Evaluation Question 7

What do you feel you have learnt in the progressions from creating the college magazine (preliminary task), to creating your music magazine?

When I made my preliminary task, I didn't know the difference I would make between that, and my final magazine. From using two different pieces of software, and from using better quality images, fonts and effects I feel like I really did feel like I achieved something by going from one to the other. I feel like that realising that publisher is terrible software for this scheme of work, and that using something like photoshop which is hard software to use, is a lot better. Although using photoshop isn't bad once you know how to use it. I have learnt what looks professional and what doesn't, I have learnt how important it is to manage your time well, and I have learnt how important it is to keep certain things the same across the board, for example colour schemes. I have learnt many things in between making my main music magazine, and making my preliminary task.

Evaluation Question 6

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing your music magazine?

Throughout the time in preparing for and making my magazine, I used many different forms of technology. To start I used Microsoft's publisher, to come up with a basic design for a magazine, and just testing how things work. It is a very primitive basic software, and didn't give me anything good to use, besides knowledge of what I need to improve for my real magazine. I not long after while doing my research for my magazine, I used a website called survey monkey, which uses software that shares surveys to people with an account, and you get results by people from across the globe very quickly too.

The main software I used in the production of my magazine was Photoshop CS6. It took me a while to get used to using this software, as I hadn't really used it before, and I didn't know how to do things like layer images, or add effects to texts or images. The majority of my work was done on that, and by the time I had finished my magazine I had learnt how to use the software very very well.

When doing the photo shoot I also had to learn how to use the camera, which was a “Canon EOS 5D Mark 3” which although at first seemed tricky to use, was very simple, for its basic functions which I needed it for at least anyway. I feel like I could have spent more time learning all its functions and I may have gotten some better photographs, however I was stuck on time, so I had to use what I could get my hands on in the time I had. I do feel like with the time I did have tho, I did well.

Evaluation Question 5

How did I attract/address my audience?

My target audience as I have spoken about previously is people aged 15+ who are fans of the indie-rock music genre. The actual bands/artists, of which I have mentioned throughout my magazine, are very popular bands/artists which will attract my audience to my magazine, as they will be interested to read about some of their favourite bands. In my magazine I have also advertised competitions and offers that will attract the audience. The colour scheme I have used is mainly a black and white theme. I tried to keep it simple but effective so that the colours stand out on a shelf, and not too bright so that the audience are put off looking at it. Keeping the colours black and white makes it look professional. I have set my pictures and the text I want to stand out the most, in larger font or in colour so they stand out more. This will attract the audience to read more and learn about what these more important articles are about.

To decide what I wanted to actually put in my magazine, I did a survey on SurveyMonkey to see what my audience wanted to actually see in a magazine (the results of my survey are linked in my contents page). They wanted to see interesting articles, about their favourite bans/artists. They wanted to see opportunity to win free things/ to get free posters, which I have advertised in my 3 pages. I tried to consider all variations of the “indie-rock” genre by going from techno indie, do Rock’n’Roll so I have a wider range of readers.

Overall I have tried to do all I can to attract my target audience to my magazine, and to try and give them everything they want in a magazine, whether that is by giving them want they want to see, to just making it easier for them to read.

Evaluation Question 4

Who would be the audience for your music magazine?

The target audience for my magazine is persons that are fans of indie/indie-rock/rock who are generally aged 15+. I decided to make this my target audience due to research I did in my planning stage for my magazine, which ended up with results that the majority of people that like indie-rock genre are over 15. Though not stated on the magazine itself, my magazine will also be available on a digital format since, my target audience are a younger generation they would be more in touch with the newest technologies i.e. Ipads and this makes it a lot more user friendly and I feel like my target audience will really appreciate it.

Evaluation Question 3

What kind of media institution might distribute your music magazine and why?

The publisher I want to produce my magazine will be The Professional Publishers Association (PPA) as they have a gap in their own market for and indie rock music magazine. And I know for a fine fact that the company will want to broaden their range of products. And due to their gap in their own market of not having a rock/indie magazine, my magazine would be perfect for them and due to PPA being such a large company, it will easy to make and distribute my magazine. And not only distribute it, but distribute in nationally, and for then the expansion of “indie-pendant” as well, an online publication of the magazine could be produced, and there is potential nowadays for a mobile app to be made, as that's what lots of people do now, it will increase customer satisfaction. Which will hopefully make them buy more magazines.

Evaluation Question 2

How does your music magazine represent particular social groups?

My music magazine is an indie-rock magazine so in my magazine I represented the indie-rock scene (which at the moment is re-coming of the mods and rockers) so the bands/ musicians I have talked about in my contents page are all bands which are iconic in indie-rock social groups. My article its self is about a young indie singer songwriter who not only plays the music from that music genre, but wears the type of clothes that people in that social group wear. It would just be wrong to have someone on the front cover wearing a pair of nike airs and a tracksuit. The whole music genre is know by people who are looking classy and well dressed. And the black and white fonts I use, were my attempt to replicate the rock'n'roll iconic look of a plain white t-shirt and a leather jacket, I think this really represents the indie-rock genre.

Evaluation Question 1

In what ways does your music magazine use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of existing music magazines?

In my magazine I tried to not necessarily come up with new ideas of things to put in/on a magazine, but to develop them, make them better, and more attractive to the audience. This not only saves time for me, as I dont have to try and create new things, but often I think people don't like change, so I tried to keep the roots of the conventional magazine. This was my front cover:

Other magazines of this music genre for example NME have a similar style, where they have a photo artist of band on the front cover, where the main coverline is about whoever is in the photos. The magazine will have its mast head across the top/top left. In my magazine I have followed these conventions, with the mast head and main coverline. A lot of magazines like NME however for their main image, have a long shot. I decided to go with a mid shot of my “artist” because I feel that it feels up a lot more of the page, and it will grab the audiences attention better on a shelf. My mast head itself is layered behind the head of the artist. This makes the artist stand out more than conventional magazines. If this was a real magazine, the company would want the mast head to stand out so people remember and want to buy another product, as I have layered it under the artist, I decided to make the font for the mast head itself have a drop shadow, and a outer glow to help it stand out. Not many magazines do this for their mastheads.

The colours I have used across my magazine are black and white mainly, with some greys. Besides the images. I have done this because the black and white contrast well with each other, and it makes the text easier to read for all potential readers and, it still looks very professional. And because I leave the pictures in colour, they stand out a lot more, it helps the reader see which articles he wants to read, and it brightens up the page a bit compared to the rather plain but classy black and white colours.

Below is my contents page:

In my contents page I tried to keep some of the conventions that a lot of magazines do, where they have a masthead/contents page in the same style at the top of the page, one main image, a smaller one, and the list of the contents of the magazine. I also included an “every month” which a lot of magazines do. I decided to change it up by putting a small review in my contents page, which is a preview for what is to come in the full review on another page. Along with a picture about the review. I often see contents pages crammed and crammed with pictures and text and it can be very disorientating. So I decided to be as minimal as I could be with the contents page, by putting less pictures, less text and less bright colours than most music magazines on their contents page, I have instantly made my magazine more “user friendly”. This is one of the ways I think my magazine, has developed most modern conventions. As you see with all media and technology now a days. Making interfaces/ media texts more user friendly is the big development at the moment. And I wanted to do that with my magazine.

Below is my double page spread:

I my double page spread I tried to stick to the normal conventions in that the article is on one side of the page and the main image for the article on the other side of the page. And then having my masthead but a lot smaller, next to my page number. I have used all the font in black as it keeps it looking professional and classy, and easy to read, compared to magazines that have black and yellow fonts which looks tacky. So I stuck to my black and white colour scheme. I didn't have any white font on my double page spread as it didn't go very well against the background, so to try and keep the white in the page, I put a white outer glow on some of the text to help keep with my colour scheme, and to help it look professional. Which is what I wanted to do because you see some magazines where everything is different colours and it just looks ridiculous. And yet again like a I said earlier, it isn't reader friendly and I wanted to make my magazine as reader friendly as possible. Not many magazines consider this anymore, they just try to cram as much as they can in your face.