Units: 2, 3, 22Task 1: Nature and purpose of research

What is research?

Research is when you conduct an investigation into a study and use the results gathered from your investigation to come up with information/ an answer to your study.

Types of research

There are two types of research:

Quantitative Qualitative

Quantitative

Quantitative research is research that is based on measurements/ numerical based research.

For example, in a media scenario…A media teacher could ask a class how many students like horror movies and/or can take a class tally of the results.

Qualitative Qualitative research is research based on opinions, attitudes, preferences. This can help people to develop ideas for possible quantitative research.In a media scenario, although a media teacher may ask how many people like horror movies, but it would only be a qualitative research if the teacher asked WHY they like horror movies. It’s the opinion(s) of a person that makes the research qualitative.

Methods of research.

There are two methods of research

• Primary• Secondary

Primary research

Primary research is your own original research which you have developed (from scratch)

A game designer may need to develop their own primary research to create a report on their product. Or they can hand out a survey to people who have tested their system and the results they use to create their reportThe information that the designer has gathered and implemented into their research is what makes it a primary research.

Secondary researchSecondary research is when you gather existing data from someone else’s research.

For example, a TV producer may use another producer’s results and research on a sub genre to compare to their own.

Purpose(s) of researchThe purpose of this research is to understand the requirements needed to please and/or horrify the audience

Audience: -Demographics -Psychographics

Market: -Competition -Advertising placement Production: -Viability -Costs -Technological resources

AudienceDemographics:Demographics are the studies of a population based on factors such as age, gender and ethnicity. This is a physical purpose as this purpose usually cannot be changed.The demographic table contains codes (A, B, C1, C2, D, E) which represent the status with people, factors such as their age and jobs they work can play a role in this table.You can also see the percentage of the UK population in 2015 with most of the percentage ranging within B to C2. There has been an increase in the intermediate managerial, administrative and professional jobs as there has also been an increase in the development of England as 40 years ago, there would’ve been a higher percentage of jobs ranging between D and C2.

Link to table

Audience

Psychographics: Psychographics is classifying or grouping people based on their beliefs and opinions. This is a mental purpose as these classifications are based on the thoughts, preferences and mindset of people.

For example, a teenager (between the ages of 15-19) would feel appealed to horror movies as they would find them to be interesting and exciting and could be seen as an explorer however, a ten year old may not like horror movie as they would deem them to be “too scary” and typically can be seen as mainstreamers.

Market

Market research:For horror movies, market researching is when you use other horror movies to compare to your own so that in the case of competition your product is better than theirs.

This research could also be conducted into the audience so that, you would know what target audience is required and what you can do to meet the requirements of what may interest the target audience.

Production

This production will cover the viability, costs and technological resources which means that this will cover how we can use the equipment we have to make the best quality horror trailer with a low budget.

Viability This research into viability is check what we can do in order to make sure our product is able to work successfully.In this case, for the horror movie, we research what we can do to fulfil the main convention of horror movies which is fear. We want to make sure our horror movie is able to scare the audience and let fear dwell within them. And we also research how we can do this with a lot of quality and not a lot of expense.Also, in order for our horror trailer to be more viable, as well as covering and striking the main convention (fear) into the audience, we would need to make sure that there is a storyline because then the horror trailer will make and have no sense to the audience.

Cost

We will research all the equipment and settings which we will need and what we can do without using a lot of money as we would like to try to make sure that we can make the best quality horror trailer with minimal amount of money used which would result in us gaining profit from this.

For example, the 2007 movie Paranormal Activity made the best quality horror trailer with a $450,000 budget and then went on to gain $90,000,000 profit as a result

Technological resourcesOur group will research the resources required in order for our product to work effectively and their importance.

For example, it is vital for us to have a camera to film this horror trailer because we can’t have a trailer without a film. We would make sure the camera has a good quality e.g. 1080p HD so that the audience would be able to see everything filmed clearly. We will use Final Cut Pro on a MacBook to edit our trailer and help us make sure it is constructive and effective on our audience.