Short Film: Target Audience Profile

For all films it is important that you know who your target audience is. This provides you with a basic blueprint for what you should include in your film and what the main bulk of your audience will respond well to and more importantly what they won't respond well to. Therefore it is a very good idea to build up an audience profile for your target audience and that it what we are going to do in this post.

For our short film we are creating a horror film genre and therefore we will be making an audience profile for the horror genre. The majority of modern horror film fans are aged between 15 and 25 and thus we have decided to do our audience profile about that age group.
 
Facts:

• Working Life: Most will be in full time education or in a part time job with the emphasis been on their social life
• Social Life: Are the most likely to go out on a night with their peers, much of their income will be spend on nights out
• Home Life: Most will either still be living with parents, in student accommodation or in a rented homes - very few own their own property
• Finance: Most will not be in full time employment so finances come either from part time jobs, family or student loans 

Media Use:

• This generation tend to get most of their information from more modern forms of media i.e. TV, Internet
• When it comes to TV use most of this generation will tend to be drawn towards watching music channels, Sit-coms and sports (males)
• Internet use shows that this age group is the most likely to use social network sites such as Facebook, Myspace and Twitter etc
• This is also the age group that consumes the largest variety of music genre and therefore consumes the most music

Cinema habits:

• This age group are the most likely to go to the cinema with a group of friends, The average group size is 4
• While at the cinema 96% of this audience will watch the adverts at the beginning of the film
• They are most likely to go see a film within the first 2 weeks of its release with 72% of 15-25 year old's visits to the cinema to see a film that has been on release less then 2 months
• 23% of the age group are heavy cinema goers, this is classed as going to the cinema at least once a month

This information is taking from a Pearl and Dean Survey 

Media Audience's Powerpoint

Media audiences 1.2

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Short Film Plans: Genre

For our short film we have decided that the genre that our film will mainly be a horror genre. There are several different reasons for our choosing horror as a genre.

Firstly it is quite hard to generalize horror as a genre as it is split into several sub-genres leading to most horror films fitting into one of these sub-genre's. Examples of these different horror sub-genres are:


The Slasher Movie
The slasher movies were originally a product of the 1970's. They normally follow a run of murders by one psychopathic killer, usually against 1 town or group of people. The slasher genre has recently gone through a mini revival after the success of the Scream film series (which often parodies the sub-genre)



The Zombie Movie
The last year has seen an increase in the amount of movies that use Zombies as the films antagonists. Films using Zombies were also popular in the last 70s/ early 80s. The genre has seen several remakes of these original zombie movies in recent years including films like Dawn of the Dead

Teen Centered Horror's
Many horror films revolve around a group of teenagers that are often hunted by an unknown foe. In recent years many of the horrors revolve around a group of lead characters that are still in their teens. A reason for this may be that the main audience for horrors now is between the ages of 15 and 25.



Torture Porn
In recent years a new sub-genre has emerged that has become known as torture porn. These films often focus on torture and the subjects of the films suffering from painful and gruesome deaths. This genre of film is often referred to as the newest sub-genre in horror.




3D Films
Like most genres in the past year, horror is starting to move into using 3D technology for their films. In fact one of the first success's of the new incarnation of 3D was a horror film, My Bloody Valentine 3D. Many people suggest that this is where the future of the horror movie lies.




Horror: A Franchise Genre?
In horror it is very rare now that you will see a horror film that is a stand alone movie that does not belong to a Franchise. This seems to have been the case for at least 40 years going all the way back the 70's with early horror franchise's like the Friday the 13th

Rules for Making Short Films

While researching what different people believe to be the ways to make a good short films i have found what i believe to be the best rules for making short films:

1) You must use an original idea - Short film audiences do not tent to enjoy watching films that are along the same idea lines

2) Have a good script - The script in a short film has to be stronger then it does for a feature film because it has less time to engage and inform the audience

3) You NEED to engage your audience within the 1st minute - Many audiences lose interest in short films if the opening is too slow

4) Keep it short! - it seems a given rule considering it is for Short film but the shorter a short is, generally speaking it will be more successful

5) You must keep every shot interesting - for example during a short film your film making skills will normally be assessed more then it would be for making a feature film

6) You need a quality crew - because you have less people working on a short film those people you are using must be the best you can get if you want the best film - this also applies to the actors that you hire

Lighting

There are several different ways of lighting a set for Film or TV:


The 3 point lighting system - There are lights coming from 3 different directions with the strongest light (The Key Light) lighting the subject from the front left, there is a weaker Fill Light at the front right and then the weakest light (The Back-light) placed behind the subject.

Back-lit - You only have a back-light that gives the effect of a silhouette of the subject

Ambient - No light is used other then any natural light and any light sources that the audience can see

High Key - In the scene there is a lot of light that fully lights the set

Low Key - The opposite of High Key where there is very little light on set

Filters - Filters can be used either during filming or in the editing process to change the color of the scene which effects the mood of the scene

For these photos we had to use Red Head Lights but for using these there are several Health and Safety Rules:

• They are extremely fragile so you have to be careful when using them so it is important not to knock them and that when transporting 2 people much carry them
• They also get very hot so you must not touch the heads
• It is important not to cover them with anything
• The lights are very powerful so don't look into them
• They MUST be switched off when not needed
• The bulbs are expensive and fragile so extreme care is needed
• All the cables must be taped down

Short Film Presentation

Short Film on Prezi

Review of I'm Here

Spike Jonze's short film I'm Here is in my opinion a wonderful short. I believe that it been a short film is the perfect option for the film. It's futuristic world would probably end up been repetitive by the end of a feature film. One of the main success's of the film is that it manages to create strong enough characters that an audience can easily associate with them by the end of the film despite the fact that they are not human. Another triumph of the film is how the characters manage to portray emotions through their eyes and their voice. The story is original and the films world manages to capture the attention despite the repetition that does start to creep in towards the end of the film. The overall experience of the film is an enjoyable one that left me wanting to watch the film again.

 

Character Profiles

In Film binary opposites are often used. This makes it easier for the audience to relate to which characters are good and which are bad.

We were asked to create 2 character profiles who are binary opposites in our horror story. For this we chose the killer and the police officer who is interrogating her.

Apologies for the quality of the pictures!