Media EvaluationBy Chris Silcock

My Media product uses a variety of forms and conventions of real media products such as Kerrang! Magazine. The first thing I focused on was the layout of the magazine and ensuring that the whole thing looked like a punk rock magazine before looking at the finer details. For example, text in most rock and punk magazines is usually distorted, unrefined and dirty. Taking this into account I made sure that my text was similar in style. This obviously isn’t the case with the Double Page Spread where text is one of the main focuses.

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge

forms and conventions of real media products?

Layouts of rock and punk magazines tend to appear disorganised while being well structured at the same time: http://www.wotyougot.com/pictures/30-seconds-to-mars-kerrang-cover-080311.jpeg

Shown above is a Kerrang! Magazine. There is clearly a lot going on just looking at the front cover and to some people, it will look very disorganised, but looking closer you start to see how each section has its own purpose and characteristic. I have taken this into account with my contents page and front cover.

Double page spreads in rock and punk magazines have a variety of different conventions in different magazines. The most common was the focus on a particular band so I was able to integrate a band and a whole back story into my Double Page Spread making it seem more professional. Just like all magazines, I developed a dark themed house style to keep a level of consistency between each piece of the magazine. My 3 main colours where blue, white and black. Blue and white was often used for headings and strap and tag lines while the white was used on a black or dark background to keep the theme of rock and punk there while making text clearly visible.

In this image you can see how the house style works. The dark background brings out the different headings and text while following some of the conventions of a punk rock magazine.

For the main image of the front cover I used a medium close up of a member of the band featured in the DPS. This is common in rock and punk magazines.

Typically, my media product attempts to represent the punk- rock/Pop scene as a visually dark but semantically happy genre. For example; the main story in my DPS has a humours theme which is fairly common amongst punk bands such as Bowling For Soup and Sum 41 who live as punks with happier music who still tap into the classic conventions of the genre.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

My media product also represents the punk scene as a happy thing with plenty of opportunity to express yourself freely. For example the lead singer of the band featured in my magazine as his hair tinted purple which could arguably represent freedom and anti- conformity.

A publishing institution or multi media company such as Bauer media group may distribute my media product. Bauer Media Group is a multinational media company headquartered in Hamburg, Germany which operates in 15 countries worldwide. Since the company was founded in 1875, it has been privately owned and under management by the Bauer family. It was formerly called Heinrich Bauer Verlag KG, abbreviated to HBV and usually shortened to H. Bauer.

What kind of institution might distribute your media product and why?

The Bauer media group may be interested in producing/ distributing my media product an they have a history in the music publication industry in similar genres of music. They currently produce and distribute Kerrang! magazine which my magazine is similar with regards to genre and style. They also have international reach which could potentially open the product to a much larger market.

My media product is aimed at both males and females aged 16- 21. The idea was to focus on a sub-culture backing and particular musical genre, in this case punk. So this magazine was designed to aim at a fairly limited audience who are interested in local bands (probably not) while still featuring bands such as Paramore and Fall Out Boy who are two huge bands in the punk scene.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

Although this may seem to go against the aims of most magazines which is to gain as larger readership as possible which would in turn generate more profit, my magazines audience/ readership is much larger than you may think. Not only would it have the support of the specified sub-cultures but it would likely gain interest from Kerrang! And NME readers. There is also a huge local rock/ punk scene in areas like Brighton and Crawley.

The way I attempted to attract my audience was to simply follow some of the rules and conventions of magazines similar to my own and use my own knowledge of the genre that I’m interested in. First I thought about what comes to mind when I think of the word punk. Anarchy and Anti- conformity where some of the things that I thought about first. So from the offset I tried to give my magazine and industrial, distorted look following the classic punk theme of Anarchy given to the genre early on by bands like the Sex Pistols.

How did you attract and address your audience?

I also ensured that the colour of the magazine reflected the genre. So for the backgrounds for images and text I used images, taken by myself, that reflected oppression such as fences and brick buildings with the idea that ‘punk’ was fighting against these institutions. What I then did was filter much of the colour of these images to re- enforce the theme of anarchy.

The images of the main band, Probably Not, where supposed to reflect the modern Pop- Punk scene by being very positive and un-serious which I think was shown well in the DPS. The story that was also featured also reflects the humours side of the genre. The taglines and Masthead where made to look damaged and distorted again showing the Punk and anarchy theme.

I have learnt how to effectively use a camera without using the automated settings by adjusting the zoom and focus manually to allow me to take a variety of shots using these new found skills . I have also developed a thorough understanding of GIMP and how to apply these practical skills on a specific task. I have learnt the basics of blogging, embedding text on to web blogs and embed videos and files.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of

constructing the product?