2. In what ways does your media
product
use, develop or challenge
forms and conventions of real
media products?
3. Coverlines are an indicator of what the magazine will include. They
measure to the audience how exciting and worth-buying the
magazine is therefore it’s crucial to choose and display the most The barcode has been added
essential and appealing features/articles. to enhance the professional
look of the magazine and
because it’s important for
retailers as it has to be
The one convention that every scanned in order to be sold.
genre-based magazine The pug is usually located
undoubtedly has is the next to the barcode but
masthead because it’s the occasionally under the
identity of the magazine. masthead too; it shows which
season/month the issue
belongs to and also how
much it is worth. I’ve situated
both the barcode and the pug
at the bottom left of the
The main image was
cover.
deliberately chosen due to the
convenience of the layout- it Eyebrows are also a regular
had enough negative space on convention particularly in
the left for coverlines and music magazines and they’re
although it’s not entirely from usually an ‘exclusive’ feature
waist up, the model’s pose was so when they’re stacked on
the most appropriate for the the shelves in the store, the
front cover as she’s looking eyebrows will be the second
directly into the camera. thing after the masthead that
would capture the customers’
attention.
4. Development and Challenges
A challenge of my main
image is that it’s not from
waist-up but I tried to
disguise that by covering
Some creativity was put the bottom with coverlines.
into the masthead as a
group because we Whilst a convention of Rock
considered a different music magazine is the
language (Bulgarian was our bombardment of coverlines
final decision) that would and the crowdiness of
still sound similar to English different little images and
would attract the cultural boxes overlapping on the
audience and it also makes side- I tried to avoid that
it sound more exotic and because I wanted my
dramatic (as it’s spelt with magazine to be different to
K’s). The masthead has also its rivals in order to appeal
been developed from the to its target audience.
original design (with black
background) to suit my
Appearance/stereotype:
main image as I didn’t want
checked shirt and more eye
to crop anything out nor
make up (as it’s a typical Rock
have a studio mode picture.
look). But my intention was to
strive for a Rock/Glamour look;
and combined with the lack of
Colour Scheme: although Rock music magazines have a dark colour coverlines, I believe this is my
scheme (and their picture usually contributes as well), I’ve tried to break USP. Other than these, I believe
that convention by loosening the colour scheme and have only added a my front cover relatively
small amount of black (navy blue) to make it look more appealing to the follows the rest of the codes
female audience. The picture itself consists of little black (jeans and the and conventions.
gate) and is fairly ‘glamorously’ bright due to the editing.
5. The word
‘contents’ is a
convention for all Categories are another
magazines. convention so that readers
would jump straight to what
they’re looking for.
Date has been placed
above the title of the
magazine and
‘contents’ to once Subjects have been categorised
again, state the under the sub-headings and
season/month that it not in numerical order as this is
belongs to. a common convention in all
types of magazines. They all
I’ve added images from the consist of either a quote or a
same photoshoot (this little intro to the article.
wouldn’t be so in a typical
magazine; I’ve done it merely
because these were the only
pictures I had taken) and put Page numbers are crucial as it’s
them in a corner just under the the whole purpose of a
title of my magazine- this is a contents page; they inform the
conventional location for reader where a certain
images on contents page of a article/feature is throughout
Rock magazine. I’ve also the magazine. Page numbers
sectioned the images into three have also been put on the
sections; each being dissimilar images as it’s another
to one another. convention.
6. Development and Challenges
I’ve also developed the
layout a little further by
I added the original adding extra boxes that
masthead design so stand out with added
that readers would information to engage
constantly be reminded the readers, for
which magazine they’re example ‘Exclusive’ or
reading/flicking ‘Turn to pages...for...’. It
through. I’ve done this also makes the page
to also resemble the look more lively and
style on the front cover crowded which
as this will be a running connotes that Rokk
theme throughout the Muzika has a lot to
whole magazine offer.
(another typical
convention).
7. There’s a dominant image and two other images behind it- I tried to go for a
Heading’s are mosaic type of look so that each picture would be different from eachother.
usually the main I’ve added simple thick borders to make it look less messier. All the pictures
aspect that ought are on one side of the page as this is a likeable convention in most cases. Page number and
to stand out on the category has been
DPS and that’s the added at the top of
aim I tried to the page in
achieve. relation to the
contents page; so
people are able to
find it.
I chose a relatively
small font (11/12) Pull quotes are a
so that the text big convention in
would fit on just DPSs and although
one page instead the location varies
of two. (sometimes it’s put
on the picture and
sometimes
amongst the
text), I’ve placed in
in the middle of
the article.
At the beginning of the article we see a standfirst which is a significant convention of a
music magazine as it gives readers an insight on what the article consists of and captures
the readers attention; that’s why it needs to be interesting. I’ve used standfirst in the way
of rhetorical question to hook the readers.
8. Development and Challenges Heading: I’ve also
seen in some
cases that
magazines have
added creativity
by using two
different fonts to
I haven’t reinforce the
added any appeal of their
By-Lines. layout. I took that
a step further and
used three
different fonts in
different locations
and rotations to
make it look more
fun and youthful.
I’ve maintained
the red/black
theme but added
a new colour to
the colour scheme
(however, I chose
a murky colour-
Typically , in Rock magazines, the background seems to be a single colour but I dirty
took advantage of the InDesign tools to create an abstract sense of background green/yellow- so it
to make it look less mind-numbing. would resemble
the Rock genre).
9. How does your media product
represent particular
social groups?
10. My target audience are teenagers and young
adults of both genders.
Therefore, I intended to make my colour scheme as
basic and appropriate to both genders as possible
(as black/red/blue are all unisex colours).
I’ve also tried to make it as cultural as possible by
having the title of the magazine in a different
language, and by using a non-English model for my
main feature image.
This is because Rock has been stereotyped as a
‘white people’s’ genre and I wanted to break that
stereotype and show that anyone from any culture
can like any type of music.
Also, the audience that I’m targeting at are
not the ‘emo’ and ‘goth’ driven kind of
people but more or less those who are a
fan of Rock but are also into the glamour
world of fashion and style.
11. My article is fairly quite
formal in sense of not having
any slang to ‘teen’ language;
I did this because I wanted
my readers to take it
seriously as it’s a
controversial matter and
many people are affected by
it. If I were to produce the
rest of my magazine, I’d have
a lot of informal articles and
features, therefore I wanted
to balance it.
I kept the font big and bold
and avoided using any fancy
fonts to help reach out to a
wider audience. No one
would have anything against
simplistic and basic fonts.
I made the design and colour scheme as un-biased to either genders as possible. I’ve
maintained the red/black theme to keep the Rock spirit throughout the magazine but I avoided
to use overly bright colours because it would lose its theme.
12. What kind of
media institution might distribute
your media product and why?
Bauer Media reaches out to over 19 million UK adults across multiple
media and adding another Rock genre based music magazine will increase
the amount of adults reading Bauer’s media product.
Bauer Media also has Bauer Radio which consists of Heat Radio, Q
Radio, Smash Hits! Radio and The Hits Radio will are available on DAB and
Free view. However, because my music magazine has a USP and a different
type of audience, this may encourage them to distribute my product more
as it’d have a new (even bigger) target audience.
IPC is another alternative and it’s UK’s leading consumer magazine and digital publishers
with a massive portfolio selling over 350 million copies each year. I would choose IPC
Media to distribute Rokk Muzika as it has partnerships with the big branded
supermarkets, so this can widen my target audience, as it will be more freely available in
supermarkets to who ever wants to buy my magazine.
13. Who would be the audience
for your media product?
The age range for Rokk Muzika is approximately from 17-25 - and the
percentage of genders would be 58% female and 42% male. They would
need to be fairly educated as some articles include formal words/language.
They should have some sort of a job with income so they would be willing
enough to spend money. Rokk Muzika doesn’t focus on just one particular
class; its audience is broad and anyone who belongs to any class can buy it as
it’s neither too expensive nor too cheap.
Students/young adults are also trying to achieve goals and get somewhere in
life therefore they’d need a lot of inspiration; and Rokk Muzika provides that
for its target audience and encourages education immensely. Some would
even want to get involved in the music industry or so.
14. How did you attract/address
your audience?
I followed the convention of
just having one picture on
one page and only text on
The style of my model is Rocky, the other for my DPS. This
however the editing (I enhanced layout appealed to me
the colours to make it look more personally and therefore
appealing and professional) and the decided to use it. I also
composition of the picture is didn’t want to use a single
influenced by fashion-genre based picture and displayed it as
photo-shoots. This is because I three instead. This would
wanted to reach out to people who attract the audience as
are a fan and influenced by both there’s an existence of a
factors. balance between the
Also, coverlines like ‘Top 10…’ grab amount of text and images
the readers attention instantly. used.
The colours vary/ the masthead
and the colour scheme connote
the type of music that it belongs
to. The style of writing (although
there’s a variety of them) are all
plain and bold.
15. What have you
learnt about technologies
from the process of constructing this product?
By doing this task I have become fluent with using SlideShare
which I had never used before; moreover, I didn’t have much
difficulty with Wordpress as I have used blogging sites before
and therefore, it wasn’t anything unfamiliar to me.
Using a professional camera wasn’t anything new to me.
Whilst making Rokk Muzika, I had to demonstrate my
knowledge and understanding of different programs like
Adobe Photoshop and Adobe InDesign which helped me
make my magazine as efficient as possible.
At first it was hard to work professionally because I didn’t
know what InDesign entailed but when I started making my
final piece, I did some research on ‘good tips’ to widen my
knowledge and explore new things.
I also learnt how to enhance my images without leaving the
image pixelated and also the separate layers that enabled
me to be creative with my masthead and DPS.
16. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have
learnt in the progression
from it to the full product?
For the preliminary task, I didn’t need to think so much
of the age range and other factors that influences the
conventions of a magazine as a whole because it was a
College Magazine and it had a wider audience.
Whereas, for my final magazine, I had to consider the
specific codes and conventions as well as the audience I
was targeting at.
As you can see, a couple of elements have been
developed and added to my final piece, for e.g.
barcode/eyebrows/photo alteration. I also learned
more about planning as I had to book the photoshoot
and edit the photos in time.
I’ve learnt the importance of continuous saving to
prevent losing my work.
I developed my understanding of InDesign in the
process of making my final design as I had never used it
before. I overlapped text boxes so there wouldn’t be
too much space in between the lines- I also used the
same skill to make my masthead (the K’s are overlapped
onto the rest of the text).
I added more colours to my colour scheme.
