7. Development of skills and understanding

Looking back over the task I have learnt many news skills about Photoshop, magazines and audiences. I designed my magazine to appeal to my audience, considering colours, layout and content. I did a questionnaire towards the audience I was aiming the magazine at to get an idea about what they wanted the magazine to look like, how often they wanted to buy it and how much they would pay for it. My skills using Photoshop have developed since I did the last project of the College magazine as I looked more closely to the style and content that real music magazines use and based my ideas around them. I looked at the style o fonts and colours that attracted the audience I wanted and worked on them.

6. Technologies

Over the course of the project I have to better at using Photoshop as I have learnt new skills within the programme. I changed the contrast and brightness on my main cover image and the images on the double page spread to make the colours more bold and sharp and to look more like a professional studio shoot rather than digitally shot outside. I did a first draft of my front cover but when I got used to using Photoshop I developed my ideas more and after looking at more magazine covers I got my house style in place. Once I had decided on this, making my double page spread and contents page was easier to make as I had a template to follow. I developed the knowledge of the different effects I could use over time such as using stroke and outer glow on text. However I wanted to keep the effects on my magazine simple and not have it too busy with too many different effects and make it look crammed.

5. Addressing the audience

The language that I used in the magazine was informal so it appeals to a younger yet educated audience. The layout of the magazine is like other magazine such as FHM and NME as it holds conventions of a music magazine. I used a contrast of bright and dark colours throughout the magazine to also show these conventions of these magazines. The images I took were of a tree piece band and a young girl singer. This was to show the different genres that the magazine offers and to make it appeal at both a male and female audience. The cover lines for my magazine tell the audience about the features in the magazine and that it includes the UK top 40 chart and the latest download chart, which aims at a young adult audience as they are the most popular listeners to the chart. The featured article in the magazine includes and bands with both sexes to help aim the magazine at both sexes too. I contrasted white writing on a dark background as it made the look of the double page spread look grungy and Indie so this would appeal to a genre however I also included a brightly coloured headline to add a lighter tone to the page.

4. Target Audience

The demographics of the audience that my magazine is aimed at are both male and female, from ages 14 – 30. The language used in my magazine is informal but not as far as slang words as it is aimed at an educated class of people, some who are in their 20s and I didn’t want to make the magazine seem to just be aimed at younger adults and teenagers. I aim to make the magazine aimed at all races of people but as the people in the image on my front cover are white British that is the majority of my audience. The social status of my magazine would range from C1 – D, as the people in these categories are the people I think are most likely to buy this mid market magazine. My audience will also be mainstreamers from anywhere across the UK as the Chart appeals all over the country but mainly in urban areas from towns and cities.
The type of sub-cultural identity the audience I’m aiming at would fall under would be a range of Punks, Indies, R&B fans and many other fans of different types of music. The band on the front cover are an Indie band as this was one of the most popular choices from the questionnaire results but the magazine would be aimed at many different genres.
My target audience is both sexes between the ages of 14 - 30. As they are between this age group a vast majority of them will be unemployed and in education or studying. The readers buy the magazine on a weekly basis to keep up to date with the current UK chart. A small amount keeps the magazine as reference in future. Many of the readers visit the website or buy the magazine after reading a copy from elsewhere. Readers like to get involved in the magazine with write in’s, competitions and questionnaires online. Many readers like going to live gigs and like to know the updates of tours and festivals. They also like the latest update on the lives of celebrities and how their careers are going so I included interviews and columns about different celebrities they may be interested in. the readers of my magazine spend an average of £250 year on magazines and lives gigs. The readers like to buy cosmetics and electronic products such as DVD’s, CD’s and ipod’s as these sorts of adverts would be inside the magazine.

3. Institution

The magazine publisher I would want to use would be Bauer because it is the largest publishing company in the UK and this would help publicise my magazine more. This publishing house also publishes magazines such as FHM and Empire, which are music magazines that are similar to my genre.

2. Representation

Many music magazines represent rebellion against culture. My magazine shows this with my choice of band for my front cover and double page spread. I wanted to show this by choosing a band that could look diverse and resistant to other sub-cultures. Within the images and the article in my magazine there is a clear representation of male stereotype. The front cover image includes two young males, showing there are more of them than females in the band making them more dominant. In the article we find out that a male member of the band write their songs which also put him in a dominant position. The female member of the band isn’t a stereotypical girl as she dresses in different Indie style clothing and in a relaxed slouched and uncaring pose just as the males do in the front cover image. The people in the photographs included on the front cover and double page spread are dressed in casual vibrant clothing to give the magazine a comfortable, casual and informal style. Their expressions are not aggressive but not happy showing that they are serious about music and give the grungy look. The photographs were also taken in an urban setting showing that the magazine is aimed at youth groups from cities.

1. Forms and Conventions

The genre of my magazine is broad and across the board as it is a Chart magazine. This means that the genre of music may change throughout the magazine rather than having on continuous throughout.
This meant that the content of the magazine could vary as well. I kept the same sort of content as many other music magazines do, containing interviews, gig reviews, UK chart and download chart, prizes and competitions, festival information and celeb stories. The layout of my magazine is brightly coloured contrasting with dark colours so it appeals to many tastes in design. I looked at other magazines for ideas for the layout so I kept the usual conventions of magazine style. On the front cover I put the masthead at the top, the main picture as the whole background and had left justified cover lines telling the reader what is inside. I also included, the price, strap line, a strap at the bottom of the page, issue number, barcode and a graphic cover mount with a free gift. My main cover line linked in with the main image and double page spread, which gave the magazine a large continuing story to cover.
The magazine that I most closely followed the conventions of was NME. This had the layout, style and content of what I wanted my magazine to be like. It was brightly coloured, busy and included the latest music news about lots of different genres of music. The house style of my magazine is similar to this as it also included a similar lexis and informal language to these types of magazines.
I constructed a broad based magazine so it would appeal to a large audience. It gives the latest music news and updates about the UK Chat, which contains a wide variety of music. It also gives information about local bands and gigs going on to appeal to those who may not be so interested in the current music in the chart.

Finished Product Contents Page

Finished Product Double Page Spread

Finished Product Front Cover

Original Image 5

Original Image 4

Original Image 3

Original Image 2

Original Image 1

Contents page analysis

Contents page analysis
Originally uploaded by Elly117

This is an analysis of an existing contents page to help me with research.

Double page spread analysis

Double page spread analysis
Originally uploaded by Elly117

This is an alalysis of a consiting double page spread to help with my research for my own double page.

Contents draft

Double page spread draft

Front cover draft

Questionnaire results

Magazine Questionnaire

Media music magazine questionnaire

1. What genre of music are you interested in?
· Rnb
· Pop
· Rock
· Punk
· Indie
· Metal
· Chart
2. What would attract you to the magazine cover?
· Masthead
· Main picture
· Cover lines
· Cover mounts
· Headline
· Price
· Colours 1
3. How much would you pay for a music magazine?
· £0-1
· £1-2
· £2-3
· £3-4
· £4-5
· £5+
4. How often would you buy a music magazine?
· Daily
· Every few days
· Weekly
· Fortnightly
· Monthly
· Annually
5. What gender are you?
· Male
· Female
6. If you could ask your fave celeb anything, what would it be?

· What inspired you to start?
· How did you start?
· When did you first realise you could make it big?
· What’s your favourite gig you played at?
· How did you become so big so quickly?
· What inspires you songs?
· Have you always wanted to be a musician?
· How do you plan to be different from the rest?
· How did you celebrate when finding out you’re number one?
· Do you plan to work with any other artists soon?
7. What other features would attract you to the magazine?
· A free gift e.g. CD/ concert tickets
· Competitions
· Horoscopes
· Gig updates
· Posters
· UK chart
8. What type of products appeal to you in adverts in magazines?
· Beauty/Grooming products
· Electrical (phones PC TV computer games)
· Music software (ipod mp3)
· Beverages/Food
· TV Radio programmes
· Music albums/singles

hiphop connection

Click the image to view my analysis

hiphop connection
Originally uploaded by ellyn.mobbs

Analysis of Artrocker magazine.

artrocker
Originally uploaded by ellyn.mobbs

This magazine "Artrocker" is aimed at students and young adults who we assume are interested in the Arts and diverse music.

Analysis of Classic Rock magazine.

classic rock
Originally uploaded by ellyn.mobbs

This magazine is aimed at mostly a male audience aged up to 39. The magazine included cover lines that draw the audience in to read more as the readership is higher than the circulation. They are also usually about different types of music as many readers are activly involved with music.

Planning my college magazine

To find out what we wanted to be included in out magazine we did a questionnaire to see what was popular. The sort of things we wanted to find out was, magazine content, cost, issue production, themes and the layout. Who better to ask than college students themselves so we produced this magazine and collected the results. The results showed us that college news, gossip and music were the most popular choice of content. These would obviously appear in the magazine. We also found out that Pop and RnB music were popular music choices for the magazine. By doing this questionnaire this me to decide how I was going to layout my front cover and contents page and what features I would include within those pages. As part of my planning towards my final front cover I designed a rough sketch of what it would look like. I took in to consideration the layout was wanted to be brightly coloured and that I had to include cover lines and other important features such as the main headline, sub stories and a name.
To help me get ideas for my college magazine I did an analysis of an existing front cover. This helped me notice what features are popular and how the layout of a student magazine should be fun and quirky. I analysed the front cover on a website called flickr. This enabled me to add little boxes with my notes in over top of the image, which was easier and quicker. I then posted this on to my blog, which is an easy way for me to organise all my files.

Original Image

Original Image used on my front cover

I chose to base my college magaine around a notepad as it is significant to college life. I made the main title bold red to make it stand out and used lower case lettering to give the magazine a simple funky edge. I included cover lines about things that college students would want to read about such as sport news and college party pictures. The most popular price for the magazine was between £1-2 so i decided to make mine £1.

What I think has been successful within my productions is I planned my front cover with a lot of detail and followed the questionnaire so I knew what I wanted to include in my magazine and so it would also appeal to the student audience. The things that didn’t go quite so well were the layout of my front cover. I wasn’t very confident on Photoshop, which I found made it very difficult to make my front cover look professional rather than just colourful boxes and writing. I overcame this with some help and used simple but effective ideas instead.
What I have learnt throughout this task is to make sure that you plan very well before you do any task as the rough sketch and the background research with the questionnaire really helped. I have also learnt a bit more about how to use different effects of Photoshop to create work with a better professional quality.

soup cover

soup cover
Originally uploaded by ellyn.mobbs