Evaluation of Urban Legend

1. EVALUATION:
WHAT HAVE YOU
LEARNT FROM
AUDIENCE
FEEDBACK?

2.  As stated before, my target audience is young children. For my
feedback to be as relevant as possible I decided to predominantly
ask my demographic for feedback.
 I was able to ask a range of male and female children ages 7-12. I
obtained this sample from friends with relatives in this age group
and year 7s at school. However, it is noteworthy that I also asked
teenagers (aged 13-16) and parents of the children as they would
be a secondary audience.

3.  I decided to begin my audience feedback by obtaining qualitative
data. This is because qualitative data is more descriptive and can
be analysed in more depth. I allowed individuals to watch my short
film without my presence and to anonymously give feedback. This
was in the form of a questionnaire.

4.  Questions in my questionnaire included:
 Do you like horror films? (with a yes or no option)
 What is your favourite horror film? (an open question)
 How scary do you rate this film?
 Which title do you prefer and why? (with options 'Itch', 'Scratch',
'Bitten' or 'Bad Hair Day').

5.  I have found that most of my target audience were fans of the
horror genre. Favourite films include 'The Nightmare Before
Christmas', 'Monster House' and 'Coraline'. Some teenagers chose 18
certificates such as 'The Shining' and the 'Saw' franchise which was
surprising as they do not meet the MPAA age requirements.
Feedback from this question reveals that children are more likely to
be exposed to horror films at younger ages. A reason for this could
be due to films such as those by Tim Burton which address dark,
horror themes such as death but in a child-friendly way.

6.  Unfortunately, the comments from my demographic were more vague
than the older audience. This includes "I liked it" or "scary" without
justification. In retrospect, I could have interviewed the children to
encourage more depth from their opinions.
 However, I did receive qualitative, constructive feedback which I
reflected on:
o "The lipstick scene is a bit long". I cut this scene and used an alternative,
shorter scene of the character applying lipstick. This comment was
productive as it allowed the narrative to be told more efficiently.
o "Green is not a very scary colour for the title. Red is scarier'. I changed
the colour to red which has connotations of blood and death,
conventions of the horror genre. In the second questionnaire I
specifically asked about the colour of the title and the 90% of the
audience preferred the dark red.

7.  I have also received feedback which can be categorised as an
oppositional reading. I considered their views but it did not influence
a change in my choices:
o "the footage of the hair being brushed is quiet choppy. I think that
you should make it flow better." I did not change this because I
intentionally used montage editing. My desired effect was to
disorientate the audience, a convention in the horror genre. This
audience feedback revealed that there could be oppositional
views about the use of editing.

8.  In the quantitative feedback I found that the the teenage audience
scored my film a 3/10 rating of scariness. However, my demographic
of 7-11 year olds rated 9/10. As the audience are children they are
more vulnerable and so I had to ensure the horror was age
appropriate. Feedback from this showed that the children enjoyed
the level of horror in my short film.