Evaluation

1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

The brief of my media product was to create a magazine front cover, contents page and double page spread page with a music genre of my choice. To start with I looked at existing magazine’s and their front covers, contents pages as well as double page spread pages. The magazines I looked at where in the music genre ‘Pop’ as I had decided I wanted my magazine to be a pop music magazine. I looked at ‘Seventeen’ ‘Billboard’ and ‘Sugar’ I analysed the 3 pop magazine front covers, contents pages and double page spreads to understand the conventions they had used. I found that the similarities between all three front covers where the use of a mast head, cover lines, a barcode, a main cover image, a main feature and a date and price line. This helped me understand what is used on a magazine cover to make it successful and look professional.

The images above show what similarities they are between the ‘Billboard’ front cover and my own front cover are and which conventions I have included from a real music magazine. These are things such as the cover lines which use a variety of fonts, sizes and colours, the main feature being in a much larger font, the image relating to the main feature which is a medium shot of a pop artist I created and took the image of. She is wearing obvious rings in the image which relates to a pop artists been seen as ‘fashionable’ as pop artists and magazines are. Both mastheads are in large fonts across the top of the page and both images overlap the mastheads as they are dominant images. I have also used a sell line which adds to the house style of the magazine and a bar code with a price and date line. All of these features make my magazine more conventional and there for similar to other media products.

I also added footer as I wanted to include more information on what will be featured inside my magazine without overcrowding the front cover and to also add to the conventions as footer are used in magazines such as ‘Sugar.’
   I decided not to use some media conventions on my magazine front cover.  An example of this would be the splash used to promote a freebie within the magazine. I took this off my magazine in one of my first drafts, this is because it made the page look over crowded and didn’t fit well with the layout and house colours. It also added an unprofessional touch to my cover I felt.

On to my contents page I found that similarities between my contents page and sugar’s contents page where the use of titles, feature section, regulars section, related images, page numbers, and information on the articles featured in the magazine and an editor’s letter. From the images above you can see the conventions I have chosen to use in my own contents page from those in an already existing contents page. I have used the style of large page numbers and a small description for my layout, like the one used in Sugar. I thought this made the page look professional and used the correct conventions. I have used a large title positioned at the top of the page, except mine is bigger and more page dominant. I have used a features section and regulars section like in Sugar but have displayed mine differently on the page. I felt these where important conventions that are used on a contents page, as I looked at contents pages from different music magazines of another genre such as ‘NME’ and ‘Kerrang’ and they both contained a ‘features’ section and ‘regulars.’ On my first drafts I didn’t include any other thumbnail images apart from my cover star. I changed this onto my next drafts and including 3 more image because looking at existing contents pages, all had at least 3 thumbnail images included. I added borders and banners to my contents page to fit in with the house style of my front cover of black white and pink, I wanted them to look like they related to each other and it was easy to tell which magazine they belonged to.

For my double page spread I researched existing pages from magazines such as Billboard and Sugar. I looked for conventions that are used throughout a double page spread and used on most ones in each magazine. I found that all of the double page spreads had on them a main image of the artists, quotes from the article or what the artist has said in larger fonts, introduction to the article, an article or interview, a by line and the name of the artist. When comparing my double page spread and the one from ‘Billboard’ you can see which conventions are used to attract my target audience.

The main image takes over the full left hand side of the page in my double page spread similar to the Billboard spread. This is a conventional method used throughout most music magazine to attract the audiences. I have used a quote on the side of the image from what my artist has said in the interview. I have used another one in the middle of the article which gives a preview of what is inside the interview. There is no quotes used on the billboard double page spread (see above) but is instead a large headline across both pages.

The artists name is the largest font used on the right hand page different font which stands out to the audience and will attract them into reading it if they like the artist. An introduction to the interview briefs where the interview happened and what it will be about, this is for the audience before they decide to read the full interview. Page numbers and by lines are used on both double page spreads for conventional reasons and to make the pages look more professional. I have also used a credits line for the photo and words; this again gives a more professional feel to the article. 2. How does your media product represent particular groups?
My music magazine is aimed at young teenagers to late 20's and mostly females and who enjoy the genre of pop music. I represented this target audience firstly by the way my artist on the front cover looks and the way she was posing. The rings are stereotypically related to fashion and pop. She is posing with her hand over her mouth in a cheeky shocked expression. Pop music artists are seen as innocent and fun, and the way she is posing suggest she is a sweet and innocent woman but also slightly cheeky. It gives the magazine a fun looking vibe. Whilst in the double page spread she is wearing shorts, a white band top and heals. She is posing confidently and represents woman in the pop industry as confident and proud of whom they are. The room she is posing in is plain white and has no other surroundings. This relates to the pop artist stereotype of been ‘squeaky clean’ and innocent.

3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?I researched into the 3 large magazine publish institutions which are bauer media, conde nast and IPC media. Here is a screen shot from bauer media’s website which shows the women’s and men’s entertainment magazine that they publish. The one which is similar to mine is ‘Pop’ As bauer media already have a pop female magazine, they would possibly not want to publish another pop magazine. However if my magazine offered something different to the magazine they already publish, which it is for 14-late 20’s they would possibly consider publishing it. 

I also researched into Conde Nast Digitial publications and found the type of magazines they would publish. Many where well known popular magazines across the UK. I would be able to offer my magazine to their publication as they do not publish a pop magazine like mine, this would then bring them to publish something different and make a profit from a different area of music magazines.

4. Who would be the audience for your media product?

The target audience I have aimed my magazine at is mainly female teenagers and university students who enjoy or like the music genre 'pop'.  I originally wanted my magazine to be for males and females, but when developing the magazine I realised that my pop magazine had become more female dominant and feel that only a small percentage of males would possibly buy the magazine. The age of my target audience will be between 14 to late 20’s. My age target was originally to 21 but I extended the age because I felt it was appropriate for people aged into late 20’s. This age range fits my type of genre and these are the ages of people who will most likely be interested in the music genre of 'pop.'

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

An example of the questionaire I asked my target audience to fill out.

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

From creating my music magazine I have gained lots more skills using Photoshop, especially. I have learnt very useful editing techniques for photographs such as the ‘spot healing tool’ and ‘levels’ tool which help improve the image and its quality significantly in an easy way. There are also many tools and adjustment layers I experimented with to make my models skin appear more healthier, brighter and front cover worthy. In this example below in on the left hand side I have used photoshop to airbrush my models skin to make it appear brighter and clearer. To do this I had to use the filter blur and gausion blur tools. However the problem I came across with this is that you can lose definition of the face and the image becomes out of focus. As of this problem in my next drafts of my magazine cover, I used a different image.

These images below have used the levels tool and spot healing tool, it makes a difference to the image and gives it a more high quality look. The edited image (on the left) makes the skin look softer and brighter in definition. I used this image for my contents page.

I also learnt how to use the select tool and layer things. This was very useful for my front cover especially on the masthead. Doing this makes them have a more professional feel and doesn’t make the page look overcrowded or parts hidden by overlapping. You can see below how my image is portrayed over the masthead.

Editing fonts and creating different effects to them was also another skill I picked up on Photoshop creating my music magazine. I was able to learn how to add shadows, inner shadows, outlines and transparency on the fonts. This made the magazine mastheads and headlines stand out more on the magazine as well as giving them a much more professional feeling. 

7.    Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?Looking at my first college magazine and my music magazine, you can see a huge significant difference between them and how much progress and skills I have picked up learnt and gained from the research, analysing, taking photos and Photoshop skills. The college magazine looks much less professional as the fonts don’t look professional and the cover lines placed randomly on the page. The puff looks out of place on the cover and the masthead doesn't stand out clearly as it should do.

I have made lot more effort and dedicated a lot more of my time for the making of my music magazine. This can be seen my the difference in mast heads on the two products, the music one looks more professional and thought about where as the college one is just a simple standard font. The cover lines on the music magazine stand out a lot more and have a variety of fonts which give them a professional look where as the college magazines cover lines are short and look plain and do not cover the front page.

By using a much larger bolder font and fitting in with my house style for the main headline it shows the audience that is the main part of the magazine.
 I believe that the two covers are different from each other and I by improving my knowledge on magazines from research and analysing into existing ones, developing my Photoshop skills and putting in more effort I have managed to create a much better improved and more professional magazine.

As of my target audience mainly been teenagers and students they would fall under the 'E' category of the 'Demographics S.E.G' this is because a lot of them will be unemployed, and if they're employed they will only attain a small wage from a part time job because of the majority of their time spent in education and studying. Therefore I priced my magazine at £2.30 as I felt this was an appropriate price to attract my audience please. I also used a skyline ‘How you can win a year’s supply of downloads inside…’ to attract my audience to buy the magazine and look inside of it. I felt that advertising free things would attract them more because of their age and how little free money they would have. I also included well known bands/artists on the front cover such as Beyoncé and Britney Spears because if they did not know who KoKo Port was, they would know these artists and buy the magazine to read about someone they already knew. To gain audience feedback I created a questionnaire which I got people aged 16-20 to answer and fill in. I then put my results into pie charts:

There is no mess in the room it is tidy and empty, this helps represent the clean pop image. Bright pink is associated with girly girls, happiness, females, innocence and anything feminine. For this particular magazine it focuses on female orientation which people in the age group of my target audience will be. The black highlights the other colours and helps the bright colour stand out. The white represents the purer innocence and sweetness of the girl and helps compliment the pink.