Alex Thorne magazine evaluation

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

• Before constructing my magazine I researched into similar music magazines to the one I would make in order to find out the conventions of a music magazine. From the research I found that it is conventional for music magazines to have one artist/band on the cover as the main image and this takes up a large amount of space on the cover. I also found that the masthead was always the biggest font on the cover, this is because the logo’s/ names of the magazines are big sellers due to the their fame and so need to be instantly recognisable.

• I also found it is conventional for music magazines to use 3/4 colours on colour schemes both on the front cover and on double page spreads this is so the page doesn’t look like it has to much going on and doesn’t look distracting. I found it is conventional for the cover story to go across the bottom of the page and the other cover lines to go down either side of the cover in a smaller font. It is most common for magazines to use sans serif font (especially on the front cover) and if serif font is used it is mostly used in the stand first. Kickers are nearly always used at the first letter of an article in double page spreads.

• I have tried to use these conventions I have found in the magazine I constructed as the magazines that use them are very successful and this may help the success of my own magazine.

• On my double page spread I incorporated a kicker at the start of the article which was a convention followed in all 3 magazines I researched. I also used serif font on the stand first which was another technique I established.

• On my front cover I used one main image of a rapper as It was conventional to use one artist on the cover. I also placed cover lines down both sides of the page and made the masthead the largest most standout font on the page.

• I chose to challenge the convention of placing the cover story at the bottom of the page as it was something my target audience disliked in both questionnaires and focus groups.

• You can also see that I have used consistent colour schemes on both the front cover and double page spread limiting to 3 main colours on both of them.

One convention I found is that the masthead is the biggest font on the front cover and is located at the top of the page

Cover story is located in large font near main picture

Another convention shown on the cover is the use of sans serif font throughout and very little serif font used on the cover. And in the layout aspect it’s a very common convention to use one main picture on the cover relating to the cover story. Organised layout is used and there is a consistent colour scheme used throughout. A plain background behind the picture is also used.

A conventional layout for double page spreads is to have one page as a picture and the other all text. Its also conventional to use a kicker at the start of an article.

Kicker

Headline at the top of the text page.

Stand first used in lines under headline to give more information on what the article is about.

A pull quote is used here which is conventional in many double page spread interviews

Kicker

In my magazine I have made the masthead the largest font on the page as I found this is conventional.

I have also followed the convention of using one main picture related to the cover story and the cover story cover line is the biggest on the cover.

I followed the convention of using both a headline at the top of the page and a stand first underneath to give a lowdown on the article.

kickerPull quote

How does you’re media product represent particular social groups?

• before constructing my magazine I made a number of questionnaires in order to find out what my target audience would be, and found that the age group most interested was from teens to 25 (equally male & female), this showed our magazine would be aimed at a young target audience and the content needed to represent that.

• One of the similar magazines I researched into ‘NME’ aim at a similar aged target audience despite the different genre I found that there are many things I can incorporate in my magazine.

• Looking at NME I found that they target a young audience. They used swearing in the magazine, which showed it is aimed at middle class- lower class young people. It also promotes festivals and gigs which are mainly attended by younger people. There are many artists inside each issue as this is a main selling point for them and the reading difficulty of the magazine is low.

• In my magazine I included a lot of content that appeals to a younger audience such as festival and concert news, artist interviews and competitions. Due to the age of my target audience the magazine is a monthly release as young people are less likely to be able to afford a weekly issued magazine. In my magazine I used simple language and slang words which would appeal to a younger audience.

What kind of media institution would distribute you’re media product and why?• When researching similar products I fond that Bauer media

group who publish Q magazine would be suitable to publish my magazine. They are a German publishing company who also publish Kerrang!, a popular rock magazine, worldwide circulation of Bauer Media Group's magazine titles amounts to 38 million magazines a week. This shows that the magazines are successful and that should it publish my magazine it would be successful .

• Bauer Media Group has a 50% stake in the British television company Box Television, the other half owned by Channel 4. Box Television acts as the content subsidiary that produces several popular music television channels, which include: Q TV, 4Music, Kiss TV, Kerrang! TV, The Box, Magic TV, Smash Hits TV. This is an example of cross media convergence as the magazine advertises the TV channels and the TV channels advertise the magazine.

• However with Bauer media publishing two music magazines it may not wish to release a third as they would all compete with each other for sales.

• This could mean that my magazine would not receive the same attention and effort levels the already established magazines would from the publishing company which could lead to poor sales.

• Benefits of using Bauer media group is that they would already have distribution deals in place with suppliers and so my magazine would be available to a large audience which increases chance of success.

• They currently do not have a magazine covering this genre of music which means there is a place in the market for my magazine and may receive an extra push when marketing my product.

• http://www.bauermedia.co.uk/

One magazine that Bauer publishes is take a break which is aimed at middle class women. It has a significantly different mode of address and layout to the music magazines produced by Bauer media. The front cover uses a cluttered layout compared to an ordered layout used in Q ( a similar magazine to mine)

Kerrang! Is a magazine aimed at males aged 14-25 and is another style of magazine that Bauer media publishes. It would appeal to heavy metal and hard rock fans.

Q is a popular music magazine aimed at over 25’s. it is aimed at a larger larger range of genres so it appeals to a wider target audience.

This shows that Bauer produces a wide range of magazines aimed at a number of different demographics including two major music magazines one of which is similar to my product. This means that my magazine would fit in well with the publisher as its also aimed at a specific target audience not currently being targeted by Bauer media.

• Bauer Media Group has a 50% stake in the British television company Box Television, the other half owned by Channel 4. Box Television acts as the content subsidiary that produces several popular music television channels, which include: Q TV, 4Music, Kiss TV, Kerrang! TV ,The Box ,Magic TV, Smash Hits TV.

• This is an example of cross media convergence as the TV channels promote the magazines and the magazines promote the magazines especially in the case of Kerrang! That have a specific channel and magazine.

Bauer media group

Kerrang!

Kerrang! TV

Kerrang! Magazine

Q

Q magazine Q TV

Kiss

Kiss TV

Kiss FM

Conglomerate

Subsidiary

Examples of cross media convergence

What would your audience be for your media product?

• I made two questionnaires two find out who my target audience for my magazine would be, from this I found that under 25’s are my target audience (both male and female) and that they are into rap/R&B.

• They would most likely be in the middle class with some lower class as well. I do not expect my magazine to be successful with the upper class social class as that is not associated with that genre of music. And some of the slang and language used in the magazine may not appeal to that social class.

• I am aiming at a vast target audience and so there is more chance for my magazine to be successful. And the genres my magazine covers is always in the charts which shows its popular and people are interested in the genre.

How did you attract/address you’re audience?

• Because of the young audience I have tried to use bright colour schemes in my magazine to make it look more attractive. I have used lots of images in comparison with text so it doesn’t look like a lot of reading which would appeal to them more. I have also used an ordered layout which makes the magazine have a more professional look to it.

• The content of my magazine includes lots of artist interviews, concert and festival news as these are the things that they said they wish to see in my initial questionnaires.

• there's a lot of different artists as readers are particularly interested in them so I have included a lot of this and an ‘artist index’ on the contents page.

I used an artist with a similar age to my target audience as they are more interested in people they're own age.

The costumes used for the photo shoot appeal to the young target audience as he is wearing a flat cap which is an item of clothing that is genuinely associated with young people and is considered ‘cool’.

The hand pose that he uses for the photo also appeals to the young target audience as I found when researching similar product NME that they use swearing to appeal to a young audience and so I have followed this convention to appeal to my target audience

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

product?• I used a number of different technologies when constructing

my magazine. I learnt how to use adobe Photoshop which was very useful for editing images I used in my magazine. I also used apple macs instead of Microsoft windows, which was another type of technology I have now learnt how to use effectively. I also used digital cameras for the images used in my magazine and so I learnt what shots are most effective for a magazine. I also improved using Microsoft publisher, which is the best program available to publish the finished magazine on as it gives the most professional look. I will now be able to use these technologies effectively in any future projects.

Looking back at you’re preliminary task, what do you think you have learnt in it from?

• I have made many improvements since my preliminary task. Over the course of constructing my magazine I have been able to research successful music magazines which has given me a better understanding of layouts and use of cover lines ,cover stories and masthead and how to make them look professional on my product. I have learned a lot about conventions used in music magazines and tried to include some in my product. cover of my final product looks far more professional than the preliminary and one of the main differences is the fonts I used (all sans serif) which helps the magazine have a professional finish.

In my preliminary task I found that my picture was to small to completely fill out the front cover and that the fonts used were not suitable for a magazine and that the cover lines looked unprofessional. I also found that before researching into similar products I did not use a suitable layout for my preliminary contents page.

Examples of Microsoft publisher fonts used before using Dafont for my final product.

Bullet points used on contents page instead of a list of articles of featured articles. Also there was no pictures used on the contents page. there was also lots of blank space on the preliminary task.

Examples of custom fonts imported to the document in order to make it look more professional

I have used an artist index and split my contents page into 3 columns to make the layout look more professional and leave less empty space.

Artist index

Yellow lines section out 3 separate columns.