2. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge
forms and conventions of real media products?
My media product (magazine) follows the same conventions
as a real magazine as I copied a lot of the layouts (see next
slides) and based my product on the VIBE magazine.
I kept to the same conventions as I wanted to create a
product that was very similar to VIBE with a slightly different
target audience.
3. VIBE cover analysis
Masthead: big
and bold,
Vibe
positioned Eyebrow
behind the
artist- layers
Cover line
Having the
artist tilt his
head slyly
draws more
attention to Eye contact:
the cover engages with
lines audience
Ears
Ears
Only three
colour used
for the cover
Barcode
Full bleed image
4. My Front cover analysis
Eye brow
Large
masthead
Eye
Ear contact
Full bleed
image
Barcode
5. VIBE contents page analysis
Eye contact
Broken
contents
Shows the number of Full bleed
contents pages image
Plain
background
Numbers to
indicate articles
6. My contents analysis
Eye Shows the number of
contact contents pages
Number to
indicate articles
Full bleed
image
Plain
background
7. Q double page spread
Full bleed
image
Large
header
Introduction
Enlarged Pull out
first letter quote
8. My double page spread
Pull out quote
Large
header
Introduction
Full bleed
image
First letter
enlarged
9. How does your media product represent particular social
groups?
The social group represented in my magazine
are people who are interested in the Hip Hop
music genre.
My magazine is simple and the
attire of my model is to attract
more mature music lovers
My double page spread somewhat represents
the old image of Hip Hop lovers as the model
is dressed in that typical attire. The silhouette
The contents page keeps to the same image also portrays the rebellious impact Hip
idea as my model is dressed casually Hop had back in the days.
in a respectable pose
10. What kind of media institution might distribute your media
product and why?
One publisher of magazines is Diamond Publishing - Metropolis
Group, the actual magazine is a specialist magazine as this
company specialises in music and media production.
The publishers of VIBE (the magazine that my magazine
is based on) is Intermedia Vibe Holdings, LLC, however I
would not ask them to publish my magazine as they
already have their own similar product.
My magazine would not be likely to I would consider asking Diamond Publishing as
be sold in a corner shops but music they publish music magazines however of
shops such as HMV different music genres: a new type of genre
could be appealing as this would target
another audience and broaden their
11. Who would be the audience for your media product?
My target audience is
heavily based on that of
VIBEs.
The differences are that
there is a higher female
audience than male and
as VIBE is an American
magazine, the
‘Spanish/Hispanic/Latin
o’ option was replaced
by ‘Arab’ as this is more
representative of urban
areas in the UK.
12. The images, unlike most of
VIBEs, found in my magazine are not
seductive or sexualized as this
magazine is aimed at females who are
generally not attracted to that sort of
thing.
As my double page is about the history of
Hip Hop, this would attract readers who
are either interested in history of music or
want to recap their youth. This is targeted
at those who like to expand their general
knowledge.
13. How did you attract/address your audience?
Recent stories and
events
Famous
names
I kept to the conventions of VIBE and
used limited number colours and
fonts: this should attract a more
mature audience as opposed to ‘teen
magz’ that use many colours to catch
their audiences attention.
14. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of
constructing this product?
InDesign CS4
InDesign is what I used to construct my
media product.
This was program was new to me as I had
never used it before, it took a while grasp
how to use it however I got to grips with it
whilst creating my masthead.
Slideshare
I was recommended to use Slideshare to
upload my files onto this blog as it can be
difficult to upload them straight from a
computer. Creating an account was very
userful.
15. Photoshop
Photoshop played a very big role in creating
my media product as I had to edit photos.
This was also new to me and I found it
difficult to crop images: this can be seen in
my front cover as this was the first piece I
completed. In contrast to the magazine
cover, the double page spread image was
more successful as I had more experience
using Photoshop by this time.
The internet was also
important as I used this
for my research and
planning, going on the
VIBE website, getting
images to analyse and
using this blog and
Slideshare.
16. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have
learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
Skills I have learnt: Skills I have developed:
• I’ve learnt to use such programs • I can now edit photos and
like Photoshop and InDesign which create layouts although I have
I didn't know before . more to learn, there is room
• I’ve learnt to analyse magazines for more development.
and the right terminologies for the
conventions used.
What I’ve learnt about manipulation of
representations:
What I’ve learnt about planning: I have learnt that using images and
I’ve learnt that planning to create a language, such media like magazines
magazine takes a lot of time as you can target audiences by creating
have to research to understand the representations of people. They do this
conventions of magazines. by editing photos, using famous people
Once you’ve researched you can to attract the population that will be
decide whether to follow these interested in buying the product.
conventions or not, as long as they
work well with the genre or topic you
are doing.
