Evaluation of ‘Live’ magazine

By Nelson Fan

My magazine doesn’t particularly challenge the conventions of the media I chose to study but I more used the forms of them to help me develop my magazine. I looked at certain hip hop and urban magazines to develop the ideas for my magazine, magazines such as ‘Rwdmag’, ‘Vibe’ ‘XXL’, and a project that I’m a part of, ‘Gospel Link’.

‘Vibe’ was the magazine I looked at for the design of my magazine title because it was simple and bold but also because it wasn’t a long title. Most of these magazines used similar colors like black, white and another color that stands out. This was my inspiration for creating my front cover seeing as it seemed to be conventional for a hip hop magazine. I tried to keep my front cover very plain so that the main images and subheadings would stand out more.

I challenged the form of ‘Rwdmag’ for my contents page as they kept their contents page minimum and it wasn’t the kind of approach I was going for but it had certain urban conventions.

Both magazines I chose to challenge used informal language (slang) to communicate to their target audiences. I challeneged the use of language on every page of my magazine, for example in my front page, I used puns and catch phrases whereas in my double page spread, the interview is very informal.

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

I tried to aim my product to represent a hip hop/urban social group.

After analyzing different magazines which convey a similar representation, I familiarized myself with the certain connotations of what this certain social group consist of.

I have used certain colors to represent my targeted social group such as black, red and white which deliver a sense of a “b-boy” theme.

I made sure that the people in my magazine posed with a sort of gangster or comical lean/posture to relate to my target audience.

I have used informal language, puns and catch phrases (punch lines) to communicate stronger to my target audience and represent a hip hop/urban culture through the use of slang.

The people posed in my magazine are dressed with an urban theme wearing hoodys and jeans (casual) to catch my target audience’s attention.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

XXLmag is a hip-hop based magazine focused on old, new and upcoming rappers from mainly The States pushing their music and informing their audience on artists’ backgrounds. The magazine publisher is Dennis Page.

Gospel Link is an urban Christian magazine soli focused on Gospel artists mainly from the UK and US and aims to push Gospel music and local/massive events to a young audience. The publisher is Roger Moore.

I would aim for my magazine to be instituted by similar publishers/institutions because it implies alike features and conveys a synonymous message.

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

My media product would be aimed at an age group of 13 year olds to late 20 year olds.

People who love urban music. Gossip/news lovers of different artists.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

Informal language

Model posing child like posture

Similar colors of house style

Urban casual clothing

Informal interview

I have learnt the use of different functions of cameras such as white balance and blurring.

I have learnt about different functions on Photoshop being a complete new user to the software. I have learnt how to crop certain parts of images quicker and the use of different effects such as color fades.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Looking back at my preliminary task, I feel that I have learnt to make my magazine look more realistic and have learnt about different conventions of certain social groups in more depth.

I have learnt how to present different aspects of magazine features to represent social groups, aspects such as use of color, body poses and font layout/design.

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?