Audience feedback

Students from different classes and even schools watched our trailer so far and we gained some useful feedback.

• The trailer has a good feel, you have a lot to work with, the ending shots showing the death and the wall dripping blood shot really works and screams the genre of the trailer the audience. However, you need to build up the story with shots which reveal the plot because currently this is difficult to understand."
• "Very freaky, editing added great tension, but once a message is made you can cut away"
• "Need more emphasis on the cheating, as the movie is based around this idea and the consequences, at the moment it is not very clear that any cheating has taken place
• "I like it, especially some of the shots, but I think you need to add some music in to the exam hall scenes to add pace to it because it becomes boring to look at after a while"

Pre Final Audience Feedback

Today we had Jesse O'Mahoney and Hugh Spurling in to give us feedback on our trailers. We discussed the positive effects of our trailer, aswell as those that need improving. This was a benefical session as we are constantly watching our trailer and having someone watch it links into what our audience would feel when released. We know our plot and therefore know the message that is coming across in the trailer, however, Jesse and Hugh found it difficult to recognise this. This is the main point which will now improve our trailer. 

Jesse and Hugh advised us into different ways of portraying the story, these includes messages on screen, short clips to engage the audience into the emotional hook. Key information they provided us with was to watch the trailer through the eye of someone else, here we will be able to notify what is missing. 

We now plan to implement our trailer, tomorrow we will film more short clips to reveal the story and after all filming is done and trailer has been put together, we will consider writing on screen to emphasis plot.

Evaluation of trailer so far

Over the past week we have been editing our trailer, putting footage together, cutting down the footage and adding effects. Effects which include music, sound effects and voice over have to complete and add a professional look to our horror trailer. We have followed our story board and planning procedure, however when watching the trailer so far, we did not feel it worked. We had built up an equilibrium showing school exams which are our emotional hook as everyone can relate but the outlook was not of a horror genre. After adding sound to emphasis this, we still did not have it. We actually have clear footage but to the extent of high standard professional horror, it was not working.

As makers of the trailer we are watching and editing this footage every day, to secure the understanding we gained an evaluation from 2 media teachers. They both agreed the trailer was not expressing horror or the plot and as a group we discussed ways to improve...

1. Change the scenes, instead of following a clear Todorov theory, this can remain with quick shots of deaths to create a sense of enigma and leave the audience questioning. In doing this, the montage of deaths could remain but we will be using our footage to a higher standard.
2. In some scenes, the visual is not as effective as the audio. A way of using the audio effectively would be to detach this and use this as an audio over a more effective piece of footage. We could use this as juxtaposing, where an exam scene would have the voice of a death. These are ideas we are planning to use to process an effective trailer.
3. Breaking down the footage, it is a trailer and the visuals should be quick shots which remain in the audience's mind. We need to gain an enthusiastic audience, not bore an audience with long scenes in a trailer.

Exam hall scene

The assembly hall is a location which is always booked and difficult to get access too, as a group we managed to promote our film and was allowed to film in here. Below is the list of props we will need to shoot our scene effectively..

• 16 students to sit in the exam and help build the exam scene
• Examiner to emphasis this and bring the emotional hook
• Exam desks, chairs and papers
• Exam boards
• Equipment for exam
  

We was given 2 hours so we was working to a timeline, this was to set up the scene and shoot the filming. Our actors worked well as the examiner had to speak many times to film from different angels. The footage we have gained has strengths and weaknesses which we will work with when editing our trailer. We would not of been able to gain this footage without amazing help from staff and students.