To market to this audience, I will be uploading the final documentary to YouTube and Vimeo and will try and employ viral marketing techniques through social media wesbites such as Facebook and Twitter, where a lot of younger audiences that I will be marketing to are a member of. Whilst I will be sharing and asking friends to share the documentary, I will also be getting in contact with more popular pages and accounts and asking them to share it also. Thus, garnering a greater viewership.
Another way in which I will be marketing this documentary will be through entering into local film festivals that allow local filmmakers to showcase their work and forge connections to others in the same industry. Entering these festivals will be a great starting point in showcasing my work but I don't wish to limit myself to just the local festivals. I believe there is a potential to be involved in larger festivals that aren't limited to just being within the United Kingdom and I aim to take those opportunities when and if they become available. I will enter as many as possible and hope to attain as much notority as possible for myself and my project.
Here are some of the local festivals I will be looking to enter:
When creating the idea for 'Modern Mobile Dating', it initially came to me by noticing just how many people are constantly on their mobile phones in public. Just how many of these people are using dating apps, speaking to people they met on dating apps or had previously used them? Of the people I spoke to, a large majority of them had used them at one point in their life and all had heard about them and had a story to tell. I want to tell and preserve these stories through the most legitimate way possible, a documentary. By getting participants that are experts in the field and people who have had first hand experiences with the apps, we can correctly portray the subject to the highest standard of information possible. I want to explore the relationships people have with these apps and how different individuals interact with them, I feel the 'a week in a life' type segment and the interviews will help in achieving this.
The idea behind 'Modern Mobile Dating' is to delve into the cyber-romantic lifes of individuals and tell their stories as entertaingly as possible. The participants I will aim to be as different as possible. I have a 19 and a 21 year old male at the moment, so I am aiming to diversify my cast to fully show the broad range of people who use these dating apps and tell the best stories possible. Furthermore, if I conduct interviews with the candidates prior, I can ensure that they are suitable. However, I need to have a set category that I must develop to narrow down candidates both prior to interviewing and during the interview process that is based on more than just having a feel for who is right. So, these will be my initial categories:
Pre-interview:
Presenter - past experience, flexible, nearby.
Contributer - Available, interesting character, open to adventure.
Interview:
Presenter - Charasmatic, confident, positive about the project.
Contributer - Fun, interesting character, confident.
I strongly believe that this is a realistic schedule that allows more than enough time to complete every stage of production to an impressive standard.
Late January/Early February:
Finish script/Begin casting.
Mid-Late February:
Audition cadidates/Finalise Cast.
March:
Shooting all of the production.
Early April:
Primary Post-Production.
Mid-Late April:
Finalise the edit.
May forwards:
Distribution.
As the casting hasn't begun, I have thought about how to approach hiring a viable presenter for the production. I have looked into the consent I require in order to use a person's image and to film in certain locations. I have to consider the safety of myself and the university. To do this I need to get proof of consent from the relevant sources. I have found a form I can use for this purpose:
In order to make sure I have somebody who would be successful in the presenter role, I have become a member of Casting Call Pro, an actors casting wesbite. This website will allow be to creating a casting call that will be specific to the role I requite and potential suitors will contact me if they are interested. However, I could also use this website to search manually for a candidate that are available. Whilst I have found this a productive experience, looking at people's showreels, I belive I will have to create a casting call to find somebody who can fill this niche role I am offering. However, this can be a viable fall back. I plan to continue to use this website in order to set up interviews for the role During February.
If this equipment wasn't already available to hire due to being a student at university, this is realistically how much this would cost to produce the documentary per day. This should help in reducing the cost largely having access to equipment and crew. This will be my new budget:
Travel - £100
Actor - £400
Distribution (Festival Entry Fees) - £100
Catering - £50
Total = £650
This budget is a lot more viable, realistically I would not have been able to raise £4119+ in this small time period. However, the £650 should be a realistic target to achieve. To fund the money, I am going to set up a funding page through Indie GoGo. On this page I will outline the major details of the documentary I will be producing and tell the investors to what their money will be going towards specifically. I will provide artefacts on the page to show potential suitors that the project is viable. Furthermore, I will offer rewards for certain levels of investment to encourage larger donations.
Production schedule
After taking part in many projects prior and then doing further research, I have further understood the importance and proper ways in which to create a production schedule and stick to it. Taking into consideration that I am the main source of creative direction, I must keep to a tight schedule to ensure that I keep moving forward at a reasonable pace. This will be the first major documentary project I will be undertaking that involves working with an outside hire presenter. As this is such a large project, I must make sure I keep to this schedule to be successful:
Budget
To ensure that I will be able to viably create this documentary, I have researched into what would be a realistic overall cost for all the potential expenses. To do this, I looked into what it would cost in the industry to hire certain equipment and crew I would require. I have also taken into account other expenditures such as travel and catering.
Below there is the costing information I have retreived from the Coventry University production rate card and broken down the expected costs for each individual item.
Cast & Crew:
DoP (Cinematographer) -£674
Camera Operator £468
Sound Mixer £469
Editor £674
Sound Editor £674
Actor £400
Boom Operator £377
Equipment Hire:
Canon 60D £60
Sennheiser ME66 Rifle Mic £30
Sennheiser Radio Mics £15
Headphones £5
Boom Pole £4
Cables £4
Manfrotto 501HDV Tripod £15
Other:
Catering - £50
Distribution (Festival Entry Fees) - £100
Travel - £100
Total = £4119
The core audience for this documentary are 25-34 year olds. Almost half of the Tinder users fall under this age group at 45%. The secondary audience is 16-24 year olds, with 38% of Tinder's userbase falling into this category. When focusing on these audiences, we hit 84% of Tinder userbase.
However, this is still quite a broad spectrum. So, we will further narrow this down to urban people, which make up 76% of Tinder users. We will apply this to both our primary and secondary audiences. Furthermore, we are going to also add the condition of them being male. This is due to the fact that the majority of Tinder users are male over female. Also, I feel aiming it towards men would be more interesting stylistically as I feel there would be more varying opinions on aspects of mobile dating.
Primary audience: Male, 25-34, urban.
Secondary audience: Male, 16-24, urban.
When researching these film festivals, it has made me very aware of the set of requirements that each individual institution gives and what you need to provide in order to be able to enter. All of these festivals that I have chosen I should be able to enter due to my film's genre and expected length. The entry fees all vary in price but are between £10-£45 depending on which festival and the date of the submission. I chose to not limit myself to entering only free festivals and have included festival entries to my budget. By doing this I am allowing myself to be a part of more prestigious festivals, thus giving myself a chance to give my documentary the most merit.
By taking such careful consideration to the distribution of my project, I will make the documentary much more successful in terms of gaining exposure on a larger level, making a greater impact. By spreading my project on a larger scale, I can broaden my horizons as a professional and ensure that more journalists will want to publish articles on myself and my project. I feel by doing my documentary on a current trend, it will also garner greater odds of it being reported on. Furthermore, by being involved in the festivals, I will have myself be viewed higher in the industry and thus will be more likely to have articles published about me and my project. Furthermore, the documentary will be reported about regardless due to being a participant in the festival
I have a great interest in creating good visuals in my projects, creating the correct look for 'Modern Mobile Dating' is of paramount importance to me. As the project is a documentary, I have to create something that looks and sounds credible so that my viewers will engage fully with what I am presenting to them. If they don't view me as a credible source, they will not believe the information I put forward is legitimate. Having a good stylistic approach is the first step to show this credibility, and is especially necessary when using the documentary format. In order to develop my film into the correct stylistic approach, I have taken inspiration from other filmmakers and their both large and small budget films. As the documentary will be set in lots of different locations and involve interviews, I have and will continue to look at documentaries that work under a similar style. Watching these have helped in developing the stylistics I am going to impliment in all the stages of production. Here are a couple of the documentaries I looked at:
I picked out all of these key techniques from each of the documentaries as I feel that these are key elements that I should be implimenting in my own production. By adding these techniques, my production should look more professional and match the genre. By adding in the following techniques, it will add the following to the production:
Establishing shots at new locations - This will help in giving the audience a sense of where they are and give me a chance to speak with the audience about what is coming up.
Shallow focus/Close ups during interviews - This ensures the audience's attention doesn't faulter from the subject, thus allowing me to more effectively convey my message to them.
Filler music used often - This will help in setting the mood and to fill scenes in which don't need a voiceover.
Experts used - This will help in giving legitimacy and more helpful and entertaining information to the production.
Lots of emotional/controversial scenes - This will help in engaging the audience due to it's entertainment to the/emotional engagement with the viewer.
Many different locations used for interviews - This could help in keeping the audince interested on the subject matter.
Ends on a memory to stick with the viewer - This helps in giving a sense of conclusion to the audience and helps in creating a greater emotional connection with them.
Teenage Gangs of South London (2015) Ross Kemp
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Establishing shots when entering new locations
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Lots of close ups during interviews to show emotion.
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Shallow focus on subjects
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Many different locations when conducting interviews, often unconventional (e.g. in a car)
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Expert guests involved often
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Very controversial questioning to create drama
The Age of Loneliness (2016) BBC Documentary
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Cut away shots during interviews to other relevant shots.
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Shallow focus/close ups during interviews.
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Establishing shots in new locations
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Introduction about new documentary participants.
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Lots of emotional scenes due to subject matter
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Ends on an ending thought to leave a memory with the viewer.
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Filler music used often
From the initial idea to now, the concept of my project has changed almost entirely. At first, I had the initial idea to just create a documentary about Dating apps, I had no concrete ideas for the content, no questions to answer or ideas to convey to the viewer. After doing research into the subject matter, I saw how vastly popular they were. After realising quite the extent of their popularity, I started noticing more and more how many people I see using them. I was inquisitive as to why they use these apps and what do they do on them. So, I decided I wanted to answer the questions of why are these dating apps so popilar and how do people interact with them. I believe my interview and 'a week in the life of using dating apps' should answer these questions and then some. However, I should perhaps diversify these segments with other fillers to create the best entertainment for the audience whilst also sticking to my intended purpose.
When looking at the documentaries I mention below, The Age of Loneliness, Teenage Gangs of London, and others, I have evaluated their content techniques and aim to take certain approaches. The Age of Loneliness particularly is helpful in developing the content of my documentary as it deals with a similar topic of romance and dating. I can see that they use certain content which I hope to employ in a similar fashion such as; interviews that are emotional and telling stories of individuals to help hook the audience into a narrative of sorts. I aim to take the same emotional approach to showing their content. I will also be taking from Teenage Gangs of South London in their approach to content and how they create drama, particularly in interviews as I feel this will be entertaining, especially as it will be touching on current trends, like in this documentary. I am constantly trying to improve my project. This can be seen from the information I have given and for example, through the improvement of documentary posters, changing from the image above, to this one to the right.
