Quick poll

DeJager said:
lol...but you also click the "x" if the movie has a company logo at the beginning. :lol:
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A properly done logo would last 4 to 5 seconds. Then its bang, right into the story. If I have to clock the logo beyond that time, chances are quite low the rest of the film is worth watching to the end, so that first 10 seconds better be compelling.

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My feature doesn't have a logo at all. Just what is it I missed in life that killed my urge to make a snazzy logo?
 
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GuerrillaAngel said:
Just what is it I missed in life that killed my urge to make a snazzy logo?
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Perhaps you have suppressed memories of being traumatized by a snazzy logo.



Maybe.





PS: I've always found hot logos to be stuck up beyotches.
If you want some serious action you gotta go after the third-tier down plain jane logos.
They've usually got some pent up frustrations primed for release.
Anything with Helvetica and her younger sister Arial are both good to go logos in my book!
Hubba hubba! ;)
 
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I went to Blockbuster's going out of business sale today and bought 15 movies for $20.
Julia / Women In Trouble / The Answer Man / Six Wives of Henry Lefay / Away We Go / Cyrus / Factory Girl plus other movies you've actually heard of. I've seen all these, and I'll watch them again. They're all very entertaining (from what I remember). They all have name brands, and they're all flops according to the numbers.

They wouldn't even register on a poll. Tilda Swinton in Julia, never heard of it. GREAT MOVIE.

Polls mean nothing. No offense to the OP.

Do what you're going to. Do what you can afford. Do it the best you can. If the acting is good enough (That's so important) you'll have something to be proud of. Whether it makes a million or leaves you broke. You've created a piece of art, that is solely your own.

Do what makes you happy.
 
Re: SUCKERPUNCH -

DeJager said:
And yet it was in a TON of theaters.
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SUCKERPUNCH tanked, big time. Made on a budget of 82 million, the U.S. domestic gross was just 36 million. The reason it got into so many theaters was Zack Snyder's reputation with DAWN OF THE DEAD and 300.

SUCKERPUNCH's poor performance has derailed or pushed back Snyder's projects - ARMY OF THE DEAD (DAWN sequel) and MAN OF STEEL (this will get made because BATMAN's Christopher Nolan is the producer).

Article:
"Can one film ruin a career? Maybe it can, if that film is Sucker Punch."

Another:
"Given how poorly van Heijningen’s The Thing and Snyder’s Sucker Punch fared at the box office, it’s not tough to see why Warner Bros. would want to play it safe."
 
directorik said:
Even when it comes to the CGI vs. practical efx question I can't
really answer. Some CGI is so much better, but in many cases
it looks bad - blood efx for example. I'm talking as a movie fan
not a filmmaker. CGI blood efx look awful - background replacement
looks great.
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You know, I'm glad you said it, Rik. To hear you say that with such authority about CG blood, it really rings the bell of truth for me. It's true. Though I totally understand why it's used. It's more convenient and you can make it behave in ways that you want it to in the computer with software. But, mainly, it looks pretty fake. I mean, take something like Kill Bill, which I'll bet used practical blood, and compare it to something like 300. The bloody violence in 300 is pretty far out, but yeah, is there a blood spray in that film with which you are not exquisitely aware was done in AE or its equivelant?

ussinners said:
Do what you're going to. Do what you can afford. Do it the best you can. If the acting is good enough (That's so important) you'll have something to be proud of. Whether it makes a million or leaves you broke. You've created a piece of art, that is solely your own.

Do what makes you happy.
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Follow your bliss?

QFT. My bias, though, is that I don't think that I care about filmmaking professionally for Hollywood.

Still, if you do want business success, isn't it standard operating proceedure in Hollywood and probably elsewhere to use focus groups?

Indiewood.
 
@Directorik

Yeah, there are some lucky people who can do that :)
They may not 'polled' but got their 'input' from good sources to make a movie the public wants. If they just made one without any consideration, then I'd say that was one helluva lucky move.

Hey, I make shitty art movies and don't care what the public wants because I do it for my own amusement. However, I may have to consider polling and getting inputs from sources to make a feature this year. It's gonna be shit, (in my mind) but at least it will make money, so I can fund my crappy art movies again :)
 
Scoopicman said:
SUCKERPUNCH's poor performance has derailed or pushed back Snyder's projects - ARMY OF THE DEAD (DAWN sequel) and MAN OF STEEL (this will get made because BATMAN's Christopher Nolan is the producer).

Article:
"Can one film ruin a career? Maybe it can, if that film is Sucker Punch."
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Except, of course, that it isn't. The most recent attempt to bring Justice League to the big screen failed precisely because executives feared putting parallel iterations of Batman and Superman on the screen at the same time. Why they have changed their minds now, beyond the potential for generating extra revenue, is somewhat open to question.
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--Ben Child.

My guess would be The Avengers are the impetus.
 
Interesting poll. The most interesting to me is the crowdfunding question, where half of the people that answered say they'd never donate.

Story vs visuals is a debate that happens a lot. My opinion is, especially for we little guys, they both have to be equally excellent to have any kind of success selling the final product. Story is probably more important in a lot of ways, but if you use that reasoning to make a movie that looks and sounds like crap then nobody is going to see it.

Visuals are more important in the getting people to pay money for a movie ticket sense, your trailer is cut from visuals with only hints at a story and that's what people decid to give you money with. If it looks terrible, you won't get paid even if the story is great. If it looks good but has a terrible story, well, you probably tricked a few suckers out of there $8. Not that that's the goal, but you understand what I mean.
 
richy said:
Still, if you do want business success, isn't it standard operating proceedure in Hollywood and probably elsewhere to use focus groups?

Indiewood.
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Focus Group for art? That's sad. Very sad.

I don't know much (if anything) about focus groups, polls, or anything of the like. But, look at things like Presidential Polls. They ask 1000 people and use that as a margin as what's going to happen. Who are these people they're asking? What makes them the majority of the minority.

You asked a series of questions to a bunch of people you don't know. You're allowing them to possibly sway you in a direction that might be totally wrong. This is art not toothpaste or Coke vrs Pepsi.

You want to see failure in focus groups, go to the "specialized jury selection professionals" that the OJ Simpson or Casey Anthony Prosecutors used.

You have a brain, it can ask opinions. But, those opinions should coincide with what's in your mind. If it's going to change your opinion, the answer shouldn't be "check this box" it should be "Why should I change in favor of what you want? What do you know that I don't?"

I'm not arguing. It's just my opinion on polls. I took yours. It was quick and painless. Just know, I'm not part of any demographic that matters in society anymore.
 
PaulGriffith; "Interesting poll. The most interesting to me is the crowdfunding question, where half of the people that answered say they'd never donate. "


Well, I donated bunch of money but the results were crap in almost all cases. So, I am very selective now and I want to see previous work and make a judgement.
The problem with these projects, most of them get the money if they have something to do with 'feel-good' ideas. You know, the PC kind of things. The same time serious proposals are ignored.

A friend who makes pro films proposed a feature and showed a REAL PRO presentation of his past work and what he wants to do with the money. He failed. In the meantime teens proposed a stupid idea and shot it on a FLIP Cam. Well, those kids movie was just like the Flip cam proposal and belongs to YT.
I noticed at one place people will give insane amount of money for anything that has to do with environment and PC subjects.

Paul, I agree with your observation about visuals and what's happening today.
Not necessary a good thing but that's the way it is. People like visual excitement, VFX so it's a valid point. Am not sure where I stand on any of this, but I understand the attraction.
 
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p38 said:
@Directorik

Yeah, there are some lucky people who can do that :)
They may not 'polled' but got their 'input' from good sources to make a movie the public wants. If they just made one without any consideration, then I'd say that was one helluva lucky move.
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An unusual distinction. A “poll” and “input” and “consideration“
all lumped in together.

Okay, if you put polling and input together to mean exactly the
same thing, I see your point. I’m sorry I did not make mine clear.
I do not believe any filmmaker creats in a vacume - we always get
input from many sources. I do not believe movies are made without
any consideration at all. But I do believe that an excellent movie
that the public likes can be made without taking a single poll.

And that’s my point.

Asking a lot of people what their opinions about something is, in
my opinion, not a good way to make movies. Even popular movies
that the public pays to see.

A certian amount of luck is always part of the process. Nobody
KNOWS what audiences will pay to see - the audiences does not KNOW
what they want to see. This is terrifying to numbers people and
money people and anyone with a statistical or analitical mind. It
is downright horrifying to think that a movie just might succeed
or fail on something untangable. There MUST be an algorythm in
there somewhere.

However, for the creative mind, it’s all we have. All the opinions
of others, all the polls, the “do you prefer this or this” are
meaningless. Once again, look at the results of the poll here. It
seems people want a science fiction suspence film with ghosts and
a lot of blood.

I know Anim8 is not using this poll to write a script or produce a
movie. How could he? He knows no one wants to see a science
fiction thriller with ghosts and a lot of blood. So he is going to
make the movie he wants to make. If it fails you will know
this proves polling the public is the better way. If it succeeds you
will wonder why - the polls didn’t reflect success.

And according to this specific poll a lot of people do not want to see a
horror film with a CGI monster and too much blood or action.

Reminds me of “Cloverfield” $170,700,000 worldwide.
 
Focus Group for art? That's sad. Very sad.
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Perhaps so, but if you're intending to make $$$ from your art, you have to do what the big boys do. I know I will be using focus groups again in the future.

I don't know much (if anything) about focus groups, polls, or anything of the like. But, look at things like Presidential Polls.
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And they were spot on in the last election.

They ask 1000 people and use that as a margin as what's going to happen. Who are these people they're asking? What makes them the majority of the minority.
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There's a science behind who you ask -- it has to be truly random. 800 is the magic number -- beyond 800 the results doesn't change much even if if you asked another 100,000 people.

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For filmmakers its not so much whether focus groups liked the movie themselves but rather, did they understand what they saw and would they tell friends they know who might like the film about it.

The story you're trying to tell and the story they're getting may be two entirely different things. This is where focus groups helps.
 
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