Q7: Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product (your music magazine)?

This was my preliminary task of a sixth form magazine. My audience feedback of this task was mainly about the quality of my image, and to follow more of the key conventions for the magazine like eyecontact and the 'Sweet spot'. The feedback of this magazine, allowed me to develop my skills, therefore enabling me to create a more successful music magazine. I also learnt whilst completing the preliminary task how time consuming it was, helping me to manage my time better for my music magazine and to plan personal deadlines to keep up to date.

I then created my first draft of my music magazine, and gained more feedback on how to improve it. They commented on the plain white gaps, and discussed how I could fill them in and to possibly add colour to the background. Furthermore, they discussed the fonts I had used inside my magazie and said I should incorporate it onto the front cover to create a recogniseable house style. They also discussed the coloured writing on the black background and that it was difficult to read, and that the Masthead needed to be behind my artists head to make her the main focus.

Here is the image of my final magazine, with all the alterations which were recommended.

Q6: What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing your magazine?

Whilst creating my magazines I had to use lots of different technologies, some which I was familar with and others which were new to me. The first stage of the actual making of my magazine, involved me taking photo's of my model in the studio. I used a Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ8 stills camera to take my images, and used the 'RAW' setting so as to enable me to edit them at a later stage. Below is an example of my 'RAW' image before it is edited, and after. I cropped it so it was just of her face and changed the saturation and hue to make the colours stand out more, for example her lipstick.

Once I had taken all my images and chosen the one's I wanted to feature in my magazine, I began the editing process on Photoshop. This was the first time I had used this programme, and it took a bit of getting used to, however it was very easy to learn what to do. On photoshop I cropped and resized my images to make it look how I desired and to fit right on my page. I then began to build up my magazine using different layers, and chose what I wanted and where it should go. I used both words and images on my magazine, I downloaded my main font of www.dafont.com and the font was called, 'Payday'.

Here is a video I filmed of me building up the layers on my magazine...

Q5: How did you attract/address the audience?

I used different techniques to attract and address my target audience. I kept the magazine familiar throughout, by consistency of font and colour scheme, to keep the readers attraction to my magazine. Also to make it appeal to them, I followed lots of the key conventions of popular music magazines so as to grab their attention and hopefully draw them away from their usual magazine.
Here is a powerpoint I made on how I attracted my target audience.

Sophie egerton q5

Q4: Who would be the audience for your music magazine?

My target audience for my magazine is male and female, old teenagers to young adults, around the ages of 16-25 year olds. They would enjoy listening to both old rock bands, such as Led Zeppelin, and more recent artists such as Paramore and Hadouken, particularly at live gigs and festivals.
I created a collage of some interests I feel my target audience would have...

Q3: What kind of media institution might distribute your magazine and why?

The company I would like to publish my magazine is Future Publishing, because they are well known for producing  many top-selling Rock Music magazines for example, 'Classic Rock'. I feel that even though they already develop lots of rock magazines that their portfolio still has a gap for a light rock magazine, like Amplify as it is different from many of their hard-rock magazines for example 'Metal Hammer'. Future Publishings speciality in Rock magazines I feel will help broadcast my magazine against my rival KERRANG! which is owned by Bauer Media.

Q2: How does your magazine represent particular social groups?

This is the original image which I used for my Front Cover. The outfit which my artist was wearing followed the colour scheme of my magazine, black, white and red. She wore a loose fitting modern t-shirt, with rolled up the sleeves to show her young age of early 20's. This colour scheme continued through to the prop of the guitar which is also black and white, linking to the conventional rock magazine colour schemes. I gave her the electric guitar as she is part of a band and plays the guitar aswell as being the lead singer, it connotes the style of rock group she is in. Her hair has been backcombed to make it messy as stereotypical rock stars have messy hairstyles. Her facial expression of agression show the genre being rock music. On the right is an example of Q magazine with a strong image to suggest the genre of music, it also follows the traditional colour scheme to connote the rock music genre. Her heavy make-up of dark eyes and red lipstick is also very similar to my artist.



This is the original image which I used as the main image on my double page spread. The outfit which my artist is wearing is the same as the front cover for the same reasons as stated above, also it is used to keep it recognisable to be the same feature article. The camera angle looking up at the artists demonstrates her high status and power she has, which will appeal to the target audience as they are attracted to the authoritive nature and desire to have the same power. Her stance and posture, of her hand on her hip, also clearly demonstrates her supremacy and influence. To the right is an image of KERRANG!'s front cover demonstrating the same low angle that I used, again to present the artists dominating, powerful nature. 

Q1: In what ways does your music magazine use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real music magazines?

I created a Wordle to demonstrate the key conventions of a Front Cover...

  

On the whole I followed the key conventions of a real music magazine; I did this as I found the more traditional Rock magazine style looked best for my genre. I followed the traditional ‘Z’ Formation to create the ‘Sweet Spot’ for my Main Feature image and key cover line to attract the reader to my feature article. Furthermore, I stuck to a traditional colour scheme of black, white and red, but also added a fourth colour of Gold to challenge the conventional Rock magazine.

Here is an example of KERRANG! magazine following the red, white and black colour scheme, it also demonstrates most of the Key conventions...



Here is my magazine front cover, labelled with the Key Concentions I have used...

I created a wordle of Key Conventions of a Contents page...



On the whole I followed the key conventions of a real music magazine contents page. At the top left hand side I placed my editorial, explaining to the reader briefly what is happening in this months issue.I also inserted the masthead and tagline in small above the editorial. I broke my contents up into sections and used subheadings to make it easier for the reader to navigate to the page that they desire, written down there is the headline and a brief summary of what is in that article. Furthermore the use of images of the key articles are anchored by their page number to make it even easier for them to get to the page they want. My contents page continues with the house-style therefore making it easily recogniseable owing to the consistency in brand-identity. I also inserted the issue number and date in the bottom left and applied this to every page inside my magazine for consistency. However, typical magazines are broken up into three or more columns to create a grid style, but I didn't as I wanted to challenge some conventions of traditional music magazines.

Here is an example of KERRANG! contents page which clearly portrays the grid formation and follows many of the Key conventions in a magazine...

Here is my magazine Contents page labelled with the Key Conventions I have used...

I created a wordle of Key Conventions of a Double Page Spread...

Overall I followed many of the key conventions of a real music magazine. My main image is in large and takes up almost the whole left page, and the text is shaped around the image. My double page spread also has multiple entry points, for example the pull quote, this allows the reader to get to information they desire. For my introduction and headline I used a quote to which the article is about and made a drop-cap, and ended it with a command. To make it easier for the reader to distinguish between question and answer I used a colour from the house-style. I inserted two more images of my artist and added captions, briefly explaining what she was doing and wearing and right alligned the text. Here is an example of NME's double page spread, it follows some Key conventions of a traditional music magazine...

Here is my magazine Double Page Spread labelled with the key conventions I used...