Evaliation Task 4 - Who would be the ideal target audience for your media product?

Demographics
Age: 13- 18 year old as the story lines and situations in the film mean this age group can relate to them and will enjoy the film more.

Gender: Females as they can relate to the main character in the film and empathise with them.

Class: Love Triangle is targeted at working/middle class families as they will most likely view the film due to the characters also being the same class and so, again, can relate to them and will enjoy the movie.


Race: Our film is aimed at all races

Geographical location: At first it will be aimed at teenagers in the Cambridgeshire, East Anglia region. However over time it will move to the rest of the UK. This is due to the British Social Realism
Psychographics 
There are many things stereotypically associated with teenagers and their likes/dislikes. Some of the tastes our audience might have include:
- Pop music that is in that charts as they like to be up to date and to fit in with the rest of the school society.
- Teen angst, romance, romantic comedy film genres (Twilight, Easy A etc)
- At school they stereotypically gossip lots and talk about recent trends and interesting things that have happened. They are also usually hard working.
-They enjoy shopping at large retail chains that are well known and trendy at the time.This is mainly clothes and fashion accessories. This is because they like to wear stylish clothes and be trendy as this can influence popularity.
-They value their appearance and how others perceive them and so put lots of effort into make up and hair.
- They enjoy socialising with friends and who they socialise with is a big part of popularity and this is valued in a teenaged girl's life.

At this age they are are still at school and so can relate to the characters, plot and the things that are valued in the film. This is one reason that they are the target audience for the film.

Evaluation Task 3 - What kind of media instituition might distribute your media product.

 

Who would distribute your film?

Film 4 would distribute our film because they often produce and distribute small British independent films. These include films that are low budget. They are part of a bigger cooperation which is Channel 4. This gives us the chance of our film being promoted on TV and a large audience seeing this as Channel 4 are a big corporation.

What else have they done?

There are 2 teen angst films that film 4 have produced, “Crush” and “Very Annie Mary”. These films are similar to ours as they are low budget, British, independent films. Another film that Film 4 helped to produce and distribute is “The Selfish Giant”. This film was very successful and was nominated for many awards. 

What is the USP of your film? The Unique selling point of our film is that it is a British made independent film that follows the stereotypical American style of the teen angst genre. This will be appealing to a British teen audience as it is more realistic and relatable to them than an American teen angst film would be. This means there is a gap in the market for a film like this as teenagers want to be able to relate to the films they watch. 

What marketing methods would they use? How will this target your audience? Marketing methods they would use would include technological convergence by creating pages for the film on social media websites, such as Facebook and twitter. These pages will provide a place for fans of the film to share quotes and other parts of the film onto their own pages. This would spread hype about the film as these peoples friends would see this and then want to watch the film to see what it is all about.

The use of the social media sites will also appeal to the teens as they are recently new to these sites and use them to catch up with their friends regularly; therefore they are well used and will be seen often on them.

We would also use posters and trailers to market our film as well as using synergy by teaming up with the well-known cosmetic brand, along came Betty, to create products that represent our film. These products will include nail polish’s, eye shadow, lipsticks and mascara. We will create different ranges of make-up, personalised for teen’s favourite characters. This will include ‘Amber’s range’ of products which will be called ‘along came Amber’ and will include a bright pink nail polish, pink eye shadows and a pink lipstick to represent Amber’s favourite colour which she often wears so fans can make themselves look like her. We will also release ‘Madison’s range’ of makeup which will be called ‘Along came Maddy’ and will include more neutral colours that are more subtle as this is the look Madison has portrayed through the film. The company will also release a range of shower gels and bath bombs related to the film that represent different parts of it. These products would be good quality yet cheap. We chose this company as the colours they use on their products are pinks and purples, which match the colours we have used in our film to relate to the teen angst genre.

The price of these products is essential as our demographic target audience suggest that they have part-time jobs but will be on very low income due to still being in school. Therefore using this popular brand shows that it is good quality products, however for an affordable price that the young teens will be willing to pay.

Where would you see marketing material? Why? The posters created for our film would be seen in social areas such as shopping centers and cinemas as our target audience are known to visit these places regularly and therefore will see our poster many times. The trailer we created would be the main source of marketing as it would be uploaded to YouTube and then linked to other websites such as Twitter and Facebook which can then be shared again on to personal accounts. This is a form of technological convergence as these websites can be viewed on many platforms like tablets, phones and laptops. These trailers would also be seen on TV and specifically channels which show similar films to ours as it will help increase our target audience.

What sort of info would be on posters and trailers? Why? On the posters and trailers for our film we would want the release date to stand out because this is the most important information as it tells the audience when they can see our film. Other information that we want to be seen would be the rating given by reviews, actors that star, the title of the film and the production company as all of these may influence someone to see our film. 

When would they release your film? Why? The film would be released during the summer holidays around June or July as this is when our teenage audience would have the free time to go and watch our film as they are on break from school and the six weeks gives a large time period to give people the chance to go see it. It’s also when groups of friends would be able to go maximizing the amount of people paying to see it. The genre of our film is teen angst which usually is linked to positive and cheerful and sunny days which we would want replicated throughout our film which would be found in the summer period instead of releasing it around November/December time in the winter. We would release our film in the summer so if it was to be released on DVD it would be scheduled for the Christmas period, meaning more hype and more DVD purchases. We would also benefit from releasing the film after specific film festivals so the film will have awareness and have hype. 

Which Cinemas/festivals would it be shown in? why?

Particular festivals we would show our film at would be both small independent festivals as well as well-known film festivals around the UK. Examples include the UK film festival, the Cambridge film festivals where the film would just be screened and larger film festivals such as the London Independent Festival which is more competitive.

Our small independent film would be screened in CURZON cinemas which show small, unique independent and foreign films which are based around London, which is our demographic location for our target audience.

Evaluation task 2 - How does your media product represent particular social groups?

We have three main social groups that are focused on in the title and opening sequence of our film. There are the popular, 'good looking' girls that everyone in the school looks up to and respects. The second group is the popular and sporty 'good looking' guys. This social group are the guys that most girls adore and guys respect because of their sport ability. The last social group is the 'ordinary' relate-able girl who is new to the school. People in the school don't particularly pay attention to them but don't hate them either. This is the group that the audience can relate to because of the situation they are in and the problems they are faced with.

These character are from the film 'Mean Girls'. They are a stereotype of the 'bitchy', popular girls that most teen angst films have. They are 'good looking' young girls. The clothes they are wearing are pink, which is stereotyped as the colour associated with girls, and modern at the time of filming. Their facial expressions and pose show they are very confident and self righteous. They have long healthy hair that most girls of this age take pride in. They also wear make up which shows they are typical teenage girls but also shows that they have some self confidence issues. This is relatable to the audience. Our characters above are the group of girls who are 'good looking' and popular in the school and also at the same age range as the characters in mean girls. Our characters will be wearing modern clothes that are pink as this helps to connote the genre to the audience. We chose to have them be very confident as they are seen as the 'bitchy' popular girls that everyone respects but fears as well. These characters will be similar to the mean girls characters as they will take pride in their looks, hair and social image. They are also similar to the mean girls characters as they think they are better than everyone else and are very materialistic with jewellery and accessories such as bags and clothes. They are nearly always with their friendship group and act similar to each other in order to keep up social appearance. The main characters in mean girls are girls and they have similar personality traits to main characters in teen angst films. They are bitchy, care about their appearance and most importantly care about their social status within the school and the local community. They want to be seen as someone important and that everyone looks up to and are jealous of. This is how this particular social group are represented in most well known teen angst and is also how they are portrayed in our film. We portray them like this by including the features listed previously.

This is the love interest from the 'Angus, Thongs and perfect snogging'. He is seen as 'Good looking' and popular. He has dark mid/short length hair and wears no make up as boys stereotypically don't. This hair cut is modern and the clothes he is wearing are also modern but simple. This shows boys don't care too much about their appearance but try to still be modern. His pose and camera shot show he is laid back and happy. Our love interest in our film has brown hair and is seen as 'Good looking'. He is popular and wears trendy clothes. All of these features mean that girls find him attractive and this is why he is the main love interest in the film. Our character is called Dylan, (above on the right) and will also be portrayed as laid backed and very happy. (His facial expressions display this as he always look happy and is never angry). He wears trendy clothes that everyone finds cool and this helps him with his popularity. He is the same age as the girls in the film and this is the same age as our target audience. Dylan is a good looking guy who hangs around with the other popular lads in the school and are very good at sport. This is a contributing factor to his popularity in the school and again, is a convention of teen angst films. Two girls from different ends of the social ladder 'fancy' the love interest in our film. It starts off with the most popular girl dating him but this changes over the course of the film. This is very stereotypical of the teen angst genre. We represent Dylan as the main male character in the film. We portray him as sporty, good looking, popular and seen as eye candy by the female characters in the film and also by the audience. This adds to the representation that Dylan is the love interest in the film. In Juno and Angus thongs and perfect snogging it is clear that the love interest plays a big part in the story line and the characters feelings that are shown in the movie. We have tried to replicate these ideas in our movie.

Above on the left is the quiet, less popular girl from the film 'Easy A'. She is the less popular social group. She works hard at school and nobody really notices her apart from her best friend. She doesn't talk to other people and all she wants is to be happy. She doesn't care about how popular she is. 

On the right is the equivalent character in our film called Madison. Again, she works hard in school and is happy with her life and the friends she has. She isn't really noticed by anyone other than her friendship group and she is happy with that. She is a nice kind girl who cares for her friends. These girls would wear typically nice, sophisticated clothes that aren't promiscuous. The accessories she has are mainly books and equipment for school as she cares more about that than popularity. She is new to the school so nobody knows her at first apart from Dylan who pays her some attention. She is friendly and acts mature for her age. She wears minimal make up as she feels she should be accepted for who she is and what everyone else wants. These attributes mean that this social group are seen as less promiscuous than the more popular girls. We represent this character as a perfect student that does no harm to anyone. She works hard and cares about grades and her friends. This is similar to the character in Easy A above and the girl in 'Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging' as they all start off being less popular and throughout the film become more popular. These are the contrasting group to the 'Bitchy' group above. These are the two main groups that are conventional throughout teen angst films. Through our research we found this out and then decided it would be wise to include these two contrasting groups.

Evaluation Task 1 - In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

1) The first picture is an establishing shot which shows the title of our film, "Madison". We used the purple font as this is stereotypically a girly font which is our target audience. We also have an effect called 'Pixie Dust' which comes across the title and is purple/pink. This appeals to the younger end of our target audience as it connotes imagination and fairy tales. It is in a serif font that connotes girly handwriting which is relevant to the film because it is based around school life. Having the title in a purple, serif font was a convention we saw during the research of teen angst films. One main title that we took inspiration from is mean girls as it has the feminine colours that appeal to the target audience.

2) The settings that we used were conventional of the teen angst genre as it is school setting. Picture two shows this with a mid-shot of the main character at the lockers. The lockers are an example of iconography in teen angst films. This connotes to the audience that the story will be based around school life and the relationships and events that it bring. The school setting is a stereotype of the teen angst genre as the target audience of teenage girls can relate to this setting and the relationships and problems that school life brings. We saw this in many of the teen angst films we researched such as Mean Girls and Easy A.

3) The clothes in the film differ for each social group. The popular group of girls has the most modern/trendy clothes as this is important to them because their clothes are an important indication to how popular they are. Expensive clothes and accessories are an important to teenager's social status and it also indicates how materialistic they can be. Researching other films lead me to see that many other films, including Easy A, are American films and their public schools do not have a standard uniform. This is what we took inspiration from and so used normal, casual clothes with the rest of our characters. The film Mean Girls has a stereotypically girly clothes that the main group of girls wear. These as pink, modern clothes and are conventional for teen angst so we decided to make the popular group of girls wear pink, modern clothes. The popular boy, Dylan, wears fashionable clothes as well which indicates his popularity and social status in the film.The less popular, new girl wears nice clothes which foreshadows how she will become popular later on in the film.

4) We used a variety of camera work and editing, with different camera shots and transitions used through out the film. The picture above shows one the POV shots we used which helps the audience to empathise with the main character and how she feels, is treated and her problems. The transitions we use keep the film interesting and so the audience will enjoy watching it more than if normal cuts were just used. Using different transitions makes the film flow better and is more enjoyable to watch. We also used fast forward in a film to speed sections up. This allows us to put lots of information into a short space of time without it getting boring.

5) The title shown in the 5th picture above is a typical title for the teen angst genre. It is conventional as it is pink and in a serif font which connotes that it is targeted at a young female audience as pink is associated with young females. Adding to this, half of the title is white which connotes purity and innocence which is assoiciateThese are a major convention of teen angst films as it helps to establish quickly that the film will be targeted at females and the film will be based on a teenager girl's life. Using appropriate titles helps to improve the quality of the film and so the audience will enjoy the film more. As said above the film Mean Girls also has a pink title as it connotes the female gender.

6) The opening sets up the story by having a voice-over of the main character in the film explain who she is and what the film will be about. It briefly explains her situation and how she is feeling. Another way the opening sets up the story is a close up on a note on the wardrobe. This is shown in picture 6 above. The voice-over is one of the biggest conventions of the teen angst genre, it helps the audience to understand the story quicker and easier as well as introducing characters a lot easier than if there was no voice-over.

7) The genre of the film is made clear from the opening due to mise-en-scene, titles, and other conventions of the genre. Mise-en-scene helps to determine the genre as from it you can identify what the film will be about and who it is targeted at. For example, in the picture above there is an example of one of the titles in the opening. The title it's self is pink and white, pink is stereotypically a feminine colour and white connotes innocence and purity as said above. This indicates that it is targeted at and based around young females and so will be the teen angst genre. This is supported by the mise en scene that is used throughout the film opening. For example, in the above picture there is perfume bottles and a mirror which are associated with females as they are stereotyped to care about their appearance, again this therefore sets up the genre as it connotes it will be about a young female as well as targeted at them.

8) One of the main we used we introduced the characters was by having voice-over. This directly tells the audience who the main character is and so they can understand the story easier from the start. Voice-overs are a conventional aspect of the teen angst genre as they help make the film easier to understand by introducing characters and explaining their situations. Another way we introduced the characters was by having a shot reverse shot between the main female character and the main male character. This shows the facial expressions and how they feel about each other and how their relationship starts and then by using more shot reverse shots the audience are able to see how this develops.

9) The example of special effects in the picture above shows speed increase which we decided to add in during editing because it helps to give the audience information but it a short time and without the film getting boring. This convention of teen angst is used often during montages or when characters are travelling. Again it helps to keep the audience's attention during a bit of the film that would otherwise be boring. During editing we also added in transitions and titles that would be seen as interesting by the target audience. Easy A is an example of a film that uses titles in an interesting way.

Final Film - Madison

This is the final film opening that we created.

Progression of the title

This was the original idea we had for the title of our film. We called it "The Kiss" as we thought it would connote the ideas about love that come up during the film and it tells the audience that love will have a strong influence throughout the film. 

These were the next two ideas we had for the title, we used the name of the main character as a simple title as it has the effect of staying in the memory of the audience as it is short and memorable. We also changed the colour of the title as we thought the white didn't connote anything suitable for the title. The purple colour connotes that it is targeted at girls since it is stereotyped to be a girly colour. It also connotes love and beauty and since these two things are very important in a girl's life and throughout our film, we thought it would be more successful. The colour is similar to that of Mean Girls. The font and colour is very similar to 27 Dresses which we thought worked well.

We decided the title also needed a symbol with it as this would help with synergy. We originally used the 'XO' as we thought it made the whole title look like a signature and so adds personal value to the movie. In the end, we decided to use a lipstick print as this is more relevant to our target audience. This is because girls in their teenage years, our target audience, use make up regularly because they care about their appearance. So by using the make lipstick symbol it not only connotes love, which foreshadows what will happen in the film, but also that girls care about how they look.  Mean Girls contains a title sequence where this symbol is used frequently so we took inspiration from this.

Feedback from initial ideas

Once we had filmed the footage and started to edit it, we had a chance to show the rest of the class and receive feedback in order to see what could be done to improve and expand on ideas we had. The following are what we received as feedback and we took these into account when making the final film opening.  

• Change the title name
• change title font and title image
• Add in the voiceover
• edit our voiceover by shortening it and include Madison's thoughts of joining a new school
• move/play around with different titles and transitions
• improve the music change so there is a less obvious fading in and out