Target Audience Research: Overdrive

Overdrive is another example of a movie filled to the brim with action-packed scenes. The plot of the movie revolves around two brothers who specialize in stealing luxury vehicles. The film features expensive cars, sex appeal, and crime, very similar to the other films my group and I have viewed and researched. This type of movie is geared towards a similar audience as the one discussed in my previous post regarding Fast and Furious 7 (young males aged 15-30). Producers of the film have gone on to produce merchandise pertaining to the film. They have produced customized print pieces and promoted the film by posting the trailer on various social media websites and other digital resources. The trailer was also featured as a commercial on several TV channels and used as a preview on other movies pertaining to the action and crime genres. By promoting the movie in various areas, the film was able to attract a lot of attention and potential viewers. It was quite successful, averaging $7,433,663 in the box office upon release.

Target Audience Research: Fast and Furious 7

                                   

We narrowed the age range of our audience down to people aged around 15-30 years old. Specifically, our film will attract male viewers. The social group our film will target is those with a passion for cars. Since car enthusiasts are prominent world-wide, our film would tackle all areas of the globe. Our film shares the same target audience as one of the films we did research on; Fast and Furious 7. The Fast and Furious franchise had already made a name for itself thanks to the previous films, however, various marketing techniques were still used to publicize the newest film. Billboards and posters were placed worldwide to promote the release of the film. Paul Walker was shown in a very respectful light in these advertisements. He stood alongside the cast members. The audience really appreciated this technique due to the respect they had accumulated for Walker throughout the franchise. Social media sites, such as YouTube were also used for film advertisements. We would definitely use various social media sites to promote our film.

Feedback and Revisions

So far, my group has developed a rough draft of our film project. There are still a lot of aspects that need improvement, however. After showing the film to the class, constructive criticism was offered by several classmates on how to make revisions. We're planning on re-shooting several scenes. The scene where Austin (Trey) receives an unknown phone call needs to be shot again because the phone screen is not in focus. Transition scenes need to be edited for a smoother effect. The opening did not portray the story clearly enough and there was a lot of confusion among audience members. The story needs a more effective demonstration.

Use of Conventions

Our group researched five car racing/robbery action movies before developing our own short film. By viewing these films we learned various media techniques that we could use when producing our own film. We took note on lighting techniques, opening scenes, title usage, cast features, costumes, props, audio and sound usage, and more. All of these elements were taken into consideration when filming our own scene. The most important focus of our film was the cars. We were able to use expensive and modified cars for our scene to get the full effect we were looking for. The targeted audience and social group is people of all ages, primarily those enthusiastic towards cars as well as excitement.

Filming Schedule

Filming took place on 12/17/17. Since the project was due the following week, we were crunched for time. Filming began around 12:30 in the afternoon and we did not finish until it began to get dark out. The filming process went smoothly, and we were able to get everything accomplished in the time frame. Overall, filming was a huge success.

Casting Film Roles

The main character of our film went by the name Austin Jones. He exuded confidence and was not afraid to live life on the edge of danger. Based off of this personality, we concluded that our group member Trey would be the best fit to play Austin. The second protagonist of the film was named Don Brevito, or "Rampage" as some liked to call him. He is confident as well and was known as a man who was not afraid of a good fight or challenge. Josh decided to take on the roll of Don. Another background character was developed by the name of Steven Puchulla. Caleb, a good friend of our group, took on this role due to his reliability and helpful nature. Cierra played the girl in the film who went by the name of Brittney Angel. I preferred not to act on camera, so I involved myself with a lot of behind-the-scenes activities such as editing, recording, and costume design.

Location Sites

Three locations were chosen for film production. The first location was chosen based off its resemblance to a bank. Although we were unable to film at an actual bank due to the use of guns as props, we were able to pick a location that was similar in appearance to that of a bank. Tristan (a friend of our group) informed us of this location because his dad owns the business next door to it.

The "Bank"

The second location we chose for filming was the parking garage of the local business, "Buddy Brew." The scene that took place here involved the two bank robbers switching to a different car in order to go through with their escape scheme. 

Parking Garage

 The third location we chose for shooting was a long stretching road with vey little traffic. The road we figured would be the best fit for the car meet/drag race was the road that the Church of Hope is located on. There is very little traffic on this road and it is located off of a main road so it was perfect for filming. 

Drag Racing Road

The final location that we filmed at was Josh's house where the closing scene of the film was shot. This was a flash-forward into the future five years later where Trey (Austin) was finally released from jail and received a mysterious phone call from an unknown number.