This document describes the evaluation presentation of the student's magazine project called "My Magazine Rumba". It provides details on the design and content of the magazine's front cover, contents page, and double page spread. Feedback from surveys showed that most people felt the three pages had a consistent design and belonged to the same magazine. The magazine is aimed at music fans aged 15-30 interested in hip hop culture. Through the project, the student learned important skills using Photoshop and how to effectively design a media product to attract an intended audience.
2. MY MAGAZINE RUMBA These are my free magazine pages: front cover, contents page and double page spread. On a survey in which I asked if my free pages looked like there belonged to the same magazine 10/16 people said yes. 4/16 said: a little bit and 1/16 said no. I am happy with my feedback since a great majority thought that the three pages looked familiar in design.
3. My magazine is aimed at young people not necessarily student between the age of 15 up to 30 that are into the hip hop culture. I chose this audience group because I am part of it and because after collecting responses from an initial survey I found out that most of the people that answered my survey liked hip hop music.
4. In my contents page I tried to keep a urban design using a set of cool colours and fonts. I’ve used pictures of the my main artists again. They are both in very hip hop identifying poses. The middle of the page is used to lead readers to the main features and articles of the magazine by laying out all the articles included behind the page number they are on. I used a few pictures taken out of the articles to give the reader a taster of what to expect. This design hasn’t got any direct reference to any other contents page but is more of a mix of many contents pages I’ve looked at and was inspired by.
5. My double page spread is designed in a really urban and ghetto style. I’ve used very dark colours for the background together with a brush that shows a set of flats which gives a sort of rough edgy look. I've also used big block letters that spread across the top of the page with the name of the article. I’ve used to pictures of the artists and placed them one on each side again looking cool and kind of dangerous. The writing is in light gray to contrast the dark green and black behind it. The above picture shows the results of my survey on the question: is my magazine easy to read?. 15/16 survey takers gave positive answers and found my magazine easy to read.
6. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? I believe that my magazine resembles similarities with THE SOURCE which has also been a strong reference during this project. Both of the magazines use mainly the left part of the page to attract the buyer with cover lines In my magazine the groups name spreads across the whole page instead of being at the left . Just like the source my magazines uses strong contrast colors in order to stand out. my slogo is over the masthead instead of below, as in The Source Both magazines have the extras on the right side under the title PLUS+ although I have tried something unusual by laying the word in vertical order rather than horizontal My barcode and dateline is on the bottom right instead of the bottom left. The colors I’ve chosen for this cover were trying to represent the Spanish flag colors because in this edition the main artist happen to be Spanish. Asking people which magazine has similarities with mine a majority thought it looked similar to the source. The majority of my survey takers agreed that my magazine resembled similarities with The Source.
7. How does your media products represent particular social group? This magazines intended target audience are young people between 15 and 25 but in some cases reaching up to 30 year olds. Out of this demographical group, those who are into urban music are the ones most likely to buy the magazine. The magazine is meant to represent a sort of urban, rebellious vibe for music lovers. Although it is representing a urban vibe it includes both, underground and mainstream artist because it is more genre based. The main genre I wanted to represent was hip hop although this genre is being affected and being crossed with many other genres and sounds. As you can see in my double page spread, my main article is about the mix between hip hop and house music. My magazine was aimed at boys and girls between the ages of 15 and 30.
8. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why? I personally believe that my magazines would mainly be sold at news agents and music stores. Distributed by the future group or IPC. It could also be sold over the internet on places like issuu.com Investigating what other people thought through a questioner these were the results: A majority of my survey takers thought that my magazine was most likely to be sold at a music store and in second place in news agents. 3rd most likely place to find my magazine would be in gigs and festivals. Some also said that my magazine would be likely to be sold on the internet.
9. How did you attract/address your audience? (include evidence of audience feedback) My strategy to attract my audience was through a cool design bringing unusual fonts which I found on the internet onto my cover. By using interesting extras and by offering a free album download link I would attract people to buy the magazine (a magazine is much cheaper than an album). One important factor of my magazine is that the main picture is not too flashy, the artist are not wearing make up and are just normal people who do music. I think that this fact makes people relate to the magazines content and will awake an interest. The style and poses the artist have can easily be related to the hip hop scene since they are both looking really cool and maybe even a bit vain which is something typical among artists of this genre, people might look up to them and be like them. I am quite pleased with the appearance of my front cover. I thing it looks semi professional and more importantly interesting.
10. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product? Before I started this course I didn’t have any idea of Photoshop and I was almost helpless without the teacher. Slowly I started learning how certain tools work and how to modify the size of a picture, how to organize layers, Light intensity modification, background colors, brushes etc. I started feeling quite comfortable with this program and I’m confident to use what I know and try new things. I have tried new things on my own and very often went on youtube and watched tutorials on how to do certain tasks. Apart from photoshop I learned a little bit more about PowerPoint and also learned how to use slideshare of which I had no idea of before starting the course.
11. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product? In my first project I didn’t have hardly any idea of photoshop nor did I have knowledge of how to attract an audience through an image or how to design or use colours in the right way. My first project was basically just a picture with some text and other pictures such as logos on top of it… From that to my final project I have learned a lot about photoshop using different tools and essential designing skills on how to make something stand out, using the right colours and really managing to get my idea on the design as I wanted. In this project I’ve applied all my new kills and I’m really happy with what has come out.
