Audience Feedback

Concerning Helen Blyth’s Music Video and Digipak

Audience Used for Music Video

• The final version of our music video was show to a group of nineteen 16 – 18 year olds (9 male and 10 female), who had never viewed it before.

• This age group is one that our music video was intended to target, so the feedback should be very useful, although the participants may not be our true target audience, due to their preferences in music genre.

• However the participants are all media studies students which may affect the result due to consumer habits that differ from that of non-media studies students.

Evaluation of Questions UsedPlease circle 1=worst 5=best

1. How much did you enjoy the music video? 1 2 3 4 5

This question was used to gain an overall rate for how enjoyable the music video is and by doing so an understanding of the popularity of the music video is gained along with aninsight into how successful it is in entertaining its desired audiences.

2. Did it hold your attention? 1 2 3 4 5

Again this question gives an indication of how successful the music video is of advertising the band as if it is boring it does not complete its purpose to the full extent.

3. How do you rate the camera work and editing? 1 2 3 4 5

This question is especially important as it includes how the entire video has been put together and because the questionnaire was given to media studies students who will be more critical about it than others and to gain a high level here is impressive. This has also been asked to see whether any components of the music video were misunderstood or weren’t successful, because it is hard to tell how audiences will react to something that you have seen and worked on for a long period of time but they see for a short period of time.

4. How do you rate the mise-en-scene? 1 2 3 4 5

The mise-en-scene is critical to the overall tone of the music video and it is crucial that it fits in with the genre of music or topic of the song. So this question was asked to ascertain whether the audience thought the mise-en-scene was appropriate for the genre of music and the tone of the song.

5. Was the music video... Too short Correct length Too long Don’t know

It is very important when creating any video to make sure that it is the correct length because if it is too long the audience will get bored and if it is too short the audience may feel cheated and unsatisfied . This question was asked in case the length of the video affected the audiences enjoyment of the music video.

6. Would you listen/watch it again? Yes No Undecided

This question was asked because if our music video and song were to become popular and distributed on music channels and over the radio the footage would be replayed many times and we would not wish to alienate our audience from it becoming a video you would only watch once. On top of this this question was asked to see if the test group were members of our target audience as if they did not wish to listen to it again they probably weren’t.

7. Can You suggest anything that could improve the appeal?

Points that can be improved upon are always useful to know for future productions and to get

in touch with what your target audience really want.

8. Were there any aspects that you find offensive? i.e representation of race, gender, age, culture, etc.

It is important that we didn’t alienate any audience members through representational issues

so this questions was asked to make sure we have not done this.

9. Was there any part you found confusing or hard to understand?

Yet again it is important that we haven’t confused our audience as we do not want to discourage a majority of our target audience, also it is important to know whether any ambiguous elements of the production have worked or not.

10. What is the best part of the production?

It is always nice to hear what you have done right and that has worked well so that these can be built on next time I make a production.

11. Does the video reflect the style of music? Yes No Undecided

As I mentioned earlier it is vital that we made the right choices when making the video so that the entire product matches the genre of music and style of song, so that it appeals to our target audience. We don’t want to create a R&B music video for a Heavy Metal band for example.

12. Does the video successfully promote the artist/band/group? Yes No Undecided

The ultimate purpose of music videos is to successfully advertise the band and the song in an unobtrusive manner that allows the audience to consume the music with added interest. Thus this question was asked to make sure that we had completed this task and had created a product that would attract a developing fan base.

13. On a scale of 5 with one being the lowest and 5 the highest how do you rank the music video? Please Circle 1 2 3 4 5

To encapsulate all these elements this question was asked to collect an overview of what the audience thought about the standard of our music video.

Evaluation of Answers

33%

22%

44%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest). The extent to which Males enjoyed our

music video

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20%

10%

50%

20%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest).The extent to which Females enjoyed our

music video

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As can be seen here our music video was better received by the female audience rather than the male. This is unusual considering more females (3 females and no males) said they found the narrative hard to follow.

Overall these results are quite encouraging, bearing in mind the evaluation was not undertaken by our target audience. The ratings are all 2 or above and the majority of which are rated as an enjoyment of 4 out of 5, this is good news as it means that they enjoyed watching our music video, but there are obviously things that could be improved if we were to market this at a larger audience.

11%

33%

44%

11%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest).How well our music video held the male

participants attention

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20%

20%

40%

20%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest).How well our music video held the female

participants attention

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There is very little difference in the way the music video kept the attention of both genders of the participants. Females were marginally more captivated than the males with 60% of females and 56% of males voting for 4 and five.

This is good because it means that we have not alienated any audience members with any gender offensive aspects of the music video.

Quite a large proportion of the participants, 33% of males and 20% of females, voted for the middle value 3 which is not so good as it means that our music video is forgettable, however the aspects that the participants said could be improved; like the number of cross fades and the confusing ambiguity in the narrative, others said these were the best aspects of the music video, thus showing the division in the participants that singles out the target audience.

5%

63%

32%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest). How the participants rate the camera work and

editing

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The camera work and editing was voted as very good which I am exceedingly pleased with, considering the hard work that went into this part of production. All of the participants appreciated the camera work and editing and 17 out of 19 people said that the camera work and editing were the best parts of the production, one male even saying that “the editing holds the viewers attention” , which is very good feedback to hear.

11%

26%

47%

16%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest).How the participants rate the standard of mise-en-

scene

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The overall ratings on the standard of mise-en-scene used in our music video is also positive feedback with 63% of the feedback audience voting for 4 and 5. One female participant who said the mise-en-scene was a standard of 4 said that the music video could be improved by “using more locations”, even though we used about 6 different places in which we filmed. Another comment was that the use of the red coat in the female characters costume as it was very “striking” against the natural, country background. The use of the red coat had more connotations but these do not seem to have been picked up on by the audience.

33%

56%

11%

How the male participants rate the length of our music video

too shortjust righttoo longdon't know

10%

80%

10%

How the female participants rate the length of our music video

too shortjust righttoo longdon't know

These results are a little strange compared to earlier results as 33o was too short, however over half of males (55%) said that they didn’t really enjoy the music video voting only 2 and 3. So it would be thought that as they did not enjoy it they would not think it was too short.

On the other hand, the majority of the participants voted that the length of the music video was just right.When we made that music video it did not fill the entirety of the song but we faded out the music at the right time with the visuals to make it look like it was the correct length. By the looks of these results it seems to have worked effectively.

33%

33%

33%

How many of the males in the test group would watch the music video

again

yesnodon't know

70%

10%

20%

How many of the females in the test group would watch the music video

again

yesnodon't know

These results are very different depending on the sex of the audience. The majority of female participants (over 2/3) said they would watch our music video again but only 1/3 of males said they would. This could reflect the way in which our music video is more appealing to the females in our target audience.

It is still positive feedback that 10 out of 19 participants would watch the video again and only 4 would not (with 5 undecided). This means that our music video was well accepted and still has interest enough to watch it more than once.

100%

How many of the participants believe the video reflects the style of music

yesnodon't know

37%

32%

32%

How many of the participants believe the music video successfully pro-

motes the band

yesnodon't know

The top graph shows how many of the evaluation participants thought that the video reflects the style of music. As can be seen this is extremely good news as everyone believed that it did reflect the style of music.

This second graph shows less straight forward results as only 37% of participants believe that the music video successfully promotes the band. This could be due to the fact that our music video has no live footage of the band and only has two characters. although combined with my digipak it can be seen that Tamas is the lead singer, the results of this question could be improved by adding live footage of the band to the music video.

11%

22%

56%

11%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest).The overall ratings of our music video by

males

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20%

60%

20%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest).The overall ratings of our music video by

females

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These results again are quite encouraging as 80% of females and 67% males rated our music video as a level 4 or 5, which is very good. Although the results from the male participants in lower than expected; this could be due to our production group containing two girls and one boy, so our music video may have become more appealing to the female audience, as it contains a lot of female ideas.

The results from the females is especially good as no one voted below a level 3 which is quite good.

Overall our music video was very well received by the participating audience.

What can improve the appeal?• Suggestions for what could improve the appeal of the music video were quite interesting:• One person suggested “less cross fades” and another suggested “less roundabout scenes”

could improve the appeal, but the use of both of these aspects were used to create a montage of flashbacks, using cross fades which are generic in love song music videos.

• Three people suggested adjustments to the narrative to improve the appeal of the music video:

1. The first said we needed to “add more depth to the story”, but to add more depth means to explain why the couple are in the position they are in and we purposely did not do this to create a sense of ambiguity.

2. The second of which suggested creating a “clearer narrative” which also would erase the ambiguous element of the music video and would mean a whole new music video.

3. The third suggestion was to make the “narrative faster” which would be interesting to achieve but the narrative is not linear so we decided the speed at which we delivered the narrative was fast enough with the added interest of the flashbacks.

Conclusion

• Overall the audience feedback has been quite pleasing, although some suggestions don’t seem to have been fully thought through.

• However some suggestions have been taken into account and if I ever undertake a task like this again I shall keep them in mind. For example:

1. The suggestions about the pace of the shots.2. The over ambiguity of our narrative, that appears to

confuse some audiences.3. The representation of the band and whether it fully

promotes them.

Audience used for Digipak Feedback

• My final print productions were shown to a group of 5 anonymous lower sixth students aged 16 – 18, (3 male and 2 female).

• Again this fits into the target audience but does not account for the participants fitting directly into our target audience as they may not enjoy the rock indie genre.

• The evaluation has not been undertaken by many people so the results may not be representative of the wider audience.

Evaluation of Questions Used

Please circle 1 = worst 5 = best1. Does the digipak successfully reflect the genre of music? 1 2 3 4 5

This question was asked because to market the band effectively the digipak must reflect in some way the bands style of music, so as not to divert the target audience from buying the product.

2. Does the magazine advert successfully reflect the genre of music? 1 2 3 4 5

Again this question was asked to ascertain whether the entire print productions advertise the band for what they are and are not misleading.

3. How do you rate the standard of graphics in the package? 1 2 3 4 5

The standard of graphics needs to be evaluated to make sure that the audience can enjoy the digipak and advert to their full extent because the graphics are good enough to be aesthetically pleasing.

4. How do you rate the standard of graphics and print on the album? 1 2 3 4 5

This question was asked mainly to discover whether the print on the album is legible to all members of the audience especially since I have used a Russian style font which may be hard for some people to read as the N’s are back to front.

5. How successfully is the Britishness of the package established? 1 2 3 4 5

In the specification for the coursework it was said that all productions must include references to the culture they originate from, so I had to create elements of Britishness within my print production designs. This was fairly difficult for me as I had decided on a look of soviet propaganda that is popularly used by other bands like Franz Ferdinand. So this question was asked to make sure that I had achieved some elements of Britishness within my print productions, as a sense of culture will affect the demographic of the target audience.

6. Would the magazine advert encourage you to buy the digipak? Yes No Undecided

The whole purpose of the advert is to make the audience want to buy the album that it is advertising, so this was asked to see whether I had achieved this goal by creating a successful advert.

7. Can you suggest anything that could improve the appeal of the productions?

There is always room for improvement and it is good to know what the audience members would do to create a more successful print production package, this gives an indication of where I have misunderstood or mistaken the needs of the audience.

8. Were there any aspects that you found offensive? i.e representation of race, gender, age, British culture, etc.

This was asked in case I had alienated some of the audience due to representational issues that I had not noticed or had no effect on me.

9. Identify the strongest feature of the print productions?

To know where I have gone right is useful to know how I can improve things a=that are suggested in question 7 without destroying the things that work well for some of the audience members.

10. On a scale of 5 with 1 being the lowest and 5 being the highest, rate the print package overall 1 2 3 4 5

The answers to this will give an indication of how effective the print package is in its relationship with the audience. Thus showing me that my work is successful or not.

Evaluation of Answers

On this question concerning the music video we did very well with 100% of people thinking the video reflected the genre of music, however my digipak has not achieved so highly, however it is not all bad as no one has voted below 3 and 40% of people voted 4. Which is a very good result considering the participants of the evaluation have only heard one of the songs from the album I created.

40%

40%

20%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest)How successfully the digipak reflects the genre of music

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40%

40%

20%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest)How effectively the magazine advert successfully reflect

the genre of music

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These are the same results as the slide before and they show that the test group thought the magazine advert did the same as the digipak and reflects quite well the genre of music it was designed for. 60% thought that the generic reflection was very good, so I am happy with these results, although they could be marginally better, the test group was very small and had not heard all of the songs.

The results of this question are not so pleasing, as 60% of participants thought the overall graphics were of low levels 2 and 3 out of 5. This is not a very good result, but may have something to do with the comment a participant made that “the print on the bottom of the advert is hard to read”. The print is concerning copyright issues and is of little importance but in hindsight should have been a little bigger as although I found it perfectly easy to read others may not.

It is unusual though that 4 out of 5 of the test group commented that the colours and photography used was the best aspect of the print productions, so it is quite strange that most did not like the graphics.

On the plus side 40% of the test group voted that the graphics were of a level 4 standard which is very good.

20%

40%

40%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest)Overall rating of the graphics in the entire print

package

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20%

40%

40%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest)Overall rating of the graphics and print in the album

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Again the results for the album are the same as for the advert package, perhaps due to the fact that I used the same sort of design adjusted for the use of both the print productions.

These results are not quite what I hoped and I am a little disappointed because I specifically created a bold simple design so the graphics would look good and I believed I had achieved this.

40%

20%

20%

20%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest)How successfully the Britishness of the band is estab-

lished

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These results are not great but it was what I expected as I created y design for the print productions without thinking about showing the Britishness of the band, however the reviews added to the advert and the album cover show the Britishness of the band. Apart from adding another picture of a British emblem like the union jack or a cathedral, there is very little I can do to change this result.

Some of the test group have noticed the British references in the reviews as 40% have voted a level of 4 and 5. But I know that the Britishness of the band has not been communicated to a thorough level.

60%20%

20%

Would the magazine advert encourage the par-ticipants to buy the digipak

yesno undecided

This is an encouraging result considering the test group is not my definitive target audience and 3 out of 5 people saying that the advertisement is effective, is very good feedback, because if it worked on 3 out of 5 of the public who see it the result would be good record sales.

20%

60%

20%

On a scale of 1 (lowest) - 5 (highest)Overall rating of the print productions

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I am extremely pleased with this result because no one voted below a level 3, and 4 out of the 5 participants voted for a level 4 and 5 which is a very good result, meaning that the print productions together are effective.

Some comments made about the best aspects of the productions say that there is “good use of colour and photography and font” 4 people thought that the use of colour was the best part of the production and the other participant said the font “with the backwards N’s” was their favourite part. So the design of the print productions seems to have been very well received.

Comments

Some comments were made about the best aspects of the productions:

• “good use of colour and photography and font” 4 people thought that the use of colour was the best part of the production.

• The other participant said the font “with the backwards N’s” was their favourite part.

• So overall the design of the print productions seems to have been very well received.

Conclusion

• I am very happy with the results received from the feedback.

• However if I was to change my print productions I would make sure the print concerning the copyright is legible to everyone and not just me.

• I would not however change my overall design, even to add Britishness, because that would ruin its simplicity and charm.