Question 2- Part two

Question 2- Part one

My Prezi Question 1

Question 1

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

 

I decided to answer this question by referring to the four micro-elements on Prezi. Here is a link to view my answer!
 

My target audience - demographics and psychographics

The majority of people who watch horror films are between 12 and 25 which I discovered from my secondary research. They tend to be more working class than middle class and more men tend to watch horror films than women. Our media product included female characters and so we aimed to encourage more women to watch our film as they could relate to the characters and their roles e.g mother. According to secondary research more parents watch horror films than not, this could be because the male in the relationship could encourage the female to watch horror films with them as they enjoy the thrill and gory side of the genre.

My target audience profile

Age: 15-25 - as this is the most popular age range for watching horror films.
Gender: Female - as they can relate to the mother and her situation.
Demographics: Social class C1 and C2 - as they can relate to our location (house); there is enough room for the mother to be oblivious to the actions going on elsewhere in the house as it is a two-storey house.
Marital status: Divorced or single - as they can relate to our characters situation of being a mum looking after her daughter on her own with no male to protect her.
Psychographics: They're  mainstreamers and aspirers. 

Note: Social class is now less obvious as we all seem to blend into a middle-class community according to a London Times article.  

Definitions:

Psychographics is the study of personality, values, opinions, attitudes, interests, and lifestyles. Because this area of research focuses on interests, attitudes, and opinions.

• Aspirers: people who want to appear rich and attractive.
• Reformers: people who want social change, are unimpressed by status and make decisions based on their values
• Explorers:  adventurous people who like taking risks
• Mainstreamers: people who follow the crowd
• Strugglers: people who find it hard to achieve (poverty)

Demographics are the study of a population based on factors such as age, race, sex, economic status, level of education, income level and employment, among others.

• Category A(Upper middle class – bankers, doctors)
• Category B(Middle class –  teachers, middle managers)
• Category C1(Lower middle class – office supervisors, nurses)
• Category C2(Skilled working class – tradespeople)
• Category D(working class – unskilled manual labour)
• Category E(People at the lowest level of income – unemployed, students, pensioners)

Paranormal acitivty case study

A perfect example of a successful low-budget horror film that made millions in profits is..

 Paranormal activity. It was a hit phenomena that went on to make 6 films including the most recent; Ghost dimension (2015).

 The film cost just $15,000 and was first shown at the Slamdance film festival where it caught the attention of Steven Spielberg, the well-known Hollywood film director. His initial plans were to make a big-budget remake of the film however he then decided to take the film to Paramount/DreamWorks, where it took off beyond imagined. The movie was marketed as a unique "experience" for its audience. The trailer was a bit far fetch as it did not reveal the scariest moments as the film was based upon a slow build up of terror. This worked particularly well and put it in high demand for the midnight viewings available. The high demand led to Paramount releasing the film in cinemas on a normal schedule rather than just the late showings. The film created an online buzz which meant marketing for the film was cheap! Social media was used for marketing as well as research when Facebook and Twitter accounts were set up purely to see peoples reactions to the film!

 3 main reasons for Paranormal Activities success;

1. It let the consumers dictate the demand, once demand hit 100,000 the film was distributed within a radius of everyone's home who wanted to see it.
2. They did not require a high budget for marketing as they let the fans market on their behalf.
3. The film did not have high expectations and so there was no false-hype, viewers expectations were exceeded.
4. As the film was low-budget, distributers could play around with marketing and experiment different ways to advertise the film for example by portraying the true aspects of the slow building film within the trailer rather than giving the audience everything by jumping to the climax.

 

Evaluation of my media product

Okay so before you see Esme and I's final horror opening for Inside I want to make you aware of some changes we have made to the storyline and also identify why these changes have been made...

• The doll was abandoned. We filmed the scene where Alice was possessed by the doll however when editing this scene it proved difficult to communicate our idea to our audience. We asked various people to watch it and provide us with feedback which resulted in us abandoned the doll as a prop. As an alternative we had her possessed by a spirit that lives in the house.
• The park scene as featured in our initial storyboard was also abandoned as the location proved too difficult to get to and it was also a public area which meant that we could not anticipate whether people would try to get in the shot and ruin it. Also, on the days we allocated to filming, the weather was not as pleasant as we would have wanted it to be and so it would not portray the idea of 'happy family in the sun'.
• We changed the characters featured. Olivia Martin and Zac Levin who were featured in our character profiles to play the parent roles were often busy and so it proved difficult to arrange a date we could all do and so to fit to our short filming schedule we just had a mother who I played the role as. This idea added to the idea of vulnerability as there was not the typical macho man father to protect his daughter or wife.

To further present the changes made to our horror opening I am going to post a picture of the final storyboard.

Audience pleasures

After watching multiple horror films in order to gather inspiration, ideas and what not it suddenly dawned on me... why do people actually enjoy being scared? When people watch horrific images, their heartbeat increases by as much as 15 beats per minute. Their palms sweat, their skin temperature drops several degrees, their muscles tense, and their blood pressure spikes. So why do people pay to watch horror films if they are just going to get themselves worked up?

Well, personally I enjoy the sense of achievement once you have lasted the duration of a horror film and I also enjoy the thrill and suspense created before a scary scene. I love experiencing the different fears; jump-scare and the gradual fear from a prolonged build up like in Paranormal activity.

Some people may see the trailer of a film and will go to see it in order to know how it ends, audiences enjoy walking away from films with the knowledge that any disruption has been settled, the 'happy ever after' ending always leaves an audience happy after.

Teenagers tend to watch horror films because they feel they are mature for being able to watch them, some adults feel they do not need this adrenaline rush and frown upon horror films which makes teens want to watch them more. This could be why horror films are usually aimed at teenagers with an age rating of 15 on average.

Some theories say people are merely seeking violent entertainment in order to cope with their own feeling of fear or violence. Adults tend to frown upon horror films as they believe it will cause their children to act in a violent manner however the average horror film thrill seeker won’t have had their personalities altered. Horror films spark fears, I honestly panic when swimming in the ocean depths as a result of JAWS! But some viewers enjoy conquering their fears by facing them head on in a film where they can walk away after, knowing that there is a solution for example in the end, Jaws dies and so he does not exist therefore you cannot fear him. There are many different reasons that lead to people watching and enjoying horror films, if you like them, is it because of any of these reasons or is it because of something else? Please comment your thoughts and opinions!