Media Evaluation

I produced my magazine front cover, contents page, and double page spread using Photoshop, and shot my pictures using a mini Olympus digital camera. The main difficulties I had producing my magazine was using Photoshop even though I’ve used it for producing my preliminary tasks, I found that trying to produce a formal music magazine was more challenging as I tried to make it look more professional than I did with the college magazine. I still found it difficult to get used to using different layers, and sorting out different fonts. I found that the main cover was the most challenging out of the three. Other than using Photoshop, I found no real issues with my magazine cover. Even though I struggled with my front cover, the knowledge I discovered from using Photoshop, I found helped me with my contents page and double page spread. Looking back at my preliminary task I found that I have found a better understanding in how the usual conventions for a magazine works, as they are all pretty similar as they mostly always include a title, a strap line, a house style, continuity, head lines, features, puffs and a barcode. I have used a large bold mass head to capture the audiences attention and make them remember the name, a main background image of the main girl who is featured in the main double page spread interview in the magazine I have also used continuity with the images used for example; same setting, costumes, hair and makeup and also same props, I have used competitions included in the magazine to make the audiences want to purchase the magazine more, a barcode as every magazine uses one in help to sell the magazine, a price of £2.99, and features included within the magazine. I have also included the website address on the front of the magazine, for reasons that my magazine will be more well known. I have used a lot of typical music magazine conventions as my product is a music magazine and therefore some conventions need to be followed therefore the audience will recognise it instantly as a music magazine and not a fashion magazine or a sports magazine. On the double page spread I have used page numbers, two quotations a large title of the artists name and also I have used synergy to advertise the artists single and album to buy on Itunes.

I have designed my magazine so that it targets the demo-graphical group of unisex. The readers of my music magazine, I have aimed it at are from the ages of 14 to late 20's. As Pop and R&B music is so heavily advertised a lot of young adolescents and adults are aware of pop music, as it is played a lot in TV drama's, on the radio, over adverts on the TV, and TV music shows. Everywhere, pop music is advertised, therefore attracting a wider audience. The social groups I decided to aim my magazine at are groups E - Casual labourers, unemployed, state pensioners (13% of the population) and D - Semi-skilled and unskilled manual workers (18% of the population). Overall that's 31% of the population on average so even if I have been able to target even a small percentage of that my magazine will be recognised. Therefore if not many people can afford an expensive magazine, my feature on winning free tickets to concerts will be more enticing to an audience.

The reason I have targeted these specific social groups are mainly to do with their age, for example anyone at college/school/university or even part time working students, would be classed under group E, then young people coming out of education would start of semi-skilled or un-skilled leaving them in group D.

I have based my magazine on majorly pop and R&B. I really like this particular genre of music, because it never gets old, and it also targets a wider market. It may not be very adventurous, and targeting a specific niche market, but I think that it contains a lot of sub-genres, which can also target a wider audience.

I have tried to relate my product to young people, by using similar fashions on the models and also I have used quite dark colours which also reflects winter which is when the magazine was published. The props I have used are very basic, cigarettes and empty alcohol bottle and as the setting is in a wood, this also represents young people and what the environment is like at a festival.

Finished drafts

Layout of Double page spread and draft

unfinished contents draft + layout

Second front cover design

First Draft of New Front Cover

Changes to front cover.

New Names 

I decided that I didn't like the name of my previous magazine and that I wanted to change it something more edgy, wild, and more rock 'n' roll. I also wanted to change the genre of my music magazine, to more of an indie/rock feel, instead of pop. I decided to change the genre because I personally prefer the rock/indie style, and I thought that I would be able to input more ideas if I felt more strongly to the genre. I came up with a few idea's:

• NV
• Edition
• Beatz
• Pulse
• Anchor

I did some research into Indie/rock music magazine names and came across magazines such as;

• Q Magazine
• Kerrang!
• NME: The New Musical Express
• MOJO
• Rolling Stone
• Paste

I discovered that most of the above names are short, so that they are simple, and easy to remember, but also ‘punchy’ and will have a large impact and more memorable impact over other leading magazines. Also I realised that not many of these music magazine names had much to do with the contact of the actual magazine. So when I came to choose the name of my music magazine, I eliminated long words, as I thought that it would not have a long lasting effect on the consumer. Therefore I decided to narrow down some ideas I came up with five, short, snappy and memorable words.

My favourite out of the above 5 are probably; Beatz and Edition.

I like Beatz, because it gives off the impression of loud, up tempo music, but I don't want a title which only refers to music.

I decided to go with Edition as the title of the magazine, because I think it's modern and laid back, which also ties in with the conventions of indie music. Also my target audience are young adolescents therefore I think it will fit well as it's youthful yet also sophisticated. But, as it's a soft word I have decided that I want to contrast the word with the font, and make the font edgy and fun, with an almost eroded/destroyed look.

Possible Fonts 

All fonts used in the process of making my magazine will be from dafont.com, and are not original images.

Birth of a hero-

Network Vampires-

Kingthings Extortion -

Acid Label Font - 

Alfred 24 -

Desert Font - 

My two favorite fonts are 1 + 2, Birth of a Hero and Network Vampires. But the fault I find in the first font, is that it's too thin, and for a masthead I would like the font to be bolder, and more in your face, where as even though the font itself is nice, it's too thin, therefore I will use this font for sub headings on my front cover, and the contents page. 

Price

I have already done some research into price and publishing, but I decided that I wanted to change the price of the magazine so that even thought the content would still be to the same high standard, I would lower the price just a but, therefore this could give me a USP (unique selling point) and an advantage over other competitors. When I looked back into my market research and into my target market, I thought it would be best to lower the price as the majority of my target audience are students, a lot of them won't have jobs, and if they do they would probably be on minimum wage: -
16-17year olds = £3.64 
18-20year olds = £4.92
21+ year olds= £5.93

As I have earlier stated that I decided to do some research into how much other music magazines were, and how often the were distributed, I found that;

• Q magazine is £4.99 and published monthly
• Rolling Stones is £4.70 and published bi-weekly therefore equals £9.40 per month.
• Kerrang and NME are £2.20 and published weekly therefore that costs £8.80 per month, just for one magazine.

I have now decided to change the price of my magazine and made it even cheaper than the original price of £3.50 and charge £2.99 for my magazine and sell it monthly. This is because a lot of young people won't be able to afford a weekly magazine, and also I have charged £2.99 as it is a lot cheaper than my competitors.

New potential images for the new cover of magazine

For new and more inventive images for my now indie-style magazine, I wanted to do a "festival special" edition, because festival season is coming close, and also as tickets are starting to go on sale. I decided that I either wanted to shoot my photos in a deserted building covered in graffiti, a dark wooded area or in a sunny field. But when it came to the day of shooting I couldn't find an area in Hessle with graffiti and also by the time I had the model ready, it was after six o'clock, and it was dark outside so I couldn't use the field. Therefore I had to use the woods. I thought that the woods worked out very nicely. In the picture below the woods are fully grown but as it was winter when the pictures where taken there where no leaves.

Potential Costumes for images
 
For my front cover photos I wanted to use ripped black tights for the urban look, with military heel boots with fur, a short black skirt with a dark-ish urban look top and a gold pendant necklace. These items of clothing on their own are worn by the target market, therefore, makes the magazine images more desirable to the audience.

 Potential Images