MUSIC MAGAZINE EVALUATION

Ryo Panis

Front Cover

FINAL PIECES

Contents Page

Double Page Spread

Target AudienceWho would be the target audience for your magazine?

My music magazine was targeted at young teenagers going to young adults from the ages of 13-21 who come from the lower class as well as middle class areas of London. I intended to target my audience to people who listen or like the genre of ‘Hip Hop and Rap music’ and for those who update themselves on latest rap battles or new upcoming artists by viewing them on sites like YouTube.

For my front cover I took a close-up image of my protagonist character who is the main story of this magazine. I positioned my character by having his chin up but at the same time looking down, this gives an effect that he thinks his above everyone else which contrasts with my article. I made my character wear clothing that are followed by trends, so he would be wearing a bomber jacket which represents that his big, strong and confident and that his wearing black ray bands and a Obey snapback. His clothing represents trends so I followed the trend as it contrasts with my genre Hip Hop.

Addressing The AudienceHow did you attract/address your audience?

To attract and address my audience I used different features and techniques as well as getting feedback from my music questionnaire. I used images, sell lines, teasers, different colors and the type of language (colloquial language). I decided to use colloquial language because it would make the reader more comfortable and confident when reading the sell lines and the featured article. Some of the language used in my featured article were mostly slang and a bit of standard English.

I addressed my audience mainly to males instead of females because I was not sure if females would be into the genre of ‘hip hop & rap’ because of the lyrics used. However if it was in America then it would be considered into addressing it to females as well as males.

I tried to associate mise-en-scene with my music magazine by making the two artists wear clothes that ‘hip hop & rap’ artists would wear or for lower and middle class people would wear referring that the two artists came from the streets of London.

ConstructionWhat have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing your magazine?

As I was making and creating my music magazine I used different designing and editing technology to produce my front cover, contents page and double page spread.

During the making of my product I created a questionnaire to get audience feedback on what to consider for my front cover, contents page and double page spread. I used questions like position of the image, position of sell lines, whether the masthead should be in front or behind the main image etc. This questionnaire helped me to brainstorm and think of ideas on how my music magazine would be constructed as and how to.

I decided to use ‘Photoshop CS4’ instead of ‘Microsoft Publisher’. I thought that using Photoshop would be the best way to create and make my front cover, contents page and double page spread because it has a big variety of editing and designing tools that would be suitable for creating my music magazine. Instead of using publisher which has less tools to edit and design a magazine. I chose to use Photoshop because I was familiar with the different tools such as: wand tool, brush tool etc. I used the different editing tools to create my background for my front cover, different font styles and colours for all my text and the position of the images.

The most important part needed for my front cover, contents page and double page spread was the images. I decided to use a canon slr to take my pictures which gave me a high definition image.

Presentational IssuesHow does your magazine represent particular social groups?

My music magazine represents the social group of ‘young teenagers to young adults’ as them being convicted with miss-uses of drugs, sex, alcohol and mostly violence that occur in the UK alone. This is thought to be true because they are more reckless and violent towards the community as well as the government. This is highly portrayed in London as young teenagers are convicted of drugs, sex, alcohol and violence most of the time.

In my magazine I represent that young teenagers “started from the bottom, now we here” these are lyrics from a rap artist called Drake who is well-known the music industry as well as Hip Hop, rap etc. These lyrics suggest that he started from the bottom where he poor, poor educated and was accused of being a convict. But right now he has loads of money and now his wealthy.

My magazine represents that young teenagers try to aim high as in be wealthy and popular. So the young teenagers try to follow trends from other people but then try set their own trends which make them wealthy and popular.

However in other countries like America ‘hip hop’ rap is kind of similar to UK ‘hip hop’ rap because of what the purpose is behind the lyrics they think of and speak as they walk to the mic. But my music magazine only portrays UK alone rather than other poor areas in the world, aiming at the London streets.

InstitutionsWhat kind of institution might distribute your magazine and why?

For my music magazine I would consider distributing it to certain institutions to gain revenue and such. My music magazine targets mainly males however could appeal to women who would enjoy reading my magazine, so I would distribute it to big institutions like ‘WHS smith’ as this institution is well-known for mainly books, newspapers, general accessories for school etc especially magazines ranging from kids to adult magazines. This could give me an advantage to target different ages as there are different kinds of magazines that held and sold there. Solely I would consider in distributing my music magazine in that store to gain revenue and to advertise my magazine to a range of ages.

Another institution which I would consider would be a food supermarket like ‘Asda’ which sells a lot off food & groceries as well as books and magazines, again ranging from kids to adults. This would be a great advantage because a lot of customers attend the shop everyday to shop which could advertise to them. So if I was to distribute my music magazine their then customers who purchase my magazine would go there every week to get the next issue which would benefit me and the company Asda.

Forms & ConventionsIn what ways does your magazine use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real music magazines?

Front CoverI think that my final music magazine develops and challenges forms of conventions of real music magazines through different aesthetical features. As you can see my final music magazine has the needed components for a magazines such as: masthead, main image, sell lines, teasers, barcode, issue number and date and feature article. However to most magazines they are laid out the same but I positioned them in a unique way developing a new look/layout of magazines.

One of the main conventional forms is the ‘main image’ which I have for my front cover, instead of having my main image in front of the masthead I put it behind as my magazine is not that known yet and that you could see the masthead better. The positioning of my main image is a close-up of the person with the chin up but looking down at the camera. This could show status, power and authority that the person is about. Another conventional form is the ‘masthead’ which I have here in bold, capitals and in white to stand out from the other conventional forms on the front cover. I decided to put the masthead in front of the main image because my music magazine is not that known yet and it would confuse the consumer who was too see it and think what magazine is that. So by following other magazine forms I put the masthead in front of the image to stand out and look bold so consumers can see it.

Last of all what magazines need are ‘sell lines’ to help advertise and interest the consumer which I have here e.g top 10 reviews on sket or bullet boy, these make the reader want to read the magazine.

For most magazines they have a colour trend which is consistent throughout the whole of the magazine which I considered using as it was good and efficient way of being unique because of the colour scheme chosen to use and when and where to use it. As you can see on my front cover I considered using 3 main colours which are grey, black and white which are very simple colours that contrast well with each other.

Contents PageAs you can see my contents page includes many conventional forms such as: title, content list, article images, masthead and caption of magazine.

Here on my contents page I have the contents page name itself in the middle at the top of the page in big, bold , black with capitals highlighted with white to stand out from the rest of the text. I have the masthead of the magazine in corner of the page which conforms conventions of contents pages. I also have the different articles featured in the magazine with a little summary of the article and page number, so that its easier for the reader to know a bit of the article and what page it’s on. In addition I added in 2 article images along with the page number which are like added articles.

So by having these different conventional forms of a contents page, I was able to conform my own contents page following other contents pages. By doing this I had to know what forms I needed so that I can apply it to my contents page.

As you can I see I conformed some similarities of my contents page which other contents page that are not the same. There are the page numbers, article summarises, masthead name, main image etc.

Double Page SpreadFor my double page spread added in many conventional form such as: title, article content, page number, quote and main image.

As you can see my double spread follows one of the conventional forms which is the title ‘Tiny Tines Is Released’ which is at the top of my DPS in big and bold. Although some other magazines have other text around it which are called ‘sell lines’ to help advertise the article. I laid out my title over the both 2 pages so that it would be easier for the reader to read and it would look professional as in filling up empty spaces like most magazines that try to cover up the empty space by either enlarging text or adding more.

Furthermore I added a caption below the title of the DPS using standard English language to help the reader interact and read the article well as it is aimed at young teenagers to young adults.

Last of all for my DPS my article is laid out in 5 paragraphs starting with a big, bold capital letter for each paragraph to help the reader to know where to start from. This is a conventional form as most magazines have this for their main article using a big capital letter to start a paragraph and a small letter to finish it.

School magazine vs

Music magazine

Front Cover

As you can see my school magazine looks similar to my music magazine considering the layout.

Firstly for my school magazine I used 2 main colours (red & purple) which were 2 very simple colours that contrast. Although for my music magazine I used 3 main colours (grey,white,black) which contrasted well together to give it nice professional look. Also the way I positioned my sell lines like in my school magazine you can see they rotated a bit to a certain degree and my music magazine the sell lines are rotated a tiny bit to make it look different to other magazines. In addition my music magazine as extra aesthetical features to it like the pop-up, barcode and site names e.g. TWITTER.COM/BASS.

However my music magazine doesn't have that much sell lines on the front cover itself but the school magazine does because I didn't think that much on sell lines to add to the music magazine. Furthermore for my school magazine I used the image for the whole front cover whereas for my music magazine i edited the front cover and added in a light grey background using the software ‘Photoshop cs4’.

Last of all for my music magazine I added a more variety of font styles to use and editing tools to change them and make them look better. But for my school magazine i was limited to amount of font styles and colours. Being able to use a variety of font styles allows me to decide and choose on what font to use and would it be suitable for the purpose.