Beauty and the Beast Marketing Case Study

This was a huge release for Disney in 2017 and has had a phenomenal marketing machine behind it to ensure it was a success. I think it's safe to say they succeeded as it was the biggest March opening weekend of all time and the number one opening of 2017 to date taking £18.4 million in it's opening weekend. 

This was a remake of the very popular 1991 original cartoon which already had a huge fanbase so the film's marketing campaign relied heavily on nostalgia to bring in fans of the old disney film. They did this by using the original music, characters and costumes and recreating iconic shots from the first film such as the rose petals falling, Belle entering the castle and the beast tearing the family portrait. All these shots were used in the trailers, especially the teaser trailer which was devoted to enticing fans of the original film with direct parallels being drawn between the two. All this resulted in a record breaking weekend, second only to the release of 'Star Wars: The Force Awakens' which also had a huge pre-existing fan base. 

We have been able to follow this film right from the start when the film was announced in 2015 as updates were released on casting the main characters, specific attention was on the casting of Emma Watson as Belle which caused a lot of excitement around the film. 

Next they released the first poster - a rose in a jar to reassure fans that this was going to be true to the 1991 original film - this was the first of the nostalgia fuelled campaign.

The next poster released was of the two main characters dancing to create hype around the romance and magic of the film. The background is dark to create a sense of mystery but also to entice fans by controlling the tantalisingly slow release of information about the film's look.

Afterwards a theatrical one sheet showed us the ensemble cast the movie sported using the famous actors (such as Emma Watson, Ewen McGregor, Ian McKellen and Emma Thompson) to rouse more fan support and hype. 

Next a triptych poster was used to show the three main parts of the story - the town and Belle’s life, the castle and the romance and the villain Gaston. This allowed fans to have a glimpse of the locations of the film too. 

Next a whole selection of specific character posters were released to show each individual character clearly. This, again, allowed the high profile cast to be flaunted to gain interest and excitement whilst also showing fans updated costumes from their favourite cartoon characters. 

These were also created as motion picture posters. 

The company then released a teaser trailer giving glimpses of the sets and characters using the original music and iconic shots and camera angles to spark further nostalgia. 

Then a full trailer was released outlining the story and showing iconic shots from the original film. 

The third trailer released went into more depth about Belle and the developments of her character the 2017 film had added. 

There was an official website for the film which sported a huge ‘Buy Tickets’ banner as well as trailer, behind the scenes pictures, film stills, a plot synopsis, the motion picture posters, cast interviews, the credits of everyone involved and links to the Disney store merchandise including dolls of the live action characters. 

Disney showed examples of synergy by promoting their 'Beauty and the Beast' apps from the film on their website to increase profits on multiple media platforms. 

There was a twitter, Facebook and Instagram page where the film was promoted with short clips and posters including countdowns to the release of the film, soundbites of the cast singing and ‘random’ pictures from behind the scenes. 

This reached huge audiences on social media and allowed fans to follow every step of the campaign by tracking the actors and specific film social media pages for updates and sneak peaks. 

TV spots aired showing clips of the film with each one focussing on different characters. One even aired at the golden globes opening ceremony and during the oscars broadcast. This meant the film reached industry experts and film fans who watched the award ceremonies at home, a more specific and highly relevant target audience.

Disney exercised corporate synergy when stars hosted an episode of ‘The Bachelor’ on ABC to promote the upcoming release. There was also lots of symbiosis with companies such as ‘HomeAway’ which offered the chance to stay at Duns castle with 20 guests, ‘Morgan Taylor’ with movie themed nail polish colours and Twining which put some of their tea flavours in movie branded packaging. 

Cast members did loads interviews to promote the film for magazines and youtube channels, the first being Emma Watson’s interview with EW which showed us first looks of her as Belle, pictures of the Beast and the movie’s tone. 

The film also had a lot of attention drawn to it through Disney's first explicitly gay character, 'LeFou' played by Josh Gad. This is a positive development in media representation however, that's not why this character made the news. The film was banned to anyone under 16 in Russia due to this representation and, in Malaysia, the film hasn't been exhibited due to Disney's refusal to remove the scene which they want censored. This has created a lot of talk around the film and it's characters, especially with Emma Watson's development of Belle as a feminist. This created lots of publicity around the film and actually helped generate audience interest. 

Overall this film campaign has been huge, expertly planned and perfectly pulled off. It used it's biggest source of income - pre-existing fans - as it's base using nostalgia and enticed new fans through famous casting choices, modern day story and character developments resulting in the most successful musical film opening weekend ever in the UK. 

Audience Feedback on my Final Cut

The target audience feedback was positive and I'm really happy with it. They said that they understood the plot and managed to relate to the protagonist because she is the same age as them. They also said it was incredibly tense and this atmosphere was created by the building 'franticness' of the scenes and the soundtrack. I put a lot of thought and effort into this so I am thrilled that they picked up on it. I did get more interest in the story when I showed the opening to girls and, although there may have been other reasons I believe this is because the opening is tailored to appeal to a female target audience.

They also said that it was good at foreshadowing the later action through the build up of flashbacks leading to the modern day moment.
One person said that they really enjoyed the clever use of media technologies to get information across to the audience (news report as Emma walks into the room). They said this meant they understood the plot and what was going on in the town without being overwhelmed or bored with information. They also really liked how it was still in the story so didn't break the bubble of the film world with an outside voiceover or information to read on the screen. They said it made it feel real and like they could've been there.
I was also told that my opening engages the audience through the use of the narrative enigma. After they'd watched the opening, every single person turned to me and said, "Well what happens?!" This is really encouraging as they were drawn into Emma's world and engaged with the characters so much they wanted to know what happened to them in the rest of my film.

I showed the finished opening to an audience member who'd watched one of the earlier rough cuts and said that they weren't sure when it was a flashback and when it was modern day. They suggested I maybe added transitions to show when we were moving between the two. On seeing the final cut they said it was much better and that the transitions I'd added really improved their understanding of the piece. They also said that they loved the filters I'd put on the flashbacks which helped to differentiate them even more from the real time action. I was really happy that they could see an improvement in my opening an that it helped their understanding of my plot.

Evaluation Question 6

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

I have learnt a lot about technology in the process of creating my film opening. When I started my project I had no experience with DSLR's, filming, editing or composing music; the whole experience was entirely new. Therefore I have had to learn everything required for me to make my film opening from scratch.

The very first thing we did was to set up our blogs.

I had never used 'Blogger' before so this was all new. We chose templates, designs, colours and fonts to personalise each of our blogs individually before moving on to use them for writing posts.

I also had to learn how to add pictures and embed videos into my blog. I had never had to do this before in any computer programme so I had to learn how to get videos from 'YouTube' actually into my blog without using a link.

I then learnt how to create link lists to organise my blog so my posts where easy to find and in the right order.

I also had to learn how to set up a 'YouTube' account. Although I had used 'YouTube' in the past, I'd never had my own account so didn't know how to upload videos, or edit them by changing titles and thumbnails. I had to pick this up quickly as we got all our footage onto our blogs by first uploading it to our channel and embedding it from there.

I also had to learn how to create a presentation and pitch with it effectively in order to sell my film idea to enable me to continue making it through the course. I was very nervous before it but I managed to get through it successfully to achieve the best pitch I could've. 

I began with learning about the cameras. I had never used one for photography or filming before so I had to become familiar with how they worked before I began my project. I did this in our prelim task. I had to learn about how lighting effects the footage and where to position the camera for the best quality shot. Then I had to understand how to adjust the ISO on the camera depending on the level of light and how this effected the quality of the picture.

Next I learnt about the white balance on the camera, of all the things this is the one that stuck in my mind as the most important. Before I filmed anything for my opening I held a piece of white paper up in front of the camera to ensure the colouring was correct and nothing was too orange or too blue. This meant that my footage was all correctly exposed and coloured.
I also learnt how to use manual focus to vary the footage and create different moods and bring the audience's attention to areas which I wanted them to focus on in the composition of the shot.

Once I'd done this, the next thing I had to focus on was my ident. I filmed my dog, Connie, yawning against a green screen using as much natural light as possible.

Once I had the footage I uploaded it to 'Final Cut' for my first bit of work editing on my opening.

I learnt how to change the green screen to different backgrounds by first layering Connie up in front of colour bars. Next I had to learn how to use 'Photoshop' to create a background as similar as I could to that of the MGM logo with the addition of my own 'Schnauzer Studios' twist.

 I had to cut the middle out of the MGM logo on photoshop to leave room for Connie to take centre stage instead of the lion.

Then I had to learn how to use 'Illustrator' to create the text using a font as similar to the one used in the MGM logo as possible. Once the background had been created I had to put the new layer on top of the one of Connie in 'Final Cut' to create my ident.

I used similar skills to this when creating the news report. This was also filmed on a green screen and then layered over a background of a newsroom to make it look like a real report. Then the non-diegetic sound of a news room could also be layered over the clip to create an overall very convincing report.

Then I learnt that the sound recorded by the DSLR's wasn't good enough quality to be used in my film, therefore, for my scenes with dialogue, I decided use a microphone plugged into the camera and held as close to the actor as possible.
The first time I filmed my opening scene I didn't use a microphone and the difference is definitely noticeable.

My first take (without microphone):

My second take (with microphone):

This meant the dialogue in my film was as clear as possible to make it professional and easy for the audience to hear. You can hear this in the beginning of my film opening where Alannah is speaking and in the news report in flashback two.

I had also never edited any footage before, especially not using something like 'Final Cut Pro'. I had a practice using it when I created my prelim so I had a head start with learning the ropes when it came to my actual film opening. First I started by learning how to actually import the footage and chose which section of the clips I wanted to use in my film to drag these onto my timeline. With the actual footage in place I then learnt how to add transitions, filters, sound effects and credits in layers on top of the footage to make it as interesting as possible for the audience as well as making the plot easy to understand.

Within this process I learnt how to chop and change the sound to get it to match parts of the footage e.g. when I had to use the blade tool to 'cut out' the beeps from my heart rate monitor sound effect to ensure they lined up with the visual animation the audience could see.

I also learnt how to detach the audio from the footage in order to control what sound the audience can hear and create sound bridges between scenes to pull the whole thing together in a more fast paced, cohesive structure. I did this specifically with the sound from the news report. The actual report was a scene in its own right which I then played on my TV and recorded with a DSLR to create the tracking shot when Lucy enters the room. However, the sound from this was not very clear and didn't fit with the quality of the sound in the rest of my film. To rectify this I imported the original  footage and detached the audio. Then I muted the audio on the clip of Lucy walking into the room and layered the original sound over the top instead.

You can see the difference in my two rough cuts.

Rough Cut 5 (without the sound bridge and original sound):

Final Cut (with the sound bridge and original sound):

This is much better and clearer than before and something I never would have known how to do before I began this process

When it came to creating the soundtrack I was more than a little bit scared. I have never had any experience with music whether it be playing, composing or creating it. I made the underscore I did using the app 'Garage Band' to layer different instruments up to build tension through different parts of my opening. I decided to set the key to minor because I wanted the music to have a somber tone. From there I selected different instruments, trying different ones out on top of each other until I created the effect I'd imagined. I even learnt how to play the musical instruments on a computer keyboard. I think this composition is one of the things I am most proud of in this whole process because its definitely the one I had the most fear about and I'm so so happy with the resulting soundtrack I've created.

Final Sound Cut:

I had a clear idea of how I wanted my titles to look however, I didn't know how to use the programmes needed to create this. Therefore I had to learn how to use both 'Illustrator' and 'After Effects' to make the animated text I'd imagined at the end of my opening.
First I learnt how to use 'Illustrator' to create the actual text more specific to my film opening in a font that wasn't available on 'Final Cut'. I had to learn how to change the colour of the text, adding effects such as the 'inner glow' one we put on the letters to give them more depth and a slightly sinister light. I also learnt how to outline each of the letters and put them on individual layers so they could be manipulated individually.

Next I moved onto learning how to use 'Aftereffects' to animate the letters so they came in from different areas of the screen to form the words using keyframes. I learnt how to put different effects on this too using things such as 'easy ease' to change the movements of the letters to be slower and more sinister.

Finally, I learnt how to use a camera layer on after effects and turn the letters of my titles 3D and into vectors to the camera could move up to and around them.

All these skills combined were used to make the final product which I love and think works really well in rounding up my opening.

Overall almost everything I've done in the process of making this opening has been learnt from scratch from filming the footage, to editing, to sound. I am so happy with all the new skills I've learnt and how the final product has turned out. I think a clear vision and grit determination had the biggest roles to play here and I'm very pleased to say that I think it paid off.

Evaluation Question 3

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?


I believe my media product would be distributed by a company such as 'Optimum Releasing' because this is a distribution company which tends to distribute UK independent films such as my own. They recently distributed the film 'Kill List' (2011) which was also a crime film and, similar to mine, it was made on a very tiny budget, in fact with just £500,000. It then went on to make a worldwide gross profit of $171,760. Therefore I think this would be the perfect institution to distribute my film as it's success is clear with other films in similar genres also made with limited budgets in the UK.
Other UK films also distributed by Optimum Releasing are 'The Awakening' in 2012 which had a budget of $3 million and made a worldwide gross profit of $209,696.

Optimum releasing was founded in 1999 and is currently owned by one of Europe's leading companies in the co-production, acquisition, distribution and marketing of feature films - StudioCanal.
The company acts as StudioCanal's releasing subsidiary in the UK. In 2011 StudioCanal re-branded Optimum Releasing to become part of the StudioCanal brand. It is now called StudioCanal UK.

After looking at the distribution process and the production of other low budget films, I believe I could make my film opening into a full feature length production on a budget of around $3 million pounds. It would not need a huge budget anyway as it is set in only one location - Dreamtown. The location itself would be very naturalistic and would not need editing or aftereffects therefore saving a lot of money in post-production. 
It would, however, need a signifiant cast to recreate the atmosphere and feeling of a town and large groups of professionals e.g. the police force, doctors, teachers etc. I would therefore need extras to work for me but would have to keep numbers low as they can sometimes cost up to £80 a day each.

There is one main protagonist but also several other characters with whom she connects to and works with, one of which would be a female police officer who almost becomes her maternal figure and caregiver after the loss of her parents. These salaries would also have to be covered by the budget.

The fact that everything must be naturalistic may actually increase the budget as convincing costumes, props and locations (hospitals and police stations etc) must be sourced and used. 

I would also have to cover the cost of the equipment however, I would not need massively expensive equipment as the conditions we would be filming in would not be too adverse e.g. there is not very much shooting in the dark therefore large, expensive sense would not be needed and would not be shooting on difficult terrain as a lot of the scenes take place in buildings and during working hours in a residential town. 

To keep costs down I would use unknown actors so their salaries are more manageable. I would also have minimal sets and costume. 
I would then have minimal theatrical release so the film would only go into specific cinemas to reduce distribution costs. I would also have to use creative and cheap marketing techniques as usually one third of the films budget goes on this. To bring these costs down I would have to use methods such as engaging in social media to reach a wide audience quickly and cheaply. I could do this by covering different platforms, for example, having a Facebook page for the film as a central hub which could then link to a youtube account releasing trailers, behind the scenes clips and cast interviews to create hype around the film. These videos could also be spread using the site Instagram where clips of the interviews and trailers could be uploaded with links to the youtube channel. This would also be a good platform to use in displaying posters or stills of the film, again to raise awareness and get the film marketing out to a very wide audience for very little cost. This method of distribution would be cheaper than creating billboards and TV adverts whilst still creating widespread publicity about the film. 
I think I would have my film shown in film festivals such as the Cambridge - Watersprite International Student Film Festival for young film makers. This is a good way to get my film seen by the public in a more cost efficient way than through theatrical release. 

Evaluation Question 7

Looking back on your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression of it to the full product?

Looking back on our prelim is very funny because I can see just how much my media ability has progressed. I can see in our first prelim that some of the shots are not white balanced (the shot of the clock is totally tinted blue) and we missed an entire scene out when we were filming so it looks like Jenny just appears across the table from me. This means the continuity is exceptionally questionable.

Now I have learnt how to correctly use a DSLR camera to get footage which looks as much like real life as possible. I can do this by adjusting my white balance and my ISO which I didn't understand when we made the prelim.

I've also learnt how to edit better by using transitions, titles and filters to make the footage look as interesting as possible for the audience whilst creating a very clear plot line which can be easily understood.
I've also learnt how to use microphones when recording my dialogue to make the sound clearer and more professional. This comes across when you compare the speech in the beginning of my film opening and in the news report to that which we recorded in the prelim.

I've now learnt how to use the manual focus on a DSLR to do push and pull focuses to vary the footage and create different moods and effects. This was all new to me and I have learnt in the process of filming, not during my prelim.

I also learnt how to use a bigger range of shots including wide shots and tracking shots which I didn't use in my prelim. This is because I became more familiar with the use the camera and the effect my angles and shot types would have. I was therefore able to manipulate my effect through my camera work.

In our prelims we had no non-diegetic sound. This meant we didn't have to learn how to use 'Garage Band' to compose our own soundtracks to run under the action we filmed. For my opening I did do this and spent many hours trying out different layers of instruments to create the perfect underscore for my film. This increases the impact the action has as sound effects us on a level visual stimulation never can so the soundtrack adds another dimension to the sequence, creating a more impactful performance.

Not only have I learnt how to improve my technical skills, but I've also improved with my work behind the scenes. Producing a film opening on my own meant I had to plan everything that needed doing exceptionally intricately to ensure that every step got completed. This required multiple sheets of paper containing the synopsis, scene by scene breakdowns, shot lists, filming schedules, character profiles, location scouts and prop lists.

We just filmed our prelim in school in an empty room so this required no location scouts at all. Conversely, for my opening I needed very specific settings to achieve verisimilitude in my opening to make the story understandable. This was very difficult, especially finding somewhere to film the hospital scene, as it was a very specific location which is difficult to replicate without being in an actual clinical environment. However, I managed to create it in our school disabled bathroom by using clever angles and realistic costumes and props. 

It was a massive job which I managed to organise smoothly so everything got done and was ready for editing. I could not have done this when I made my prelim, I simply didn't have the knowledge or any concept of how big a job creating films is and I never would have been able to organise the amount of things required for the production of a film opening by myself.

I have also learnt loads about pre-production and everything that goes into the creation of a story for film. Before my prelim we did absolutely no research about the genre or target audience whereas, for my film opening, I had to do extensive audience research to discover the best target audience for my film and then tailored my film opening to appeal to them in order to create something that would have increased ticket sales and profits.

I also had to do loads of research into the genre I had picked - a crime thriller - to discover the genre conventions and then decide how to conform to them and where it would be beneficial to break the usual conventions. I closely looked into shot types, camera angles, casting, sound, fonts, titles, credits and mis-en-scene in order to have a well developed knowledge of the genre I was working in to ensure my film opening could be clearly defined as a crime thriller.
I also looked into the history of crime thrillers and famous directors in the genre to give me a well rounded understanding of what I was working within so I could do this to the best of my abilities.

I also had to learn how to direct actors. In our prelim we (painfully) acted in it ourselves so we knew exactly what we were doing and where we needed to be. There was also no casting involved, no consideration of how we wanted the characters to look and no script or character profiles to create and familiarise ourselves with.
When I created my opening I cast other actors so had to go through the process of deciding on the age and appearance I wanted my characters to have. Then I had to create scripts for them to learn and schedule my filming around their availability. I was working with other people, mostly with Lucy, and trying to convey my vision to her so she could portray it as I'd imagined. This was difficult as I had a specific idea about the character I wanted to create so I wrote a character profile to try an help her understand and develop Emma. The filming took many takes and re-shoots as I was trying to talk to Lucy and make sure she was acting the way I wanted her to whilst also concentrating on the camera and making sure everything was right including the white balance, ISO and most difficultly, the manual focus.
At the beginning I also worked with Alannah who is only 7 and I was trying to direct her in a way she'd understand and respond to. This was challenging but we got there eventually and I was really happy with the final shot.

When I created my prelim I did no rough cuts, only one final cut. This was because I had very little experience with editing and I received no audience feedback which I could use to help me improve my final product. Whereas, for my opening, I did 7 rough cuts, each one being improved with my own criticism and that provided through feedback from my target audience. Therefore my final product is much more fine-tuned and tailored to achieve it's intention of appealing to my specific target audience than my prelim which was just a stab in the dark.


The editing process was much longer overall for the film opening rather than the prelim because there were a lot more complicated things to add (such as transitions, filters and sound effects) and more footage to deal with. I also had to add on company credits and titles, none of which I did for my prelim, which added on time as they were more things to learn. When creating my titles I learnt how to use 'After Effects' to animate the letters and 'Illustrator' to create the exact text I'd imagined.

I also learnt how to use 'Photoshop' when creating my ident (another thing I didn't have to do for my prelim).

Overall I have learnt so much since our preliminary task, it was very rough, the filming wasn't brilliant and even the editing couldn't save the huge mistakes in our continuity. From there I've learnt how to make a pretty professional looking film opening, using the DSLRs properly to get footage which looks like real life, 'FinalCut Pro' to edit my opening into an entertaining and understandable sequence, work with actors successfully to create believable characters, and plan and research to make sure that, were my film to be released, it would be successful at the box office.

Overall in this process I have learnt how to:
-Set up a blog on Blogger
-Compose blog posts
-Embed pictures and videos into my blog
-Organise my blog using templates, layouts and link lists
-Set up a youtube account
-Upload videos to youtube
-Edit them by changing titles, descriptions and thumbnails
-How to create a persuasive presentation to effectively pitch my film idea
-Use DSLR cameras to collect raw footage
-Change settings on the cameras such as ISO and white balance and understand the effect this will have on my footage
-Use manual focus to make sure the footage is crisp and clear (making sure the eyes are in focus) but also doing focus changes such as push and pull focus' for dramatic effect
-How to use a green screen and getting the correct amount of natural light on it to make sure it's effective
-How to then change the green screen to any background I desire using 'Final Cut Pro'
-How to use 'Photoshop' 'Illustrator' and 'After Effects'
-How to use a microphone to record clear dialogue
-How to edit footage using 'Final Cut Pro' adding effects such as transitions, filters and sound effects to create a cohesive, entertaining, understandable film opening
-How to make credits and titles using 'Final Cut Pro' 'Illustrator' and 'After Effects' (to animate the text)
-How to detach audio from footage in 'Final Cut Pro' to create sound bridges and layer dialogue
-Compose a soundtrack on 'Garage Band'
-Do audience and genre research to identify primary and secondary target audiences create a film opening that fits within a genre and appeals to my specific target audience
-Organise myself and my actors by creating filming timetables to ensure that everything gets done on track and to a high standard
-Create character profiles, shot lists, prop lists and location scouts to ensure I have everything I need for a productive, successful shoot
-Write a screenplay
-Create a storyboard
-Get audience feedback and take the constructive criticism to improve my film to make it the best it can possibly be so it appeals effectively to my target audience 
-Learn and understand the meaning of key words such as diegetic and non-deigtetic sound
-Learn the different shot types and camera angles that I could then use when filming my own opening

Overall I have learnt almost everything from scratch on how to make a film opening by myself and I am very proud of what I have managed to achieve.