Music Magazine Evaluation Reece Jackson

tune-UP where singers become stars

Classic big title dominating the page In what ways does your magazine use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of ‘real’ music magazines? The layout of the magazine is similar to others -I spent a lot of time researching magazine covers, contents pages and double-paged articles. This helped my layout of the magazine because it gave it a strong spine that I could build on throughout the making process. The single semi-close up of somebody holding a guitar was inspired by a number of magazines with a similar image of a rock star playing some kind of instrument. The text placed around it was also inspired by a number of music magazines that used the same positioning techniques. Tag-line that creates brand identity well placed under the title, but above the image. This was an idea I received from lots of online searching Classic big title dominating the page Side headings taken from a world cup football magazine that I studied earlier in the year. Bar-code on the side (just like a magazine you can buy off the shelf off any store Classic image of somebody playing an instrument that reflects the theme of the magazine

How does your magazine represent social groups? My magazine has an image of a collage student on the cover. It shows youth in Rock music being a unique path that is different from most. The reason the cover and magazine as a whole shows youth presented in perhaps a cool sort of rebellious light then it is more likely to hook the audience. To me it is all about hooking the audience to your magazine style and theme. Students are good for modeling for creative things such as music because that is when the mind is at its most creative. The age between when somebody takes their GCSE’s and when they go to University is when the brain makes the most wonderful connections and enable a person to think of original and bright ideas for the future.

What kind of media institution might distribute your magazine, and why? If a music institution were to distribute my magazine, I would want it to be Bauer Media This is because they sale mass amount of magazines each year therefore I would like them to take my magazine because their track record is very impressive. Click on the link to see the institution’s website that I would like to take on my music magazine

Who would be your audience for you magazine? The chosen genre of my music magazine is ‘rock’, therefore the target audience would be all those interested in the genre or type of music Anybody interested in darker themes or colour tones would like the style and layout of the magazine Equally anybody interested in seeing new uprising stars and want to know engaging facts or figures about certain topics in the music genre Students are social group E, but have the potential to move up to groups A or B. (Brand loyalty). This means hooking people from a young age and making them loyal buyers of the magazine

How did you attract/address your audience? The theme of my music magazine was ‘Rock’ -therefore darker colours worked best in my opinion to attract the kind of audience I was aiming for The magazine gives off a kind of gothic feel to it with a slick edge There was the opportunity of winning a prize on the front cover as a way of attracting the public into buying the magazine The price would be fairly low and I had a loyalty idea that was rather last minute and didn’t end up including. The loyalty would be the more often you buy it you would get about ten pence off your next purchase I wanted the magazine to appear cool, stylish and slick to younger people. If younger people buy my magazine and like it then they are much more likely to continue buying it and get hooked from that kind of age than in later life The colour tones are dark, yet slick and could appeal to many audiences

What about technologies from the project? The three main pieces of technology that were new to me and were used in this project are; photoshop, wordpress and InDesign. It took me a while before I got used to photoshop, but my foundation project really helped my confidence for moving on for my main project. Wordpress was also hard for me. After I had posted a few thoughts and pieces of work the thing came to me like a click of my fingers, but to start with I needed guidance from my media teachers. I didn’t have the happiest of times when using InDesign as I couldn’t get to grips with how it all worked. I felt that photoshop was a much better way of working though it did allow me to create my double page spread. The figure presented there was photoshoped onto my cover using the lassoing tool. I took a picture of my model against a white background and cut him out before placing him on my cover I have enjoyed the new technologies I have come across and I hope to use them in the future for other projects as it has widen my skills and understanding

Looking back at your preliminary production what do you feel you’ve learnt in the progression to making the foundation portfolio? My skills have improved massively through the past few months. My foundation project to me was like a bridge or a handy extra step in my journey up through my project. These are my two front covers. The one on the left is from my foundation portfolio and the one on the right is my actual magazine cover. I know my photoshop skills have advanced greatly, especially my lassoing as you can tell (if you look closely at the one on the left it is rather messy. The foundation work was of great use to me as it allowed me to make mistakes and then correct them for my real project. I looked at and studied to far greater detail a number of different magazines for the one on the right as you can clearly tell. The one on the right looks far more professional and something anybody might want to buy. I feel that I have used the space to greater affect and the text was much more interesting then from the one on the left. The cover on the left has rather plain text and nothing really jumps out. The cover on the right allows text and image to take a life of its own and jump out at the reader.