Evaluation

For my music magazine I have looked at all the conventional elements of a music magazine and have tried to include them in my final product. On my front cover I have used a clear masthead at the top of the splash, I have used a good clear image positioned in the centre of the front cover, I have used a main feature and have indicated the main feature within the font colours and the size of the font. I have used a barcode, issue number and price. I have used a skyline over the masthead to include an established pop artists name to promote the genre of pop within my magazine. I have used a flash to show the price of my magazine and I have also used teasing content at the bottom of the page to promote one of my features within the magazine.

For my contents page I have stuck to the colour scheme of blue, pink, red and yellow. The consistency of my colour scheme was picked up through my audience feedback ‘the colour scheme is good and consistent.’ For my contents page I focused on getting the conventions of a music magazine have been reflected, I have used a page title, a features section down the side, there’s an image on the artist positioned next to the title page, I used page numbers and large clear font to show the article name and the page number of the article.

For the double page spread I have used a clear image with a quotation under the image, the image is a medium close up which was a long shot but after audience feedback I noticed that I needed to use a medium close up as much of my audience feedback comment on my use of image. I also used small images of the artist on the page and included a section dedicated to ‘fans of the magazine’ who can send in their own questions, that was used to make the audience feel more involved and it was something which I found common within my research of music magazines.

 My magazine reflects young people who have a particular interest in the pop genre and like main stream artists and music. On the front page of my music magazine I mention Conor Maynard and Justin Bieber as a way of making my music magazine specific to different fan bases. Justin Bieber is already a very well established pop artist so by using his name on my front cover I already appealed to a fan base.

Also on my magazine I offered free posters to readers this would attract young students who have a low income and rely on others for financial support. I advertised free posters after looking at other pop magazines and seeing what promotional offers they had. Based on my target audiences of young teens in the psychographic group E I decided that posters rather than free tickets or meet and greets were more appropriate for their age group.

 Through my research I learnt about many institutions and the magazines in which they already distribute. Through this research I learnt about Bauer Media, Conde Nast and IPC media.

Because if my research I learnt that Bauer media publish NME magazine, publishers of Heat radio and also play a part in FHM the men’s magazine. All these media institutions are very successful and are always high quality. Bauer media are very successful with approximately 400 magazines, 110 websites and 50 radio and TV programmes. They employ over 8,700 employers, the distribute media products in 15 different countries including the US and China.

For my research into existing media texts I researched a media institution called Conde Nast. This is a company based in America. They are in charge of publishing magazines such as; Vogue, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and GQ. They sell more than 126 magazines, and publish 104 web pages as well as selling to over 24 global countries.

Lastly I researched a media institution called IPC media. This media institution is also highly successful, they publish magazines such as; Nuts Magazine (men’s magazine), Look and Now both highly successful women’s magazine and NME. IPC media produces over 60 iconic media brands, the institution prints to cater for over 42% of men and 48% of UK woman. The brand website reaches over 20 million users each month.

For my magazine I have think that Bauer media would be a good institution to distribute my music. I think this because they specialise in more the musical side of publishing, were as IPC media and Conde Nast focus more on weekly woman’s magazine’s and fashion magazines rather than music magazines.

My target audience are young girls aged 15-24 who have a particular interest in the pop genre but also enjoy learning about fashion choices and the latest celebrity gossip. My target audience fit within the psychographic group E as they rely on other for financial support and do not provide their own income they do not have a specific skill which can be used in employment, however they do go to college and school and are motivated individuals.

When choosing my model I went with someone who looked friendly and happy because I wanted my magazine to feel the same way. I chose the dress my model as a typical teenaged girl with flat plimsoll shoes and a long sleeved top. I didn’t want to dress my model in a dress because I knew that she wouldn’t feel comfortable and that would of reflected within the images. I chose black clothing with blue plimsolls because I wanted to keep her image plain and make the colouring on my magazine more exciting and stand out more. I used a female model because my magazine was aimed at more of the female population of young girls, by using a female model I wanted to draw in the attention of the young female audience and give my target audience someone who they could connect with.

When choosing my location I looked into other magazines which had placed an artist against a blank canvas and others which had used a back drop. I liked the idea of a blank canvas because it meant that I could add more colour to my magazine front cover and choose a house style for my front cover. I wanted to create my own style of magazine and by using a blank canvas I knew I could do that. Also by shooting inside against a blank canvas I had easy access to lighting which made for better quality clear images, the lighting add a glow to the model and made the images look a lot more professional.

Whilst taking my images I used a wide range of shots. I started by taking long shots of the model holding a guitar and striking various poses. However after a while I realised that most music magazines usually use MCU or medium shots of artists on their front covers. I took some medium close up shots whilst I gave instructions for my model who posed in various positions and in some shots smiled whilst other ones she pouted giving a fun element to the shots. I took some close ups to capture the models emotions and to also capture her facial features like her smile and her eyes which I knew would capture the eye of an audience. Also whilst I took images of my model in medium close up I made her lean into the camera, I’d seen an image similar during my research on the front of Billboard magazine, I’d liked this image as it connected the artist to the audience and the artist looked directly into the camera like they were capturing the attention of the audience and drawing them into the  main feature more.

By using Adobe Photoshop I was able to gain skills of how to edit an image and manipulate parts of an image to create a certain effect. Using Photoshop was hard at first because of all the options I had of changing an image but once I knew what I wanted my image to look like and how I wanted my final product to look it became easier to follow and became a lot easier to use.

I learnt a lot by using Photoshop for instance I learnt how to but a ‘stroke’ around text or an image, this adds a coloured boarder round the object to make it stand out more on the page. This is good when I wanted to make the masthead on the front cover to stand out against the bright colouring of the magazine.

Another skill I learnt using Photoshop was how to edit my image to give my model a flawless look which many celebrities now have on the cover of many magazines. I was shown how to do this the first time and practiced a little, however I did have to rely on YouTube tutorials when I felt stuck or had forgotten a stage. The flawless look required me to use many different skills on Photoshop. The following images show the stages of changing the appearance of the models skin.

Using the quick selection tool I was able to select the part of the skin which I wanted to edit to give my model the 'flawless' look.

Next the image had to be blurred using the Gaussian blur tool, this changed the focus of the image.

Next the erase tool had to be used to erase the blur from the eyes and from the lips to make the model look more natural and therefore make her skin look better but keeping the image to look like it had been taken and her skin was already like that. 

Another software I used was Blogger. At times Blogger proved difficult because when it came to uploading images onto a blog, it was very difficult to arrange the images in an order on the blog post, also using blogger it was hard to upload images that weren't jpeg format because blogger didn't accept other formats of images.

Blogger was for the most part of the project very reliable but I had to make sure to back my work up in case blogger didn’t save my work or it blog account got hacked and the work was deleted.

However blogger is a useful software as it means that work can be kept orderly and files that are quiet big can be uploaded easily and quickly meaning work is submitted on time and with ease. Another good point about blogger is how easy it is to access someone else’s blog, for example my blog has received well over 190 views worldwide meaning that it is reaching a mass audience and it helps when viewing peers work as they can help you by giving feedback on your product by looking on your blog.

After creating my music magazine I looked back at the work for my college magazine. The biggest improvement was during the planning and research phase of the task because during my music magazine I looked closely at the codes and conventions of a music magazine and made sure to plan my ideas (mock ups) around the codes and conventions rather than what would look good. Also for my college magazine I didn’t really think about the lighting of my image whereas for my music magazine I made sure that there was enough bright lighting for my image to look more professional therefore providing a higher quality of image.

The styling of my magazine has also changed. For my college magazine I used purple on my front cover, therefore not thinking about a house style or a colour theme based on the type of magazine. However during my research and planning of my music magazine I started to look into colour schemes and looked at existing music magazines and there colour schemes, for example Rolling Stones magazine who have their signature red, black and white masthead and the splash of their magazine usually reflects the artist within the main feature. I looked at Pop magazines and saw how they used pinks, blues and other bright colours to reflect a bright and vibrant genre as well as a bright and vibrant music magazine. For my colour scheme I stuck to three main colours of pink, yellow and blue and this made the styling of the magazine look better therefore giving a more professional look as well as appealing more to the eye of my target audience.