WHO WOULD BE THE AUDIENCE FOR YOUR MEDIA PRODUCT? Q4

This thriller opening reveals a high standards of suspense in my opinion and holds key enigma codes which enables the audience to stay for more. This product could easily be established in the psychological thriller sub-genre which may interest many and I believe it holds a huge sample of target audience. In my opinion, the target audience for the product can be aimed at the age range between 14 to 28. However I feel that the product would succeed best to engage with teenagers. Though many other factors would affect this prediction such as gender for example, men and women usually have different views and do contradict.

TARGET AUDIENCE MOOD BOARD AND INDIVIDUAL PROFILES OF YOUR TARGET AUDIENCE

As you can see on my mood board and individual profiles, both are on teenagers. A typical taste of a teenager who’s interested in sports, social networking, movies and girls. And on the moodboard we see typical teenage activities, boys playing on a games console and girls walking from school with folders. On profile we are presented a male teenager who like watching movies but in the horror genre. He’s more likely to shop in places like JD or Top man as he’s interested in sportswear and socialising. Favourite TV programme would be something like Eastenders.

There isn’t much I could criticize on, therefore very well done. I do think the background music played a good part in the opening to create that extra bit of suspense.

There isn’t much I could criticize on, therefore very well done. I do think the background music played a good part in the opening to create that extra bit of suspense.

Wow! Kept me guessing all along! Typical thriller.

Wow! Kept me guessing all along! Typical thriller.

There is suspense there however the story is difficult to grasp and understand.

There is suspense there however the story is difficult to grasp and understand.

Loads of shots were used which shows that the group tried to experiment a lot, which is a positive.

Loads of shots were used which shows that the group tried to experiment a lot, which is a positive.

Hmm.. Not bad but I would prefer a bit more romance, however this was done really well by the group.

Hmm.. Not bad but I would prefer a bit more romance, however this was done really well by the group.

I do media myself, and by watching this, It definitely suits its target audience. I’m a teenager and it kept me hooked on.

I do media myself, and by watching this, It definitely suits its target audience. I’m a teenager and it kept me hooked on.

The opening is actually really good! Music was creepy.

The opening is actually really good! Music was creepy.

Feedback From Others (Target

Audience)

TO DISCUSS ISSUES RAISED AND TARGET AUDIENCE FEEDBACK

Earlier, before producing the thriller opening, one of our major concerns were to find a location. At that point we had decided our storyline and shot list but we were still unsure of where to shoot. However at a later stage we found a solution to this problem, and eventually shot our thriller opening.

Target Audience FeedbackSome of our peers gave us some good feedback after watching our thriller opening and this was very useful because this tells us whether we met our aims to meet the likes and dislikes of our target audience. The majority gave positive feedback and found it very suspenseful which was good to know. However some did comment on the technical sides of things, talking about camerawork and sound, and they were positives given from our peers and it’s great to know that our hard work on these key functions were clearly seen by the audience. We used a variety of camerashots and deliberately using the one non-diegetic sound to create tension till the very end. Many of our peers also liked our storyline and the way it was presented.On the other hand there were some criticisms from audience’s, as some preferred a more romantic theme to the opening though we had covered this criteria for our target audience’s to a certain extent. And to avoid going off track and adding more romance themes we must stick to the thriller genre more powerfully. Some found it difficult to understand the opening, this is simply because the full story hasn’t been given yet, as it’s an opening of a movie. Thereby the suspense is created for a reason and should remain as key enigma codes.

HOW DID YOU ATTRACT/ADDRESS YOUR AUDIENCE? Q5In my opinion, thriller genre is more liked amongst teenagers because

it has the thrill and young aged audiences are fond of this. Therefore our aim was to direct this thriller opening at our target audience affectively by ticking four main criteria’s of a teenagers choice. The four sections to consider were:

Genre conventions. Media language. Music. Similarities with other films.

After planning all these, it was just about producing the opening and seeing whether it would live up to the standards of our target audiences. Though we didn’t have an action packed, full of explosions type of thriller opening, our aim was to include all teenage types for our thriller opening, as girls tend to like a romantic theme therefore this opening would be suitable to our target audience affectively as it’s made for all teenagers, not just a sample of teenagers. Therefore this opening has it all for both boys and girls to keep them watching more and to meet their standards.

GENRE CONVENTIONSGenre conventions consists of four sub sections which are: characters,

iconography, narrative and themes. Firstly, I will be discussing the character traits in this thriller opening and how they appeal to our target audience. For the characters to appeal to the audience, iconography was highly important in this case.

The characters are first viewed as picture in photo frame of a couple, who both study together. Here we are presenting both characters to have a very “geeky” look, as the female character wearing glasses and the male character is in a shirt and tie. This picture symbolises the love between the characters. This type of representation is more appealing to the female teenage target audience as it has a romantic theme to it.

Then we move onto the bathroom scene where the female character is changing identities. She gradually changes from a “nerdy” character into a “rebellious” type character. This is the more thriller side to the opening, where the audience ask themselves, “Why is she changing her identity?”

GENRE CONVENTIONS

The iconography has been the key to represent characters, however what was very unusual for the target audience to see was a male character who was given a more vulnerable role instead of he “macho” heroic role. On the other hand, the female character was given a femme fatal role which is very rare to see and adds the additional thrill as it questions the audience's minds very affectively.

And last but not least we see the male character all vulnerable and dead after he’s been murdered by his own girlfriend. He is presented in a shirt and tie like he was in the picture earlier on, this shows that he hasn’t changed and is normal however his girlfriend has changed and has dual personalities. For the target audience, this is an enigma code as we see him dead and how his girlfriend treats him.

ICONOGRAPHY

Iconography is basically what we see visually on our screens when we're watching the movies, and these hold many elements such as: props, costume, buildings, cars, mise en scene, etc. In my opinion this was done very affectively as the location was correct and in the living room, there was mess everywhere which represents what a mess the female character is and how the couple’s relationship is now a mess due to his murder. Iconography was also well used as props of the female character as we see by the make up she was using to change into a “rebellious” role and the glasses for that “geeky” role. The colour of the car the character drives in was “white” which symbolises purity however this is ironic as the female character isn’t pure after her boyfriends murder, and all these representations give away messages of uncertainty through-out the opening to the audience. And therefore, this is suitable thriller opening for our target audience, as they look for uncertainty to create enigma codes.

NARRATIVEThe definition of Narrative can simply be described as a series of events

that take place over time and then later on they're then linked by the cause and effect that then takes place. As this is just an opening it wouldn’t have as many causes and affects however, as an opening it already has one cause and affect. This the murder of the male character which would then be linked to another cause and affect over time. As the murder has already took place and many questions arise on the female protagonist, this just increases many enigma codes, and therefore the whole movie’s narrative begins from the opening which is shown here. This narrative has murder and mystery which increases enigma codes for our target audience.

THEMESThis thriller opening is heading towards to become a psychological thriller

therefore we see these indications by the early mystery created by playing a dubious female protagonist and the murder. However, in the opening I do think we have more than one theme to it as there’s a feel of romance earlier on when we see a romantic couple’s picture in a frame however it’s then dominated by psychological thriller affects of how this female character has dual personalities and followed by an unaware death of the male character. Therefore the theme slightly changes in the opening as we see further on. And that’s why I think this thriller opening suits both male/female target audience because has the feel for both, and therefore it may attract them more than just having a one sided liked theme.

First picture shows a romantic theme to the movie, and then this leads to the murder of an innocent boyfriend which is a totally different theme to romance, is mystery and thriller.

MEDIA LANGUAGETo define media language, I would basically say that all the things that

makes this opening take place via using media effects. And therefore this can be done in two main ways which make this thriller opening be as smooth as it runs and more interesting. The two techniques that are used to show media language are:

Types of shots Special Effects (Editing)

These technical areas do not determine storylines, etc. However these techniques emphasise on the genre conventions made in the opening therefore are very handy and also enable the scenes to run smooth without any unwanted cuts.

TYPES OF SHOTSIn this thriller opening, if you see very clearly, we’ve used a variety of shots

in differing scenes. Many times the camera also pans forward to create suspense. For example, in our opening, the camera pan forward towards the picture in the frame of the couple- this symbolises that there’s danger moving towards this couple, and is emphasised by the panning forward of the camera. There were also some useful high angle and low angle shots used to emphasise power of the female lead protagonist and also many extreme close ups were used in the bathroom scene where the character was putting all the make up on, etc. Showing a variety of shots gives a better view for the audience to watch scenes because it creates more suspense on this occasion.

The first shot then pans forward into this to show more detail on the picture of both characters.

Some key extreme close ups used to emphasise on the detail of what the character is doing.

SPECIAL EFFECTS (EDITING)In our thriller opening we have used some very skilful editing techniques

such as fading and fading out which easily enables us to move to scenes more fluently. Also some very fluent match on actions have been used in the opening, for example when the female character enters the messy living room. These help emphasise on what the character is doing in the scene and enable move scene to scene. A fading in and out technique was used when the female character leaves her house and we see the living room, which later fades onto the next scene where she is walking towards her car. These editing techniques makes scenes look more fluent then just cut on each camera shot. This enhances the understanding of the audience of this thriller opening more efficiently.

A match on action is used when the character walks into the living room, which works fluently via editing.

The first in the living room was then to move onto the next scene by using fade in and out, this is also an editing technique.

MUSICIn this opening thriller there were no dialogues used however there

was a non-diegetic soundtrack that played through-out the entire opening until the main lead puts her radio on in the car. The non-diegetic soundtrack we had selected was perfect because it completely matched the theme of our opening thriller as it had that suspenseful beat and innocent sound to it at the right moments and scenes. The soundtrack was used from the beginning and until when the female protagonist switches the radio on, and the radio was playing rap music on (diegetic music). This soundtrack certainly does appeal to our target audience as it indicates both fields of this opening, the romantic and suspenseful therefore it matches our opening and it would also suit our target audience. The soundtrack also starts of slow and is slow till the end however at times it picks up pace and changes rhythm.

SIMILARITIES WITH OTHER FILMSOur initial idea for this storyline came from the movie called “step father”

therefore it can relate to this movie in some aspects. However we did make changes so that it’s original enough to be ours. Some of the changes we made were: Having a female protagonist instead of a male, The entire bathroom scene would be different, our shot list differed from “step father,” etc. Though the idea was much similar of how there is a dead body in the house and the main lead has dual personalities is very calm about the murder committed and carries on with their daily routine.

Both of these shots are very similar however performed differently. In my opinion this opening attracts the audience because the opening has many enigma codes which would interest the audience. Therefore this idea seemed very creative and interesting to do.

UNIQUE SELLING POINTA female protagonist playing a role as a femme fatal is very rare to see in

thriller movies because people tend to label it to be more of a “boyish” genre where all the murdering and killing happens which attracts more male target audience’s. This is also very affective because of the irony of women presented as a dangerous character, therefore it is well appreciated by male and female target audience’s.

This is a psychological thriller therefore it welcomes all target audiences as it’s main aim is to keep the audience guessing whereas a typical action thriller would just acquire of mainly male audiences.