Evaluation: Music Magazine
For my foundation production, I have produced my own music magazine. This consisted of creating my own original front page, contents page and double page spread. Within these pages, I used my own photographs, taken of friends that modelled for the magazine and knowledge of music magazines based upon research and analysis’s of front pages, contents pages and double page spreads. I used LIIAR in this analysis’s (Language, Institution, Ideology, Audience and Representation).
My music magazine has been aimed towards is between the ages of 16-25. Within my magazine, I tried to use, and stick to as many of the researched conventions as I could, as I wanted this magazine to look like the magazines you see in shops. My magazine is of a electro/house/dance music genre, I tried to find magazines to similar style and genre as well as researching alternative magazine’s such as “Kerrang!” which is an extremely well known and popular rock magazine. I wanted my magazine to have an upbeat electro look and feel to it, not pop, but not too grunge and rock like Kerrang, Rock Sound etc. One of the main conventions I tried to use in my magazine was a consistent house style, as I believe this gives the magazine a quality of consistency. I also looked at applying most other conventions to my magazine such as Masthead, left third (part of magazine showing when on display), Sell line, Screamers and Images. I feel that I have produced good pieces and they fit well together. I kept consistent colours throughout to keep consistency and I believe the finish effect gave the magazine a very professional look, also making it easy to see that these pages where all from the same magazine.
My magazine that I created was aimed for a more youthful audience, within the genre of electro/dance/house etc. With this being the genre, the ideology has lead to me create an electric, technologic look thought my magazine, the style is very different and fits will with the genre of music, and I would hope it would appeal to people of this genre. I also believe my magazine would be attractive to males and females of the social groups it is aimed at.
While designing my magazine, I had to think about the genre of music and social group that would be purchasing my magazine. I had to think about how the magazine would be presented and how the images would be places and manipulated, also how the photos where taken to attract the right audience. I also researched fonts and typography for my magazine, for the masthead, splash etc. My magazine would be sold on the high street, as well as an available online subscription. As shown in my double page spread, My magazine will also have a website, for as previously mentioned, subscribing to the magazine and also for catching up on the latest news, videos and what’s coming in the next issue. Also articles with information left out from the magazine, such as not being able to fit a whole interview into the magazine the uncut version will be posted online for readers to read what was not published. I believe posting more information and articles online would be a great way to draw the younger generation in and appeal a lot more to them, as the internet is widely used and available in the life of most average teenagers. I feel my magazine would be best distributed between the technology and music section, possibly alongside currently running DJ magazines. I myself would find my magazine extremely interesting, and while asking my friends I feel they would also be interested in such a magazine. I believe I have hit the correct age range and social group. I chose to aim for this age and social group as I believe they are the people that would find it the most interesting and become potential customers. The magazine is also easier to aim and this audience, with the use of internet, email etc.
I believe I bridge the gap between the magazine and the social group with the way my magazine looks and feels, as well as the content within. I’ve made my magazine easier to understand, but easy on the eye and nice to look at, copying trends from the front cover over to the double page spread and vice versa. I didn’t use too much colour, kept it rather minimal. I believe this look is becoming more and more accepted and desired now within my selected target audience, and people my age.
When producing this magazine in the early stages, I used all the above information and research within my first plans, IE in the positioning of things and layout within the pages to give it a desirable look. I have been using Photoshop for around 4-5 years and feel very able using the program to create high standard professional work.
I didn’t manipulate my original photographs in a major way, other than cropping and changing the hue, saturation, brightness and contrast to improve the images. The images worked extremely well with the look and feel of the magazine, throughout.
When looking at my original ideas and plans, I can see that my work hasn’t changed dramatically, but it has only improved in quality of work, and with making it look more professional. I believe I reached all of my tasks and in some areas surpassed them.
My work has been looked over by friends, and I have asked for opinions and they believe it works well and looks professional. The look of my magazine was exactly what I was looking for in the magazine, I surpassed my own hopes. The magazine is professional looking and reaches out to the desired audience and genre. I believe its well presented and the images all worked well, in harmony with each other. The polls on my blog show that people think positively towards my own work and show like towards my final product, which I believe reaches all the desired targets.
