A typical music magazine makes sure that the main story on the front cover stand out from the other many storys. I also made my main story stand out from the others, putting it in two different colours white and yellow and i also set it to a bigger font. I included a barcode with the price above it in a small font. At the bottom of my front cover i created a white bar saying what the magazine has which is extra. 'A Plus Bar' It says what artists the magazine talks about! I also kept the style of the font the same throughout my magazine to create its own kind of style to it
Contents
For my contents i have one image which dominates the whole of the page. This is very unusual for the typical magazine contents page layout as they usually include many photographs. I decided to break the rules a little to first of all make my contents page stand out more than others, and secondly because i decided that the photograph i took was really interesting and it links to my feature article i wrote. The image may also persuade the audience to read my feature article more and most of the attention will be focussed on whats happening in the photograph i took. I did something else differently to my contents too. I created different sized numbers one - four next to a list of what was actually in my magazine. This is not one of the typical elements and makes my contents page different from the rest.
Double Page Spread
For my feature article i decided to use the typical magazine article layout. I wrote my piece of journalism and set it out clearly. I used a typical magazine element were you enlarge bits of speech the artist has said which you may think the audience finds interesting and will make them want to read on. I also placed more than two images on my double page spread. Usually, two images would be placed on a feature article but i decided i would make mine different from the others. I placed four interesting photographs of my artist, this made my page less boring. I used the same colours as the front cover did and i also used the same font type to link them back to each other
I thought my innovations were likely to prove successful because the things i made differently made my magazine stand out, which was what i intended to do to catch my audiences attention. The differences worked well i thought and when i did my audience feedback i had more strengths than weakness'.
How does your media product represent particular social groups?
I have represented young people in the magazine i created. I did this by using a model who was at the age of seventeen for my photoshoot and to write about in detail for my feature article. This would hopefully manage to attract the more younger audiences of 16-35 year olds. She was also the main photograph on my front cover. On the front cover i dressed my model in a plain white patterned top and a simple cream cardigan, placing a knitted beanie hat on her head. I thought that this was considered to be the trend set by most females at the age of seventeen interested in my genre of music. So, i thought that this would be the typical way to dress for the younger generation. For the feature article i dressed my model in a floral patterned dress. I saw this as high fashion for the younger audiences and also a typical fashion trend set my acoustic singers.
When doing the photoshoot for my magazine, i didnt overdo my models makeup purposely to make her look more innocent and pure, just like a younger person would appear to be. I tied back the front parts of her hair so that no hair was on her face so that she looked neat and tidy. I also curled her long blonde hair.
In the feature article the artist i wrote about was made out to be very mature with no slang used or bad language. This was done because if my magazine was produced for the younger females as my audience which is what i wanted my audience to be, then it was most likely that the audience wouldnt use slang or bad language.
I set my photoshoot in a pretty looking garden on a very sunny day. This gave out the feel of an acoustic singers kind of scenery and i thought it turned out very well.
Overall i think i was challenging the representation of the stereotype of the younger people. The media see younger people to be getting drunk all the time, going on nights out and using inappropriate language or being violent. I challenged this stereotype by creating an artist who is well focussed on the success in her music career and obeys by the rules. She quotes "And anyway i'm not even legal to be going out, getting wasted just get!" This shows that young people like my artist can be mature and i tried to portray a whole new stereotype for the younger people.
What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
I researched 'Q' magazine which was the closest magazine to mine i could find as there isnt really any acoustic magazines produced. I came to find that the publisher of 'Q' was 'Bauer Media Group'. I came to the decision that this publisher was most likely to fund my acoustic music magazine 'AMM' because there isnt many in the market and they would be filling this gap in the market. The publisher may then find that my magazine would make them alot of profit as the acoustic fans would be buying my magazine as there isnt any others to purchase. This is what makes my magazine different to the rest. The fact that its acoustic would make it one in a million.
'Bauer Media Group' is a large German publishing company based in Hamburg. It operates in fifteen countries worldwide. It produces and distributes many popular music magazines and i thought it would be a really good media institution to distribute my 'AMM' magazine which i produced myself.
Who would be the audience for your media product?
The audience for my acoustic music magazine are mainly for women at the age of 16-35 years. They would also be fans of particular artists such as James Morrison, Dashboard Confessional, Second Hand Serenade, Taylor Swift etc. The audience would also be interested in the acoustic fashion for example; The floral dresses, Simple plain colours such as yellows, white and black and things such as beanie hats.
I think that this is a good target audiences not many music magazines tend to target for women of the age 16-35 years. It would be producing something different for this type of audience to buy which is a good intention. It would also be aiming to please a potentially large mass audience and i think that alot of women would pay for my acoustic music magazine as it is something different. I believe that the audience i chose to target are right for my product financially, also young girls at the age of my artist i created would deffinatly want to read about artists like Elisa who are the genre they prefer to listen to. They would also be interested and want to keep on buying my magazine.
I maybe likely to have a secondary target audience as the males of the younger generation who are within the age range of 16-35 years. This may happen because they are either fans of artists within my magazine like James Morrison etc or just because they are interested to read about the new acoustic singers who have appeared in the music industry which i have talked about in 'AMM'.
How did you attract/adress your target audience?
I attracted/adressed my target audience by;
1. Making my choice of title as 'AMM' which would make the audience want to know what it stands for, so i thought ahead and placed underneath the main heading 'acoustic music magazine' which is what it stood for.
2. I thought about the key image on the front cover in alot of detail. I made my model pose as though she was playing an acoustic guitar and looking down at it to focus all the attention were she was looking so that the audience would know for deffinate what the genre of my magazine was.
3. The use of storylines on my cover were expressed by using exclaimation marks and some fonts which were larger than others to emphasise the importance of the larger ones.
4. Articles on the contents pages were numbered. These numbers were placed on the contents page in various sizes. the biggest numbers being the most important and recent articles. The contents information was layed out in a numbered list type of thing.
5. On the double page spread the headline was in a bigger, bolder and yellow font.
6. The piece of journalism i wrote is well structured and collumned clearly as a typical magazine feature article would be written.
7. The article does not include any slang and it is adressed to the audience in a formal tone.
8. There is a high angled shot of my model, were the camera is looking down on her singing and playing the guitar.
9. On the front cover i cut out the main image in the programme 'Indesign' and placed it on the front of my magazine.
10. The layout of my feature article is appealing because the two colours i chose to use which are Yellow and White stand out and do not clash, they work very well together. Also the four photographs on the double page spread are eyecatching and are lay out well.
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constucting this product?
I have used the internet to find out what types of magazine are like my own which i produced. I found this particularly easy to use. I learnt alot of things from the internet for example: I looked at contents pages and covers for music magazines to see how they were structured, what the layout looked like and i learnt what a typical magazine would look like.
I also learnt how to create my own blog on www.blogger.com and how to upload particular images i wanted to put on it. I created a record of my practical work and this has helped me to see what i have improved upon.
I also learnt how to put a slideshow onto my blog, even though i didnt use the idea of putting my evaluation onto a slideshow. But i do know that what you have to do is to copy and paste into the edit html the embedded code off the slide show website once you have completed your slides and then publish your post.
I have learnt how to use 'Indesign' properly so that i was able to create my final product. It allowed me to cut out images, place the image into my cover and be able to move it to were you want to place it. It allowed me to use a large amount of fonts and sizes of type to suit the style of my magazine i wanted to create. It also allowed me to select a coloured background for my magazine and borders on pieces of text Which made it look tidier.
For my contents page i wanted to put boxes around all the numbered articles but there was lack of space to do so. I altered my music magazine by;
1. Spreading out the articles a little more with the space i had left to make them a little more clearer.
2. I had to re-colour the web adress on my contents page so it was clearer to read.
3. I had to place the issue date onto my front cover.
4. I took off an arrow looking shape from my 'plus bar' to make my front cover look a bit more professional.
Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
My final product is most deffinatly better in many ways, and i have deffinatly improved on my technique. The smoothness of the photographs edges on my front cover of the preliminary task were at a weaker standard than the photograph on my final product. Also on my final product i chose better choices of elements to tell a story and more elements, as on my preliminary task i lacked on the amount of storys. I chose a better setting on my final prodcut to do a photoshoot and i also took more pictures. A use of better lighting was also used in the photos. My title meant something on my final product and i used a better unique font which i downloaded from www.dafont.com. I used this font to create a certain style to my magazine. The layout on my final product was so much better than the way i layed out my preliminary task. My preliminary task was too spacious and empty. The use of colour on my final product was much better as they were more vibrant and stood out more clearly. I took more interestng photographs on my final and my preliminary task photograph i felt was boring.
Conclusion
Overall i thought my final product was successful with many strengths and only a couple of weaknesses. The strengths were that; The audience realises the genre by just looking at the title of the music magazine, because it has the meaning in a smaller font underneath it. They also realise that my genre for the magazne is acoustic because of the main photograph on the front cover as she is holding an acoustic guitar. The final product has a professional looking layout and my magazine is informative and my photographs are eyecatching. The article sounds like a real piece of journalism, it is clearly structured and the use of colours i have used for my final product go together very well.
The only thing i thought was my weakness was that my numbered information on my contents page were a little close together. This is the only thing which was affected. Overall i thought my magazine turned out to be successful.
