What have you learned from your audience feedback?

The main improvements that we received from our audience feedback were the following:

• Some shots unsteady- inappropriate zoom/wobbly camera


• Random horse appears in the background


• More abusive husband scenes


• Slippers featured in a scene - unnecessary


• Some framing issues

The good features pointed out from our audience feedback were the following:

• Very good lip syncing throughout


• Steady shots


• Match strike from Eddie- effective and made an impact


• Variety of mise-en-scene was good


• Variety of camera angles was good and coincided with the fast pace scene cuts.


• Good contrast in brightness and darkness of scenes, represented two sides of the story and really emphasised the mood.


• Storyline fitted the song well


• Flashback scene creative and dramatic. Created impact on viewer.

After analysing the feedback, looking into the improvements that had been suggested were our first concern as, shortly after receiving this feedback we would be re-evaluating our video and making any amendments we felt necessary. Therefore it was good to get a second hand opinion that was completely neutral and unbiased. We looked through the improvements and hoped that there would be the time and availability to amend each one however there were some constrainsts that we faced which meant that we were unable to do this.

Firstly, the random horse was clearly something that was noticable and quite distracting to the viewer, as virtually every group who reviewed ou video, mentioned this horse and questioned it purpose. Although this was something we really wanted to remove because of the audiences reaction, we were unable to as on the software we were using, you cannot crop the video clip and we were therefre unable to cut the horse out of the frame. We learnt a lot from this however as when it came to refilming other scenes, we were much more aware of our surroundings and our abilities to frame a shot was imporved because of this.

Some of the shots were unsteady, this was something that we had already noticed and its significance in the video was validated by the audience feedback we received where a few groups mentioned this. This was something we knew that we absolutely had to change and so therefore organised a few more days of filming so that we could re-film scenes that would allow us to replace these inadequate clips. We knew that we would proabably have had to have done this before we got our audience feedback, however this just reassured us that we must rectify these scenes.

To shine light on the positive feedback it was clear to see that we had overall managed to impress our critics. They were very honest in their answers. They mentioned how they liked the way we established the mood through the use of lighting. This was an editing technique I had incorporated to establish the depressive state of the abused wife. It was good to see that the audience had picked up on this and we had therefore succeeded in using editing techniques to establish a mood.

After creating the "flashback scene" I showed it to my mother and asked what she thought of it. she said that there were too many flashes and that because of this, it did not look as effective as you were just distracted by the flashing lights on the screen rather than the content of this flashback. I therefore decided to reduce the number of flashes per second to just 1 so that it could have a better impact on the viewer. They would be able to notice the flashes and recognise this effect but also be aware of the content of the flashback, which was the most important part. When I then collected the class feedback in which many people commented on how they felt the flashback was creative and effective, it was clear to see that this feedback I had received from my mother had in fact improve the final outcome. Sometimes it is very good to get a second opinion along the way, as I carried out this editing alone I needed to gain someone else’s perspective and so asked my mum a lot for her opinion. The flashback scene was the only part she suggested improvements for as her knowledge of the editing software and my abilities were limited. However, I learnt from this experience, and the video had a better outcome because of the amendments I made to the flashback scene, and the class really liked it.

Peer Assessment
When asked whether they enjoyed the music video or not and asked to rate it out of 10 100% of candidates rated our video 8/10 or above. We then asked them what the liked about the video. These were there responses; good storyline, actors were very convincing and had good chemistry, my convincing role as Kelly Clarkson, and the good variety of mise-en-scene and camera angles throughout the video. When asked whether they felt the story line fitted the song, 100% of the candidates agreed that it did. When asked if the actor who played the artist fitted her role again many commented on the many similarities that myself and Kelly Clarkson share. They said that I had done a good job with the miming and playing that characters role. When asked if the actors fitted their role, 100% of the responses were positive and said the actors had good chemistry and had good acting abilities. We then asked if people enjoyed the video and if they were fans of Kelly. 100% of people asked did in fact enjoy the video even if they were not previously fans of her music. When asked on suggestions for improvements the general comments included adding more of a variety of camera angles, sorting out the dodgy zooming within clips and adding a range of shot.

From the peer assessment that we received, we noticed that people were a little more complimentary and less critical as they were our friends and therefore did not feel comfortable criticising our video. However, they all said they had enjoyed it, the actors were good and they liked the storyline, which is a very successful outcome. They also suggested some improvements which were all things that we had already noticed such as the accidental zooming etc. This feedback was very reassuring that people enjoyed our video, however there was one person who said add a bigger variety of camera angles. When we went back to our music video we did do this. You will see scenes of me on the stairway in my house, with very high angle shots and low angle shots. We felt this would mix it up and keep it current and would also satisfy those of the audience who had suggested this as an improvement.