Question 1
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
My media product uses, develops and challenges the forms of real media products through the consistent use of typical conventions such as a masthead, plug, feature stories, skyline and main image and feature story. These conventions were used in such a way that they resembled their use on the magazines which I had carefully researched throughout the creation of my media product. Magazines such as Mixmag, Tilllate and Billboard are all existing products I researched that feature these conventions in some way or another, and so this ensured that my magazine stayed as realistic as possible and helped to keep a continuous theme style throughout.
As shown in the images which I have placed side-by-side here, there is a clear use of continuity to create a house style across the media products. The same fonts and colours have been used, as well as shapes and patterns to create a consistent and recognisable style across the magazine. I used a range of fonts throughout, however these were changed up and very few were used constantly due to the fact some fonts didn’t particularly fit in with the design. A number that I used throughout to keep a consistent style were the fonts ‘Vanadine’ and ‘Capsuula’, below is a list of all the fonts that I used for each product:
Front Cover
Masthead - Dylan Dog
Skyline/Date/Website - Vanadine
Barcode Price - Arial
Main Feature Story - Xtreem, Vanadine
Secondary Feature Story - Headline, Vanadine
Other Feature Stories - Red Moon Rising, Soul Meets Body
Plug - Headline, Capsuula
Contents Page
Title - Lemon Milk
Date - Vanadine
Website - Capsuula
Page Numbers/Subtitles - Lemon Milk
Contents Descriptions/Other Main Body Text - Capsuula
Editor’s Signature - Signerica
Double Page Spread
Title - Forte, Kravitz
Stand First - Vanadine
Main Article Body - Arial
Page Number - Lemon Milk
Cover Story/Website - Capsuula
Social Media Links - Vanadine, Capsuula
I challenged the forms and conventions of real media products by keeping my front cover fairly minimalistic and clean. There aren’t many feature stories and only one plug, which minimises overcrowding and draws more attention to the few features on the cover. I also didn’t include any secondary images or pull quotes, although it was something which I planned to do. Instead, I kept the space for the main feature story and other feature stories, although having said that, if I were to do this project again I would definitely include a couple of secondary images and a pull quote on my cover to see how they would have looked.
There are some ways in which my media product could have been improved so that it used more conventions of real media products; for example the inclusion of more feature stories, secondary images and a pull quote would have provided more visual and textual information on the front cover of my magazine. I could have also included one or two more plugs and small images to fill the space in around the cover, though this would arguably go against the typical layout for this genre of music magazine and may have closer resembled a magazine aimed at pop music culture.
The contents could have been spread across two pages to minimise overcrowding of information and sectioning of articles for easier navigation, as well as including three or more smaller images for ‘main’ articles to further draw attention to the page. This is a common form used in real media products as they often contain a lot of information that cannot be condensed onto one page, and so my magazine contents may have resembled that of a real media product’s contents page better.
Finally, utilising space on the double page spread could have enabled more visual information to be placed within and around the article, such as secondary images and pull quotes. This challenges the typical forms of a real media product as my research showed that the aforementioned features of a magazine’s double page spread are conventions which you can expect to see in existing products, and therefore my own product challenges these conventions.
How does your media product represent particular social groups?
The social groups for my magazine would be both the artists who create music as well as the typical audience who listen to it. I maintained a youthful look throughout my magazine to appeal to both these social groups, who tend to be teenagers and young adults, representing them through the design and colour scheme.
For the main feature artist of my magazine I had to come up with a persona who would accurately represent EDM and House music producers and thus making my magazine more realistic. I chose to have a young producer to represent the many recent, popular electronic artists who started from ages as young as 15 such as Martin Garrix, Oliver Heldens and Curbi. However, I counteracted the typical persona for an EDM/House producer by having my feature artist a female. Whilst conducting research into the chosen genre I found there’s an alarmingly small number of female producers; therefore by having a young female producer on the front cover would draw attention as it is unusual for that particular social group.
What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
The feedback from my focus group suggested the general audience for my magazine would prefer paper copies, meaning I would have to find a media institution to print, publish and distribute the product to meet the needs of those who preferring to purchase the magazine in this way.
However, for those who would prefer a digital copy, having online e-book services such as Amazon and iTunes offer the magazine as part of a digital subscription on Kindles and iPhones/iPads would make the product more widely available to a larger audience, particularly suiting those who prefer to have their magazines and newspaper subscriptions collectively available on their electronic device. This would also represent the development of technology and therefore suit the genre as it is a large part of electronic music; as well as suiting the audience who will be generally teenagers and young adults and therefore more likely to be using such devices.
Question 6
Who would be the audience for your media product?
The audience for my media product would be predominately teenagers and young adults whose main musical interests surround electronic music, in particular house and electro dance although the magazine could tailor to a number of electronic sub-genres. After conducting research into the audience for this type of music and existing magazines, I found that males tend to outweigh females in statistics. Although my magazine admittedly suggests that it is geared towards a more female audience through the use of colour scheme and model on the front cover, the colours are representative of the genre and would hopefully attract both males and females to reading the magazine. In terms of social class, my magazine was to be aimed at those in classes C2, D and E as described in my blog post ‘Audience Research – Social Class & Demographics’ due to the fact that my main audience will be young and therefore more likely to be students who are not employed in jobs that classify them as being middle class.
As an early task, I created a reader profile as a rough reference to my target audience which would help in the process of making the magazine. I tried to convey the interests of the predominantly teenage and young adult audience of electronic music, including products which may interest them such as speakers and mixing equipment, mobile devices, games consoles and a variety of high street and designer fashion labels. As for the statistics, I generated my own since research into existing products showed an imbalance of male and female readers, so I portrayed this in my own however made the balance a little more equal so that my product would appeal to a wider audience.
How did you attract/address your audience?
The colour scheme was used as a large pinpoint to attract my target audience. I tried to keep the colours bright and eye-catching to not only draw attention but to recreate the colourful scene of EDM and house, which tends to be the choice of genre played within clubbing environments and for this reason, is generally associated with bright colours. The colour scheme on the front cover was predominantly purple, blue and green as these colours not only, in my personal opinion, reflect the genre well but they are also fairly gender-neutral colours and therefore will appeal to a wider audience.
The front cover features a plug that would draw the attention of the audience - an opportunity to win tickets to electro dance festivals. There are a large scope of festivals available for this genre of music, one of which known as ‘Tomorrowland’ was a point of reference in my music video research and analysis blog post. These festivals attract a large audience of young adults and a relatively equal number of both sexes, however they can be quite costly, and so by advertising the opportunity to go for free would appeal to my target audience in particular as their age means they may not have a lot of disposable income to spend on entertainment such as this.
A number of names of electronic artists are also featured solely on the front cover of my magazine including Oliver Heldens, Sub Focus and Nero - all three of which come from slightly different subgenres of electronic music to appeal to a wider audience of listeners. On the contents page, I made sure to feature a couple more names alongside those on the front cover including Dada Life and Higher Self. These well-known names would attract the target audience to the magazine, leaving them wanting to read more to gain further knowledge into their favourite music producers.
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
Throughout the making of my product I have used a number of technologies to aid in production, many of these being things I had not really used much of before. The project required extensive use of computers, both on Windows and Mac operating systems; as well as programmes such as Adobe Photoshop, Powerpoint, Publisher and the internet. The personalised layout of my blog (although not really necessary), required knowledge of HTML coding which I had to teach myself, and a number of hours navigating around the blogger theme customisation feature.
In terms of research for my project, I spent a lot of time on the computer looking into existing products, audiences and the general market to better tailor my product to suit them. Most of my findings were then documented on Powerpoint presentations and Publisher documents and posted to my blog in the form of JPEG images, but I also used Prezi Powerpoints and videos. This gave me a more in-depth and hands-on experience with technology, learning how to present research which I had found in more visually appealing ways which would help to put across my ideas better.
As previously mentioned, I used videos as a part of my research on two occasions, one of these being for a focus group. For this, I had to set up studio lighting and use a DSLR camera for video recording and then put together the footage on Apple Mac’s own video editing software ‘iMovie’. This same process applied to the second video, which was a time-lapse of the studio set-up for taking my final images. The process of making these videos were undoubtably long, however worth the effort as they engage with the viewer better.
Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel like you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
After placing the two final products side-by-side, it’s clear that the design and quality has vastly improved since the preliminary task. At the time, the college magazine I created was adequate enough for the brief and task expectations, but now after developing skills with Photoshop and gaining a better understanding of the codes and conventions of a magazine front cover, I can clearly see aspects of the college magazine that would desperately need improving to make it look more professional and aesthetically pleasing overall.
In the progression from the preliminary task, I have learnt a lot about the various technologies used to achieve the final product. Although the same camera was used for both main images, I learnt more about framing and lighting and how to manipulate these in order to achieve professional-looking images. The photograph taken for the front cover of my preliminary task relied on natural lighting and colourful surroundings for the desired effect, and the images came out looking almost exactly as I had hoped, whereas, the main image on my music magazine required a plain white backdrop and so I had to learn to properly set up the studio lighting to get the best results. Since the preliminary task, I feel like I have learnt a lot more about the necessary photography for magazines and how to get the best out of the images which I have taken.
The creation of my college magazine relied very little on Photoshop, and no editing of the main image was required at all. I only learnt the basics and this is evident in the product itself as the only features that were used were those to insert text, shapes and an image. Therefore, in the progression to my final product, I have learnt a lot more about editing images on Photoshop and feel more confident with its tools and features; which is clearly shown in the product itself as a variety of text has been used, shapes have been manipulated, colours and overlay effects experimented with and so therefore the final product looks more professional and aesthetically pleasing alongside the preliminary task.
However having said that, I believe that there’s still improvements that could be made on the final music magazine cover before it looks outstandingly more professional alongside the preliminary task. Feedback from teachers since I made improvements on the first draft have been positive, however there still seems to be something lacking that leaves me dissatisfied with the final product. If I were to go back and improve it, I would try and make the front cover look more ‘busy’ and include little icons, images, pull quotes and a couple more plugs to draw the attention of the reader. I would also alter the colours and design of the feature stories and experiment until I reached a more fitting and visually pleasing result as in my opinion, the current design detracts from the main image.
