Feedback - 28/11/09

A promising start Debbie - but lots more to do - you should now be working on this blog at home to get it to a good standard.

The first genre you should be analysing is music magazines - outline the conventions and then look at covers, contents pages and feature articles and think about the following questions...

- Do they follow typical conventions of music magazines? If not why?

- Who is the target audience (GRASS) and how have they been made to appeal to them?

- Do they successfully make the audience want to read on? ( Cover and contents?)

- why do they work?

In research you need a little more on audience - who is your target audience (Demographic - GRASS and psychographic profiling - Young and Rubicon) Also how will your product appeal to its audience - use MAslow too.

questionnaires are needed - to your target audience - and feedback on this - charts and graphs are always good!

Go onto the ABC website to find out audience/circulation figures for magazines too - is there a market out there for your product?

Now move onto planning this week - ( see the last two sheets on the 'before you blog' handout) Start your mood boards, rough mock up of pages, props list, shooting schedule etc....

Research - Genre

The genre i will be following in my music magazine, will be Pop. I have chosen this genre as it is the type of music that i am into and i feel that i know the most about. My magazine will be slightly hybrid as it will be dominantly about music but will have a hint of gossip in as well, but the gossip will be about the musicians that are within the magazine.

All magazines follows the same rules whether they are Lifestyle Magazines like FHM or Music Magazines like Kerrang or TOTP Magazine. The image of the magazine must fit the content and the target audience. The name/header of the magazine must also do this. When creating and designing a magazine one of the most important things t think about is the colour scheme as this primarily hooks in the readers. To make a Music Magazine successful it is best to stick to a 'House Style' as it appeals to the audience having something familiar for them to recognise...e.g. kerrange and NME....

Preliminary Task Part 2 - Contents Page

For the second part of my Preliminary Task i produced a mock-up of the layout of the contents page to demonstrate my grasp of DTP.

I think what worked especially well with my contents page was that i split the contents for the magazine into 'For the Girls', 'For the Boys' and 'For Both'. By doing this, this gives the opportunity for both sexes to choose what they are interested in without having to flick through the whole magazine to find the section they want. Also by having a section 'For Both' means they can enjoy things for both sexes and are not just limited to the things they can view, obviously both boys and girls can also read the sections on their opposite sex. I have added pictures of the male and female symbols to make it stand out and look young and trendy. I have chosen the most interesting topics to put on my contents page so readers will find it appealing. There are also places where pictures would be put, this is to make the contents look more fun and vibrant without it just being all text. I think i would change the layout of the text when i make my main contents page as i think it looks a bit crowded with text. Also my final contents page will be very colourful.

Preliminary Task Part 1 - Front Cover

For the first part of my Preliminary Task: Print, i used DTP (Desktop Publishing Program) and an image manipulation program to produce the front page of a new school/college magazine. The front cover had to feature a photograph of a student in medium close-up shot and some appropriately laid-out text and masthead.

I think that what worked well on my design of a front cover of a school/college magazine was the colours i used. I used blue and pink for the title MARY'S MAG, i think this worked well as it symbolises that the magazine is for both boys and girls, it also makes the title stand out. Next to the heading i used my own college logo, i think that this works well as people can easily establish which college the magazine is from. I like the font i used in the title and the other text as i feel it makes the magazine look fun, young and sends out a message to the students that the magazine is in with the 'kids' and makes it look interesting. I also think that the picture is very appealing as it is a young attractive student which will draw people in to the magazine. The sub-titles are also appealing to the reader as they are on interesting subjects and it bright colours and fun fonts to catch the readers attention and make them want to read on. The set out of the whole magazine is cheerful and fun and if i was a student picking up this magazine I'd definitely want to read it.

The things that maybe didn't work as well and i would like to change in my main task is i think i should of added on more sub headings, so the reader has more things to look at on the front cover and choose the things they want to read about. Also even thought= the font it fun, some readers may found it difficult to read as some of the fonts are not extremely clear. Also the picture i placed on my front cover is in a library, maybe i could of found a more interesting and appealing location to take my picture.

Introduction

I'm Debbie and i have chosen to create a music magazine for my Media Coursework. The genre for my music magazine will be Pop, i have chosen this genre as it is universal and one of the most popular genre of music around. My artist will be a Solo Artist.