Finalised frontcover

Finalised contents page

Finalised double page spread

Evaluation question 1 (In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?)

Evaluation question 1 

I tried to research as many conventions as possible and i have used them to make my front cover, contents and double page spread however i have focused on making the front cover with the right conventions as it is the first thing people see when they are looking for an magazine and it also gives information which is important for the consumer to know whats inside the magazines content for example interviews, photo shoots and any events that is going on.


I have researched many of Q and Kerrang! magazines and rock related genres then looked at the many house styles they were mostly red and black and of those colours of the i have chosen red white and black as most of them uses this colour for their magazines, so i have based my house style with the same colour. These colours work well with each other and it makes it stand out as the colours are dominant. This 

stays true for most of the 3 pages that i have done for my magazine. I have chosen these colours because i take inspiration from Q magazine.

House style - This uses colours that stand out and are bright so that it can be read easily, the picture makes it look serious which is suited for the type of audiences that i wanted, the language used in the front cover is not formal but rather informal as rock fans love informal when it comes to the things that they do. As the rock fans love their news and seriousness i have created my magazine so that the information on it is informative to them and they would like an intense atmosphere when reading magazines.

This magazine is aimed for ages between 30-40's in those age groups i have found that there are a lot of middle aged rock fans and they love the style on they dress which is why the costumes that i chose are rock related as it shows a fashion so that the rock fans will get what they want, and this combined with the information can make them interested in the magazine.

House style spacing - The image takes up most of the middle page and most of the writing is placed on the left and right as it will fill most of the page up so that it is full of information and not blank and i used and circle with texts in it to fill out the majority of the top corner and the left corner with exclusive as this will help me fill the magazine but also make the magazine unique itself, as Q magazines typically uses the left and right sides to fill out most the space that they have, myself i think that it is an good idea as it gives a lot of information to the audiences of your magazine. I think that the audience will enjoy this magazine as it is suited to attract younger audiences that loves rock as the picture tells a lot at the start with the black colours and red text which stands out.

The contents page also uses most of the house style that my front cover uses bold red text so that the writing stands out and most of the spaces are filled which leaves no blank white areas which means that it is filled with information which is important as people who are reading the contents needs to know whats going on in the magazine and each page is numbered. I think that the image used on this suits the house style as they are related to rock and also the minor information is black on a white background which is a contrast of each other which makes it easy to read and it stands out the house style is pretty much consistent with the double page spread and the front cover.

The main image is labeled with a page number so that it makes it stand out and it gives the image more attention and makes the audience want to know what is going on in that page, i have also included two mini-images which also have been numbered so that it has a preview and makes the audience wants to see whats going on.

 I have made use of the picture as i took the right side of the magazine's background out so that when i put black text on it it will stand out and be easier to read rather than with the background which makes the text really hard to read this is done by most of the Q magazine as it is efficient and easy to do, i have also included Jordan Lloyd's guitar in as it will not look as good with the guitar cut in the middle of the page to solve the problem it may have with the text i have aligned the text so that it aligns with the guitar so that the text does not go over the guitar and make it hard to read. Most of the text stays consistently black so that it will not change when the reader is focusing on the same paragraph if i suddenly changes colour this could disrupt the reader so i have kept all the text as black.

The left side of the magazine is used to inform what the reader is reading about and what the general idea of the page really is and the costume i chose for this picture further reinforces that as my actor is using an guitar and wearing a shirt that represents nirvana and most of the rock fans will immediately recognise it as nirvana is really popular among the rock genre. and also page numbers are labeled correctly as it corresponds to the page number in the contents page. Moreover i put an quote on the left side to fill in space but also to tell the audience of what the actor is represented as.

In conclusion with all my pages that i have done i think i have used general conventions to attract the audience of a magazine buyer, from all the pages that i did i think that i have kept the style of my style model so that it looks professional.

Evaluation question 2 (How does your media product represent particular social groups?)

Evaluation question 2

I have taken multiple pictures with different costumes however i found that only a few suited the my magazine as most of it has to be direct and looking into the camera which makes it that it fits really well into my criteria as the actor is looking in the camera which shows that he is interacting with the audience and this keeps the audience interested.

The clothes that i have chose for my actor to wear reflects on what my audiences like such as clothing that are related to rock as this will make them feel relatable, and for pictures for my double page spread i had him use his guitar as this will attract my audience as it is the instrument that is popular amongst the rock genre and also a shirt that displayed nirvana which is a rock band and it is loved by many of my target audiences.

My target audiences are 30-40 year old where they are serious rock fans as they were once in the a time period that rock music was at its peak this massively increases the chance that my audience of that age group will buy my magazine as it presents bands such as nirvana and queen, i think that this has everything it needs to suit for my target audience because it has the right colours and the right background also the actor is like an rock artist. also most of the things that he wears is black which is suited for a rock genre.

The text that i have used in the magazine are mostly formal as how rock fans at this age would like their magazine with formality in it. However this is not limited to the ages of 30-40 this could be viewed by an younger teenager as well as it is formal.

Evaluation quest 3 (What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?)

Evaluation question 3

Link to Slide share

http://www.slideshare.net/ZhongweiZhao1/media-distrusters-62344856

Evaluation question 4 (Who would be the audince for your media product?)

Evaluation questions

Link to Slide share

http://www.slideshare.net/ZhongweiZhao1/evaluation-question-4-62201690

Evaluation question 5 (How did you attract/address your audience? )

Evaluation question 5 

I have used conventions such as 'Plus', 'Exclusive' this makes the audience get the impression that it is unique and this makes them more considerate about taking more of a look this is the first way that this attracts the audience and i have looked into what people are interested in the front cover of the magazine which are new information about rock genre related things and then by making that information stand out so that the audience can see read this easily as it is bold and strong also a little more information about the bands are represented in a less bold colour so that my audience will read the text that stands out the most then read the less bold one as the colours are a contrast of each other.

Another way that i tried to attract my audience is by my cover image which looks directly into the camera which makes it look like that my model is looking at the audience which is effective and most of the rock magazines that i have researched has their model look into the camera makes them feel involved with the magazine, and also the image that i use suits the colour scheme and compliments as it is black and white which suits my magazine front cover and also my magazine is aimed for serious rock fans so that my image looks serious and it looks serious which will attract exactly that type of fan.

My masthead covers the top of the page so my audience can tell instantly what the magazine is about and also it is bold and has a shadow which then blends into the background moreover my title pretty much sums up what the magazine is about instantly and i have chosen the colour of the title to be white as it stands out from the background and is a contrast to it.

I have used PLUS so that the audience will see that it will have a lot of contents inside of the magazine and it is not bland and boring this could increase the chance that they will buy the magazine as they are being offered more content and information about their favourite band.

In my contents page i have used pictures that are serious which then again suits my audience as they are dedicated rock fans it uses the colour scheme that i have been using all along which is suitable for my audience and also the pictures keeps the audience attracted when combined with the text this makes it interesting as it has a balance in text and image, and it gives information of the things that the fans care about such as popular bands and some information to get them interested to see what is inside the magazine. And i have put used the word exclusive again as this help getting the audience to keep reading this magazine.

The photos i used is direct address as they are looking into the camera so that it is immersive and keeps the audience reading this applies to most of pictures i use for my magazine as this is an effective way to keep someone interested in what they are reading.

My double page spread is aimed towards the information of my actor which is portrayed as an big rock artist this gives information of a what a rock person would be like and how the artist becomes successful, the picture i have used is my actor with his favourite band nirvana that has inspired him to play rock music and i have chose this because rock fans also love nirvana as they are a famous rock bands that a lot of people love, the shirt that he wears already gets the interest of my audience so that i can leave the space without text on it, i have also kept in the guitar on the right side of the magazine so that it does not just cut out in half at the middle which in my opinion will attract more people than having it removed as i think that it separates some of the text which makes the reader does not have read in the same direction which can give them more interest as it is not just a straight line and it is the outline of the guitar and i have generally used the same house style black text on white background as this stands out to the audience.

Evaluation question 6 (What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product)

The things that i used so far to help me progress my work are as listed:

Apple Mac
I use windows operational system mainly so i was not too familiar with Mac OS but as it was essential for media work as it was really compatible with Photoshop and other adobe software, this made using these programs easily too learn as it was laid out efficiently and not too complicated, by learning how to use Photoshop on the Mac it had help me understand how to use Photoshop which helped me create my magazine more easily than learning it on other operating systems as Mac is built so that it is easy to edit images and use the editing programs easily.

Blogger
Blogger is an website that allows anyone to post things that they want to. I used blogger so that i could blog my work for my magazine so that my work can be checked upon, and it can also be used as an reminder. Although i was new to blogger it was an easy experience to learn as it is easy to post and import images. Moreover it can be used as a process marker so that you can track the progress that you are making and see the improvements overtime.

Photoshop
I have used Photoshop a little before however it was only for a small project so i did not really get to use Photoshop fully therefor did not know much about it. As i did a prelim task i still had a little technical information on Photoshop, however when i have completed my prelim task i think that i had improved a little and i have learned more and more technical information as i used it to practice other uses of Photoshop, when i started doing the magazine task i think that my Photoshop skills were good enough to make an professional magazine

Evalutation question 7 (Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?)

Evaluation question

My work compared to the prelim task has improve massively as i learned more skills to use on Photoshop as i used it more to create better contents, furthermore i have also learned how conventions and what conventions are used to attract audiences to read your magazine which i have implemented to my final magazine front cover whilst my prelim cover did not use any of those skills that i have now which shows a clear improvement.

The differences between the prelim cover and the magazine front cover is huge as the problems with the prelim cover are that it does not use suitable backgrounds and the background removal was not perfect which is a massive problem when it comes to distributing it, and for the background i removed i have filled it in with a solid fill which can be done better as i could of added in a background that suits the picture and also the text was bleak and boring as it used a single text font which makes it boring to look at and the blue text on the red background does not look well together as both colo
rs are dark which makes the text hard to read. With the improvements i have acquired in my magazine front cover i have used conventions that makes the audiences interested in the magazine and i have used different fonts for separate areas as this will make the magazine look good as it has different fonts so it is not all the same when it is being read. and i have used house style on all of the pages that i did for my magazine which keeps the consistency going so it does not look different this gives the audience what they are wanting consistently.

In conclusion i think my magazine has shown massive improvement between my prelim cover to my magazine cover as i used conventions, greater editing skills and the skills to create a magazine, from what i knew from the start i was struggling to make a cover now i can feel confident when i am making a magazine.

Changes that i made to the contents page

This was the original contents page i had planned out but some things are not in line with each other and there are some white spaces that needs filling to make it look better.

I have filled in the extra spaces which texts and lined up some texts with guide lines which was used to help me line it up.

Front cover using guide lines

Im going to change the text to line them up with the guide lines to improve this front cover magazine.

Using the guide lines i have lined up the text with the lines which makes it looks more organised.

Improvements for the magazine

Improvements that can be made

For the improvement that i can make on the front cover magazine are filling up the spaces of the plain areas so that it will not look plain.

I can change the font of the mast head / text so that it will suit the house style of my genre more.

Assessing my Coursework

L2, Filled most of the spaces i could find and based some of the features of my style model

Anchorage text

Anchorage text

For the Anchorage text i will add sub images of my magazine genre, that will be related to the magazine, this gives more information about what the magazine is about.

The image

The image

The image for my main front cover will be in the middle of the page as it will suit it and it will leave some space for me to add more content to the page.

This will the rough size of the image for my main image

The masthead

The masthead

For the masthead i will make it so that it suits the magazine and it will relate to the front covers images, It will cover most of the top of the magazine as it needs to stand out for the audiences of my magazine.

Colour scheme

My colour scheme

For my colours I will use black as the main colour for the magazine as rock usually have black colours to represent it, then i will test on different colours to see which one fits best with it.

The slogan

I will include a slogan with something like The best selling rock magazines ever this will attract the attention of the buyers

The puff

I will include a puff that will include details of certain events that are related to the magazine and the genre of it

Buzzword

The buzzword

I will have a buzzword in the magazine which will be 'Exclusive' this will attract customers to it as it will be done inside a attention seeking text box.

The bar code

The barcode

For my bar code its going to be in the bottom right as it is not too important as it is only used to scan for the price.

The price

The price

My price will be £3, from the research that i have done on other rock magazines i found that they costed around £2-5. I think £3 is an affordable price for teenagers who are interested in my magazine because teenagers will usually have money to use.

The title

The title

My title will be big and it will be eye catching so that it will get the attention of the buyers and get them interested in the magazine.

Best selection of Double page spread of my Music Magazine

My best pictures for double page spread.

From what I have seen for double page spreads most of them are in an L shape so I used my actor to pose so that way, From the pictures i have i think these are the best selections out of them all because the guitar is not too high.

Best selection for Front cover of my Music Magazine

My best selection for my front cover

These are the ones i personally like the best as my front cover photo, I think that the photo will suit my magazine's front cover as the brick background suits of what represents a rocker. 

Best selection for the contents page of my Music Magazine

Pictures for the contents page

I think these are suitable for my contents page as it leaves many space to add texts and show the contents of my magazine as the actor is looking to the other side of the image. However these pictures and costumes are quite similar to my double page spread picture so i plan to change the costume around a bit and cask my actor if he could.

Additional Research

 Additional things I did

On additional times I researched some rock magazine to get an inspiration and looked at what costume they used so I can base some of the aspect of the things I searched up to apply them to my own magazine that I am going to create.

Taking better shots

Thursday 28th January - I looked at my current pictures for my front cover and I don't think that they look as great as they can be so i asked my actor Jordan Lloyd to take more photos for my front cover, The weather was not bad and was somewhat sunny so the pictures lightning came out pretty well.

Ideologys

Ideology in media texts

Mulan - The ideology in this films shows that woman can be as strong as men and do what they can, this shows that she empowers woman and provide them with inspiration that they are equal to men in power and strength

The news of  'Ofsted can downgrade schools for Islamic veils' - Ofsted's ideology of the students and teachers that wear veils are that it can downgrade them and stop effective communication and effective learning and the schools will be 'marked down' if the students/teachers wore veils.

The photo shoot

Photo shoot

Thursday 14th January - Jake Navarro was not in and i wanted him for my photos so i started taking pictures in the hall and found that it does not work too well as the background does suit the colour black and also the pictures did not look the best in the hall.

Tuesday 19th January - We planned to go to Jake Navarro place and while we were there we went to the back yard to test out how the pictures looked there, the pictures turned out good and the background of a wall suits my genre of magazine that i am creating.

Permissions

Permissions

Wednesday 13th January - I spoke with the care taker if we could use the hall for the photo shoot on the Thursday.

Planning

 The start of the plan

Tuesday 5th January - We started planning for the photo shoot and what we are going to do in the next two weeks.

Thursday 7th January - Continued planning and confirmed some of the plans on certain days with my actors so the plan will not go wrong.

Friday 8th January - I reviewed the plan and saw if things were all in place however, Jake Navarro was off so i had to change one of my actors.