Magazine Evaluation

BASSBy Bianca Rahmany

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

• My media product is a music magazine, that in itself is a form of a real media product. Besides this, the magazine features real artists that customers would be interested to hear about. The layout of the front cover is one that you may see on an real music magazine, it has the magazine name on the top of the magazine which makes it clear for customers to see when the magazine is stacked on shelves. My magazine is a hip-hop and r&b magazine, I researched real magazines from this genre, for example Vibe to get an idea of how what kind of font I may use for my magazine title, to get a realistic feel for my magazine. The magazine also featured an advertisement in it, on the double page spread, I feel this is a challenges forms of a real media product. The contents page show follows the structure that a real magazine would and features photos that I had taken from concerts.

How does your media product represent a particular social group?

• My media product is a music magazine, for social groups that would listen to hip-hop/R&B/grime. It would attract an audience in the ages of 16-25. The magazine features major hip/hop artists such as Nicki Minaj as well as up and coming local artists. This gives the magazine a variation of artists and also gives readers the chance to relate closer to those featured in the magazine. The social groups that are likely to read the magazine are from urban areas and perhaps some have the same sort of backgrounds as artists and look up to them for making the life they have and getting out of the ‘ghetto’ they may have been in. The magazine come help aspire youth to get to were their favourite artists may be now. The language used in the magazine is the same as youth in urban areas would use, this makes the text more approachable for the readers.

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

• I feel Bauer Media would be a good media institution to distribute my media magazine as it focuses on both men and woman. The target audience is between 24-40, although they do tend to reach a younger audience too. Bauer distribute a wide range of different music magazines such as Q and Kerrang, and this publicity would help bring in customers for my magazine. Bauer also promotes things for a cross media production, such as Kiss 100 who focus on hip-hop and r&b, which is the genre my magazine focuses on.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

• I feel my music magazine would be aimed for male and females aged 16 to 25. People who are interested in music from the hip-hip, grime, R&B genre. They would be more of an audience from urban areas such as London, and more of a middle-class audience, as the magazine is not too expensive. I feel more females would buy the magazine as many of the artists are females and they can relate to them better than males would.

How did you attract/address your audience?

• The photo used on the front cover is a of a young up and coming artist, the clothes she's wearing are fashionable, that may attract some audience, as well as the fact that she is looking into the camera, that draws the potential buyer in as they have eye contact in a way with the artist. The background colour of the front page is a striking red, this may attract the audience. The front page, and contents page use a red and black colour scheme, this keeps the readers interest. There is also a steady colour scheme in the double page spread so its an easy read and therefore the reader doesn’t get too confused nor distracted by all the colours. The language in the text is how the readers may talk, so they understand it easily. All three pages of the magazine have big bold headings so this attracts the audience as it stands out a lot. The front covers background is a bright red, which would really stand out on a magazine shelf in a shop.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of

constructing the product?• When making my magazine I used a lot of technical processes that I

hadn't used prior the construction of the magazine. When looking for information so as to write my article for the double page spread I used the internet for my research, to find interviews and information on the artist, so I could get an idea on how to form the article and so I had facts to base it on. For the front cover photo I did a studio photo-shoot, this involved taking photos with a SLR camera, as well as organising the different lighting used. Then once I had the photo I used different editing programs such as Photoshop and windows live photo gallery to get the final piece. This was the first studio photo-shoot I had done, however I did not find it too challenging as I had previous experience with an SLR camera. I made the magazine using Photoshop, although I began using InDesign, but I found that a lot more confusing and complicated. I feel Photoshop is more straight forward once you have practise with it. Before constructing the magazine I had not used Photoshop much, anything I had done was for photo manipulation solely. Although I had not used it much before I didn’t find it too challenging and feel I have now grasp many of the techniques.

Look back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the final

product?• When I look back at my preliminary task I don’t

feel it is very good. I used simple techniques, and did not do anything to complicated on the front cover nor contents page, all the fonts were from InDesign were as for my magazine I got the fonts from www.dafont.com and edited them on paint to get the right fit. Also the photos I used and took in the preliminary task are more basic and I didn’t edit them or use any special lightening for them. I made my preliminary task on InDesign and my final product was done on Photoshop so the layout looks quite different.