his football. He enjoys browsing the internet for funny videos and jokes and he enjoys his regular read of classic car magazines. I believe that being a young teenager he would find the storyline's present in IV easy to relate to. With the competitive nature between many of the characters in a school based environment could also leave him a lot to compare himself to. He may find the IV website appealing with the outake videos and character blogs. I think being a young teenage boy himself he may take a liking to the young, attractive characters that are involved in the soap.

Evaluation Four- What I Have Learnt About Technologies From The Process Of Constructing My Product

1. Photoshop

Applying the new skills and techniques i have learnt on Photoshop this year, i have managed to create many different things throughout my project, including this collage and the TV guide front cover, where i experimented with the blurr techniques, cropping tools and slice tools etc. This is the first time I have ever used Photoshop properly so I feel I have learnt a lot, especially how to use the basic functions of it.

2. Final Cut Pro

Using my developing skills on Final Cut Pro i managed to edit our trailer, i learnt how to cut music and footage effectively adding transitions and fades. I also experimented with different shortcut keys making editing a faster and easier process.

3. Vimeo

This is the video sharing site we uploaded our trailer to in order to make it easier to show and upload to our blogs. It was easy to upload in HD giving us the opportunity to show our trailer in the best quality possible.

4. Google

Google search engine came of extreme help to me, i was able to easily access relevant research and pictures

5. Blogger

I used blogger to upload my weekly schedule, uploading pictures and evaluations of my work.

6. iWeb

iWeb was the software we created our website on, completed on the apple macs. From the group all being new to this software we learnt off of eachother, experimenting with different ideas, colours, fonts and pictures.

7. iMovie HD

We chose to edit on iMovie HD when editing our interview and outtakes, we wanted to take the opportunity in learning two different editing softwares, however this one was very different to Final Cut Pro, there are less effects available and is harder to understand.

8. London Grid For Learning- Audio

Here is where we found our soundtrack from, available to download copyright free. We also used this website last year for our Thriller coursework.

9. YouTube

Here is where we uploaded our trailer in order to add annotations this was also a part of our evaluation task.

10. Apple Mac

Due to iMovie and iWeb software only being downloaded onto the Macs we used them more often. We where able to create and publish our project to the best we could with access to the Macs.

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The camera was simple to use and easily held and balanced, with the wide angle lense we was able to get more of the shot in and in better quality. The Tripod ensured a steady balance and also allowed us to experiment more with the techniques available on the camera i.e. zooming.

We connected the camera to the TV in order for the whole group including the actor to see what was being filmed and for everybody to have the opportunity to comment and give positive/negative feedback.

We connected extension leads to the microphones in order to get as close to the action as possible, eliminating any natural sound coming from the crew and camera. we also used one of the microphones pointing towards an open window, this helped to create a more realistic silence also helping to set the mood with singing birds and distant sounding cars.

Evaluation One- In what ways does your media project use, develop and challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

1. Title - IV: independent Variable

The title of our soap is shown in the first box, it was created on Final Cut Pro, It is the font "Neon" It is also 3D and spins on its axis

We decided on the title I.V simply because of its definition, it is short for "Independent Variable", defined as a thing or object that is changed or manipulated over time. We believe that this best relates to our soap because through the duration of the soap characters continue to develop as a result of experiences and things happening around them.

Our chosen font gives the soap a sense of drama and also helps it remain "cool" with the almost bubble writing effect.

The continuing line which extends in sync with the music plays with the idea that the soap follows a continuous storyline, and also symbolises the idea the soap will be broadcast longer

2. Costume/props - Bedroom

I chose a picture representing the main focus of our trailer, the bedroom scene. It is the most referred to throughout the trailer and best symbolises our characters and soap. It shows a teenage girls bedroom, with close attention payed to the mis en scene with posters on the wall and books and pictures helping to create a realistic feel, leaving audience members the ability to relate.

3. Props- Olbas Oil

I chose the Olbas Oil picture because it was a technique we used in order to make the main character in the trailer cry. It was good fun and an interesting experience, it also really help set the mood, leaving it a lot more realistic.

4. Camera Work

I chose this picture because it shows our group at work, dealing with the sound and the lighting behind, it also shows our effective use of digital technology using the zoom technique and focusing in and out.

5. Editing- iMovie HD

Despite using Final Cut Pro on our trailer i chose to put up the picture of us using iMovie, it successfully shows us editing the focus groups to put onto the website, we experimented with fade in and out and dissolves, we also added black pages in between cuts showing the questions that where asked.

6. Storyline- Dead body

i chose this picture because it is the most powerful shot in our trailer, it pieces the storyline together and the build up to it is flashed throughout the trailer starting from the first shot shown. I believe it broadens our target audience because of the broad and confusing storyline.

7. Genre - Drama Soap

Our soaps story-lines are different as the show progresses so identifying one particular genre is difficult. However, for my picture i have highlighted the main story in the soap, the girl group ganging up together against one girl who is left to the side. With the black and white version it creates suspense and mystery playing up upon the genre of this particular storyline.

8. characters (how they are introduced) - Girl Group

The picture best represent the stereotype of a traditional girl group, close, attractive and stern. It portrays them as being hard to talk to and harder to be a part of, they look like the type to get what they want and are never let down.

9. Soundtrack- London Grid For Learning (lgfl) Audio

I uploaded a picture of the lgfl website logo, this was one of the websites where we could download tracks without breaking copyright laws, we found a suitable track and altered it in order to fit in sync with the surroundings and movements in our trailer.