08.45am-9.20am
Present - Maria Alexiou, Sinthuja Tacks and Tamika Smith
Abesent - None
1. Questionnaires and Focus Groups
We feel as a group that before we produce the new treatments, scripts and storyboards that we should send out questionnaires and hold a focus group meeting which will then influence the decisions made for our new soap. We will call on our focus group once we have produced the first draft of our trailer to gain there feedback before producing the final product.
2. Treatment - Tamika Smith will be adding additional work onto the treatment
-More characters will need to be added onto the treatment
-Locations will also need to be explained - Edminton Green, Train station which can be a landmark.
-Content of our soap will need to be explained more
-Episode 1 and future episodes should be explained in more detail.
3. Location (Myself - Maria)
It was important to decide what locations we will be filming which is why we held this meeting.- We decided to film in a house to show community along with a pub, bus station and train station to express the location and area of the soap opera.
4. Storyboard - Sinthuja Tacks will complete the storyboard and then post it onto the blog.
- We decided as a group the main points in the trailer to our soap opera to ensure Sinthuja was aware what must be included on the storyboard.
- We expressed that esablising shots, long shots, medium and close up shots must be included in the trailer.
- I will complete the script and post it onto the blog.
- The dialogue will be limited in our trailer as it is only going to be a maximum of 2 minuties long.
-I have a ruff draft of the script which I will need to improve before posting it on the blog.
End of meeting.
Questionnaire
My group and I thought it would be appropriate to make a questionnaire regarding current viewing habbits which will help us when attracting our target audience. We only gave out questionnaire to people over the age of 13 as we felt they would be more interested in watching soaps. The questionnaire was as followed:
Questionnaire
Circle the following:
1. How old are you?
13-18
19-25
26-36
36-46
46+
2. Are you male or female?
Male
Female
3. What ethnicity are you ?
Please state .......................................
4. Do you watch any soap operas?
Yes
Sometimes
No
5. If yes, how many different soap operas do you watch a week?
1-3
4-7
8-11
11+
6. What soap operas do you watch?
Eastenders
Coronation Street
Hollyoak's
Home and Away
Neighbours
Emmerdale
Others please state.........................
7. What time do you watch soap operas ? (circle more than one)
5.00pm
6.00pm
7.00pm
8.00pm
9.00pm
BBC iplayer
ITV player
4oD
5 on demand
8. What has been your favourite storyline over the last few years?
Please state......................................................................................................................
9. Would you be interested in watching a new soap opera?
Yes
No
10. What issues would like to see in a new soap opera?
Please state.........................................................................................................................
Results
Out of the 21 random people chosen only two of them were 46+ and the rest where aged between 13-18. When producing my soap opera we will ensure that target 13-18 year olds. This result also enabled us to decide that we will target our focus group of teenagers aged between 13-18.
I felt asking our audience if they watch soap operas will give me a good idea of how popular soap operas are at the moment. The results for this question were that out of the 21 asked 11 people said yes, 1 said no and 9 said sometimes. The person who said they do not watch soap operas was a male. This is something to take into account when targeting the audience. These results enabled us to understand that soap operas are popular which is both a negative and positive for us. This is because we have a large amount of competitors which means we have to ensure our new soap opera can interest them. Holding a focus group will give us a further insight as to what will interest a new audience. We also aim to interest people who sometimes watch soap operas, as they have not established one to watch frequently which gives us room to gain there interest.
When asked if you would watch a new soap 11 people said no and 10 said yes. These results state that the people asked were split between the interest in a new soap opera. This result has given us fuel into how successful our soap may be. We have to make sure that our trailer brings something new which means fixing up the treatment from the results from our focus groups will be very important as narrative is key within the success or failure of a soap.
When asked what issues would you like to see in a new soap opera the top 3 most stated issues were death, relationship and teenage issues. This means that we will attempt to convey all three of these issues within our trailer, however this decision may change after gaining the results from our focus group.
As a group we decided the next step needed would be to hold a focus group to ask for more specific answers regarding what they like and dislike about soap operas. We will now ask students aged between 16-18 to become our focus group.
Focus Group
The information collected from the questionnaires was very useful to gather who our main target audience are, however I have now conducted 5 different interviews to gather more specific information on what is successful and not successful in soap operas. The information from these focus groups will help me when producing my soap opera.
The questions asked to the focus groups were as followed:
1. Do you watch soap operas? Why? (we felt this was an important question as understanding why or why not somebody watches a soap opera can give us an insight as to what we need to do to keep audiences remaining interest or gain interest)
2. Do you consider yourself as a casual or religious viewer?Why? (we felt this was an important question as the viewing habbits of our focus group can determine how many viewers we can gain for our soap. Answering why you watch soaps frequently or not frequently will help us to decide what we can do to reach out to audiences to gain them as religious viewers.
3. What would like to see in a new soap out of the following?Why?
Death
Relationship issues
Teenage Issues
Any others?
(the 3 issues stated below were taken from the questionnaire result as they were the most popular. However we still have room for further ideas and imput before changing our treatment. This question is important as it will enable us to edit the current narratives running to suit a larger audience.
4. What channel do you watch the most? Why? (finding out what channels are most popular will help us decide what channel we will broadcast our soap on)
Results
Naomi - Girl - 16
1. No i don't watch them because they are unrealistic and pointless
2. Neither
3. I'd want to see real issues because then I can relate to them
4. Not many television channels, mainly on the internet
Naomi expressed she finds soap operas unrealistic and hard to relate to which aids to why she doesn't what them. In order to attract Naomi we will need to make our soap as realistic as possible. Naomi also insisted that she prefers to watch programs on the internet. It may be in my interest to stream my soap opera online as well as on the television.
Nathan - Boy - 16
1. Yes i watch them with my parents
2. Casual viewer because I don't find them all interesting
3. I would like to watch soaps with more of a twist
4. Channel 4 because its more realistic
Nathan expressed he watches soap operas with his parents, I found this interesting as I would like to attract many different audiences. He doesn't find all soap operas interesting and would like to see them with more of a twist. I will need to ensure my soap opera can keep audiences interested this will enable me to attract audience members who do not necessarily watch soap operas regularly. He also said that Channel 4 would be his prefered station to watch a soap which is something I will need to think about.
Ashely - Boy - 17
1. Yes, because I've watched them for a long time
2. Religious viewer, I enjoy watching them all
3. Relationship issues because that's what i am interested in
4. BBC1 and Channel 4 because the programs I watch are on them channels
After interviewing Ashley I was able to understand that he enjoys watching all soap operas, but in order for mine to stand out he insists I should aim to make it as realistic as possible as he finds some of the story lines very unrealistic. He also would like a narrative regarding relationships to be shown within our soap. This works well with our treatment and I will ensure that this is shown in our trailer to gain Ashleys interest. He also insisted his favourite channels are BBC1 along with Channel 4.
Ipek - Girl - 18
1. Yes i find them entertaining and interesting
2. Casual viewer, I am not obsessed
3. Teenage issues because I am a teenager, I can relate to them
4. BBC1 because I watch Eastenders
Ipek's answers to my interview were helpful as she explained that because she is a teenager she would find a soap more entertaining if it related around teenagers. This was a very important point as I already intend to make a soap around teenage lives. I will ensure that teenagers are shown in the trailer to identify the character base straight away. BBC1 is her favourite channel because the only soap she watches (Eastenders) is shown on that station.
Ibrahim - Boy - 19
1. No, I don't find them interesting.
2. Neither
3. Death because I find the aftermath interesting.
4. Channel 4 because they have interesting programs on.
Ibrahims interview differed from the rest as he explained he watches no soap operas at this present time simply because they do not interest him. I feel that in order to grab the attention of audiences like Ibrahim i need to make something new and exciting. Ibrahim said he would watch a new soap opera if it included death in it and how the characters lived resulting this death. We will include a death in the trailer as I feel many audiences will find the aftermath interesting as these are new characters. He insists that Channel 4 have the best programs on so this will work towards our final decision on the channel of broadcast
Overall I have learn't a lot from this focus group session. I now understand that many people have there current viewing habits due to force of habit rather than because they find the soap story lines highly entertaining. Four out of the five interviewed insisted they would be more than happy to watch a new soap opera if it included more realistic events and circulated around teenagers/ relationships and death rather than adults who they are unable to relate to. I also was able to identify that the most popular channels for these people where channel 4 and BBC1, I feel that broadcasting our soap on BBC1 would be an issue as Eastenders is a well established soap and we will be unable to attract audiences to watch two soaps on the same channel. We decided that channel 4 will be the best channel for our soap as there are no soaps on around the time of 8.00pm on this channel.
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