Task Three: Audience Feedback and Response

Once completing our music video and album cover we wanted to ask our target audience their response to the product. We asked a wide range of demographics so that we could evaluate whether our initial aims had been successful.
We created an online survey using surverymonkey.com, this allowed us to make our questionnaires interactively and we were able to organise our responses effectively. As a group we came up with a variety of questions that would; establish the audience's demographic (for example Age, Gender etc.), highlight the strength's of our production, and the areas in which our product could be have been improved.

Referring to Stuart Hall's "encoding and decoding" theory, the responses to our video were complex as some gave us a preferred reading and responded in a way we wanted them to, whilst others gave us a negotiated reading and interpreted the music video in a completely different way. In general, the audience feedback was very positive. They all said they felt connected with the star image through the close-ups, which was one of our main aims from the start. Moreover, many of the responses showed that the themes of female empowerment had been successful conveyed. "i liked the way she appeared dominant over the camera and looked powerful over the male band". The responses also showed that the special effects were particularly successful in conveying the narrative of the video, the audience understood the journey of our star escaping jail in a visual and exciting way "the tunnel was my favourite bit". However, some of the responses showed that the choice of costume in the prison (gaffe tape) slightly distanced the female audiences as her image was too sexual and overpowering. Furthermore, our audience feedback showed the need to include more shots of the band, many responses show that there was to much on the star and not enough of the whole band in general.

Moreover, the feedback we received on YouTube was also very positive. "hurtwoodhousemedia:I really liked the concept of the video and how at the end she escapes by helicopter. It was really clever how you used the lights to create the effect of a helicopter hovering over the roof top. i also really like the shots looking through the jail bars, especially the close ups with the bars blurred. She's giving direct address to the audience which gives us a connection with her. really good guys!". From this response, we have shown we were successfully able to create a star image that followed the conventions of Richard Dyer's Theory that "a star should be both present and absent" through direct address and connection with the audience.

These responses have been very helpful in evaluating the success of our product. From the responses we seem to have achieved many of our original aims. These aims were to a create a powerful, rebellious star image that would draw in the target demographic and make them "want to see her again". We also wanted the audience to be able to relate to our star image through age, looks and ideas that conform to many aspirations of our target audience. However, looking back I would reconsider the choice of costume in the video for our star image, as this seemed to distance the audience at times by being too provocative and therefore making her seem unrelatable.


http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/C57JHG3
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/JKJLRZX
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/JK6LZQT