Music magazine evaluation

Preliminary to final product The images at the side at the top are the pieces of work I produced for my preliminary task and the pieces of work at the bottom is pieces of my final product. As you can see neither of these pieces for my preliminary tasks are excellent pieces of work. However my final piece of work I am very happy with because I have learnt a number of skills along the way such as:- I have learnt to resize different images to make them look more effective rather then just stick them anywhere on the page.- I have also tried to use different fonts and use more effective colours so my pieces of work stand out to the reader.- I have learnt to think carefully about were to put my text and how it will stand out to the reader and what font I should normal and what I should put in bold.

I’m very glad that I done the preliminary task now because I think if I went straight on to the final product then I think my final product would be at a very poor quality and I would be very disappointed.

I feel I have also been able to spend a lot more time on my final task because I have learnt a number of skills on Photoshop so I have been able to complete my work at a lot better standard.

Front coverTo the left hand side is the final piece of my music magazine which is called Rock ‘N, Roll. This piece of work took me a lot of time to complete and I had to start again three times because it wasn’t looking like a rock magazine but all of a sudden things started to go right and I finally finished it.

I decided to follow most conventions of the genre of the music magazine I was doing which is Rock such as the kind of font I decide to use and the amount of font that is in bold which is quite a lot of it so it stands out to the reader when they see it such as the teaser about the posters I put in bold because this is what most readers look for. The only convention of rock magazine I didn’t follow was in terms of use of images I only used two images a main image and a smaller image so the front cover didn’t look to blank. The reason why I decided to use only a couple of images was because I didn’t want my front cover to look to busy and I want the readers to focus on the main image.

I feel that the readers will be able to tell that it is a Rock magazine firstly because of the title has the name of the genre of music as the title and secondly because of the dress code of the people in my images and secondly the prop I used in the smaller image of the person holding a guitar I also used an effect on that image called glow so the light reflected of the guitar adding extra effect.

I also feel readers will be happy to buy my music magazine because it is not over expensive for a music magazine the feedback from my results told me that they think that music magazines are too expensive so I thought if I lowered the price more readers will be attracted to it.

Contents pageTo the left hand side is my contents page this was probably the less time consuming piece of work during making my final product.

For my contents page I didn’t follow the conventions of a rock magazine because I wanted to see if people decide that they like the way my contents page is formatted compared to contents pages you would usually see.

I decided to put the text down the middle for a reason and this reason is because I want it to look neat and for the readers to be able to read it because I feel with over contents pages that they have to use small font because of the small amount of room they have left because of the large image above it so I decided to use my main image as my background so I could have my text on top of it so the readers can actually read what will be going on throughout the magazine.

I also thought the smaller image was relevant to the contents page because one of the articles that will be in my music magazine is the model talking about his upcoming tours and some news about them.

The only thing that I am not very happy with is that the smaller image doesn’t blend in with the background image colour but apart from that I don’t think it looks bad and I think it’s something different that readers will like to see.

Double page spreadI’m really pleased with the way that my double page spread ended up like and I found this the easiest part of the final product. I think this is because my skills on Photoshop became better so I felt more relaxed which made it easier for me to do the double page spread.

Again I didn’t really follow the conventions of a normal rock magazine the only thing I did keep the same was the type of font that I used. Things I did do different was used more images because normally Rock magazines have on one side an image but on the other text whereas I had a couple of images on both sides. I also decided to add a background image on each side of the double page spread because I felt it created more effect and it makes it look like there is less text.

On the second side of my double page spread I decided to angle the images slightly to add a bit of effect which I think the readers will like and I think it’s different.

I also choose the colours that follows the genre of music that I’m doing and I used the eyedropper tool on Photoshop to add as a third colour and I used it as the title colour font because again I felt it’s a colour that you don’t usually see in magazines.

I decided to use the same model because I wanted to keep a consistency throughout my magazine and she is the main focus on my magazine front cover rather than change it to my other model because I feel it might confuse the reader.

Photo’s I took and usedI felt this was the most challenging piece of work for the final task which was taking the photographs to use for the magazine that I was going to create I feel this was down to not having good photography and secondly my lack of organization.

It took me a lot of attempts to get the right photographs because I wasn’t getting the models in the center of my shots I was taking the only good thing I feel about my images was that I did eventually manage to get a number of different shots e.g. long shots, mid shots and close ups and I also used different props to give different effects.

Thankfully with Photoshop there are a number of editing tools which I used to make my images to look better otherwise I don’t think my work would look very good at all. I also used an effect called glow on one of my photos so it added even more effect and would hopefully engage the readers attention when they see it.

I choose this six images out of the ones I took because I felt they looked the best in terms of genre of the type of music magazine I was doing and also because of the variety of different shots that I took.

How does my music magazine relate to existing examples of these media forms

I think that my music magazine is quite relative to other music magazine’s that are in the same genre.

I thought carefully with the conventions whilst designing my music magazine such as the images that I had chosen to use because I made sure that the people I chosen looked like rock stars so it would stand out for the right target audience.

I also thought carefully about the kind of text and what font size I was using because I wanted to make it stand out to the reader but at the same time I wanted to use the same kind of font that other Rock magazines use to follow the conventions so the readers know it’s a rock magazine.

I used a different kind of layout compared to what rock magazines usually use such as I only used a couple of images so it don’t look to crowded and I only have text down one side of the page whereas usually they have text all around the front cover of rock magazines as you can see to the right.

Working in media production contentsI found that I took a lot of time deciding how to layout the front cover of my music magazine and were to put the images and the text but after I worked out were to put everything it all came together alright. The most time consuming bit I found was editing it getting the right font and cropping the images the right size I wanted it. Another thing that took me a long time was trying to get to use to Photoshop but in my last piece of work I felt a lot more comfortable using it and I feel that my skills have progressed a lot now and I’m more comfortable with my work.

It was really important for me to manage the people in my photo shoot because I had to make sure that they looked like rock stars because that was the genre I was going for so I had to make sure they was dressed appropriately so I could get the look right.

The location I used was the media room at Bodmin College and I used a black backdrop and used some lights so it added effect to the photographs when I took them. The props I used was also important because I wanted to have a variety of different photo graphs rather then ones of people just posing . I decide to use two different props a guitar which really added a rock star look and I also used a dolls head which I thought was different because you don't usually see dolls heads in rock magazines.

Thinking about the audience and who it represents

I got my ideas from the results I got back from my questionnaire because I thought it was obviously what the readers wanted to see so I decided to use what they like to make my music magazine as successful as I can.

I wasn't really surprised with the results I got back from the readers because I knew that either R n B or Rock would be the most popular because of the current day and age. I don’t really imagine most teenagers or adults wanting to see a country type music magazine because I don’t think there’s a lot of country style singers now anyway. I glad the most people did like the genre of Rock because it is one of the genres I’m also interested in so I found it enjoyable making a Rock magazine more than I would probably making a country music magazine because I don’t find that genre of music very interesting not interested.

I don't think anyone has been excluded from my music magazine because it’s not gender bias or anything and if anyone is interested in music magazines then I think that they would like to read my music magazine. I think the only people that would feel they have been excluded is probably younger children because they might not be into that genre of music yet but I doubt young children buy music magazines.

Institute

I have decided to use the institute called Bauer the reason for this is because they are publishers of other magazines in the same music genre such as Kerrang so I thought if people know the publisher of Kerrang and enjoy reading about the articles then as soon as they see my magazine is published by Bauer they might read it because Kerrang is such a popular music magazine so I think it’s a good way of influencing readers to buy my music magazine. They also publish Q magazine which is a different type of music magazine to Kerrang but is still so popular so I think it will be really effective and look good when people find out that my magazine is Published by such a good magazine company.

Another reason why I used Bauer is because they sell magazines to a number of Countries world wide such as USA, Russia, China and Europe so people all other the world know about them so it’s also a good way of advertising my music magazine all over the world and they even own radio station and seven music channels which include Q TV, 4Music, Kiss TV, Kerrang TV, The Box TV, Magic TV and the Smash hits TV so they can advertise my artists music which will make them popular and recognizable to the readers when they see them on the front of my music magazine

TechnologiesWhen I was first introduced to the Macs and Photoshop I found it very hard to come to grips with using it and what I had to do in order for my work to look good and throughout the preliminary I found it hard to produce good work with using this completely new software to me but when we started the final product all of a sudden I felt a lot more comfortable with it and I fell I produced a lot better work at the end.

There is a number of skills I have now learnt with Photoshop and the Mac such as:-Cropping and resizing images-Adding effects to my images to make them more effective-Using different font sizes and font to go with the genre I was doing-Adding images from the camera to the desktop-Putting the images from the desktop onto Photoshop-How to put the image on the background and the text on top

Another thing that was completely new to me was blogger I have never heard of it before I started using it for this piece of coursework and after getting use to it I found it simple and a lot quicker then writing everything out. The only thing that did take me a long time to figure out was how to put images on there because I tried putting them straight on not realizing you have to print screen first.

Finally another thing that I have never used before was Survey monkey I feel that it was very easy to set up and design a questionnaire and it’s a good way of getting feedback from people so you have something to base your ideas on.

FeedbackDan (16) The front cover for me is really impressive the only negative thing I would say about it is that there is still a bit of space. Like how you didn’t follow the conventions of a usual magazine for your contents page again there is quite a bit of space. The double page spread looks really good I like the way you angled some of your pictures it makes it more effective.

Lisa (15) Really like the front cover like how you have the main image on the side rather then in the middle and I also like the way you used a smaller image so there’s less space on the cover. Think the contents page is different a lot more clearer to see than normal Rock magazine contents page normally it looks squashed don’t think the smaller image is very relative this time though. The double page spread is cool like the way you used background images although in some bits it is hard to read over it.

Jake (17) Think that the front cover looks really good I like the font used. However if it was me I would have the barcode across the page rather than have it up the side. I’m not to sure about the contents page it looks o.k. but there is a lot of room I think you could of added a few extra images. The double page spread however looks really professional and neat I like were you have the images and the way you have slightly angled two of them.

Ben (15) A lot of information to read about on the front cover however there is still quite a bit of space. Likes the way that it’s set out looks neat and tidy. Harder to read the text at the bottom compared to at the top. I feel that the pictures are a bit cramped in. I like the way their is quite a lot of information to read because it would keep me interested. But overall good.

Josh (17) Think the front cover is good. I like the way you put about the posters in bold it would grab my attention if I was going to read it. I like how you tried something different with the contents page rather than copy ideas from other rock magazine the only negative thing about it is the amount of space on the page. I think the double page spread is good I agree with some other comments people have said such as its hard to read the text when the background images is on it but I agree with the effectiveness of the background images.

Martyn (26) Think the front cover looks really good like the different kind of fonts you have used it’s what I would expect for the type of genre the magazine is. I don’t really like the contents page I think there is to much space and not enough images for me because I like to see loads of different images. The double page spread is good I think the angled images look effective but I don’t understand why you haven’t done it to all images.

Analysis of feedbackThe feedback from the different people is very helpful because it gives me a better understanding of what they liked and disliked and what they thought look good and bad. I’m happy that there wasn’t any serious negative comments and I’m not saddened by the fact that there were some negative come backs because now I know if I had to do it again what I would have to do in order for it to be even better.The main positives were that:-They like the way I angled the images on my double page spread-The different fonts I used on the front cover-Like the way the teasers are in bold-Like that the text on the contents page is neat-On the double page spread there is lots of information that would keep them interested-Like the background images on the double page spreadThe main negatives are:-To much space on the front cover and the contents page-The font on the double page spread is difficult to read off the background images-Why haven’t you angled all the images

Overall there is a lot I have learnt from this feedback and has given me a good indication on what bits could of done with improving and what bits are good.

ConclusionOverall I am very happy with the final piece I have produced and now have a lot more confidence when using the Macs and Photoshop I now believe that I can create good pieces of work that people will like and be interested to look at and tell me what they think about it like the feedback I got from people with my music magazine. I’m glad that I managed to do different things with the photos I took so that they look more effective and not bad and I found it really fun creating a music magazine and doing about a genre of music that I was interested in so that it gave me an advantage when creating my music magazine.

I’m also happy that I have created something that readers will enjoy because I based it on the feedback that I got from my survey but I feel that my magazine would appeal to everyone and it might even make more people start liking more than one genre of music and it may also get more people into reading especially younger people because they don’t seem to read as much any more this could because they don’t find other books or magazines interesting but I feel that it could make them interested.

If I were to do this again I think I could do it even better because I have looked at the feedback and have found out what people dislike about it so I would make sure I done the same but make the negatives into positives so then people really enjoy looking and reading about it. I also think I would be able to do it a lot quicker because I have got use to the Macs and Photoshop so I now have a better understanding with it.