Audience Research – Independent And Mainstream Films

The second half of my audience research was to discover what people expected from Independent and Mainstream films. The information I collect could help the direction of my own thriller very well.

From Of One To five, How Would You Rate The Plot Structure Of Independent and Mainstream Films?

Shows that in terms of Mainstream films the audience usually expect films to have a medium to relatively poor plot line and are more concerned that the plot line acts as a catalyst for interesting visual sensation.
Whereas for Independent films they expect that the plot is cheaper to make up for a cheaper budget in terms of visual sensation.

From One To Five How Well Do Independent And Mainstream Films Represent Characters

When it came to this question I was surprised to see that both films were expected to have good to excellent character representation with both of the answers for Independent and Mainstream films having all been in the upper three choices. This shows that good character representation is integral for a film.

From One To Five How Would You Rate The Use Of Camera Shots In Mainstream And Independent Films?

The results for this showed me that it is clear that audiences expect Mainstream films to have good to excellent camera shots, whereas they expect that budget costs will limit the quality and extent of the camera shots in Independent films.

Choose Which Of These Subgenres You Would Expect To See In Mainstream And Independent Films.

It is somewhat harder to obtain extra knowledge from this question because other than what is written clearly on the graphs show. The audience expects action to be largely prominent in Mainstream films whereas they expect Independent films to be on subjects that can greater explo mental and cultural ideas.

Choose Which Of These Settings You Would Expect To See In A Mainstream Or Independent Film.

1)

2)

3)

4)

5)

Again this question is quite direct and it is hard to explore the thought behind it. One thing I did learn from the people I interviewed was that they thought because that because Independent films have more diverse and rich plot structures, a variety of more obscure settings could cater better to Independent film.

What I Have Learned:
I have learned that the audience expects the smaller budget of Independent films to be substituted by stronger plot lines and more diverse settings and subgenres. When making my Thriller I will think about how to cater partly to the audience’s expectations of a thriller but perhaps prove them wrong on some of the areas where they think Independent films lack.