FORMS AND CONVENTIONS

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media

products?

Production

I used the internet to check for big-name music magazines such as Kerrang!, Q magazine and NME to see how their magazines are portrayed.

I created my music magazine using mainly photoshop to match up to the quality of real music magazines.

I based the layout of my cover, contents and 2 page spread on certain rock magazines that inspired me.

Camerawork

Here are a few examples of photos I used in my music magazine:

I used my IPhone camera to take all photos in my magazine.

I took them from different angles to give them different effects (i.e. low angle, close up…). I thought I’d do this because as I flicked through the pages of famous rock magazines, I noticed that their photos were taken from different angles, etc.

I took a wide range of photos; different angles of the same photos. This helped me choose the best photos.

I used the best technology at my disposal to get the best possible photo quality I could.

Layout The main image slightly covers

the masthead, just like in most magazines I analysed. This is because the magazine is so famous, you only need to see a few letters from it’s title and it’s shape/design to recognise it.

The taglines are scattered around the main image, using different fonts.

I got the layout idea from two different covers: a Kerrang! magazine cover and an NME magazine cover. They have generally the same type of genre in their magazine so I thought it would be relevant to use them as a template.

Layout In the top left-hand corner of my

contents page, I left an “editors message”, directed at the people who have bought my magazine. I saw this feature in a few magazines such as Kerrang! and thought it would be interesting to put in my magazine.

I tried to use as many different fonts as possible without going too over the top with it; I basically used a different font for each bands name, depending on their genre (distorted for heavier bands)

Layout I based the layout of my 2 page spread on a “Rock Sound” music

magazine’s 2 page spread. One page has pull-out-quotes with a photo of a band member playing an

instrument. Rock magazines that I analysed had this feature so I thought it would be good to include in my magazine.

The other has the lead singer posing next to paragraphs of text which talk about him and his band. This is the first time I used a photo of a band member posing, so I thought it would be a good idea to use it next to text that is talking about them.

My 2 page spread Rock Sound 2 page spread

Focus Group I used a focus group to evaluate my final

magazine draft, hoping to use any constructive comments to improve my final product.

This allowed me to do the best I can with the technology at my disposal to get the same effects for my magazine as big name magazines i.e. Q magazine, NME and Kerrang!

I published my focus group on my blogspot.