Demographic

I chose this magazine to do my demographic on an I challeneged the conventions of the this magazine by making the person on the front young, to appeal to an younger audience. My magazine will appeal more to teenagers and to people who like music in general. Also, for funky people who like fashion and the new trends as it will have certain pages in which will be based on new trends. My magazine reader will also be up to date in technology and will probably have the latest phone or iPod (Won't be more than 6 months old)

The median age of The Lick magazine reader is 17 -63% female and 37% male and they tend to be single and urban.

They don't have a lot of money coming in and most of the money is due to EMA. This EMA would usualy go towards:
# Food
# Clothes
# Tunes
# The latest mobile and MP3 player

Most of the readers (73%) will still probably be in full time education and will still be living with parents/guardians.

Evaluation

Q1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

One typical convention I used for my magazine was making the masthead go across the top of my magazine.

I felt that when you go into a shop to buy magazine, the first place you look, is at the top to see what the title of the magazine is, so, by doing this, I gave into the typical magazine structure. I also made the topics in which are going to be discussed in the magazine run down each side which is something you see on an average magazine.

Also, notice that most of my topics are in different fonts and sizes along the side, I also used this convention from other magazines and I thought by doing this would make it more attractive to readers as having all the things on the front page in the same font and colour would be a bit boring and wouldn’t attract many people.

I tried to use as many different fonts and different colours for my front cover, but also to make it look realistic, not over done. I announced the usual things that are announced on front covers such as competitions and free posters on the front cover to make it appeal more to the audience. I tried to develop the free poster aspect part more by giving a little sneak preview of the poster that will be inside on the top left hand corner. I also developed my own competition award with the “Polaroid experience”

By doing this, I gave the reader an insight into the competition and gave them a choice as to whether whey want to buy the magazine and enter the competition and making the competition appeal to them.

Also, by using a medium close up of my model for the front cover, I am also giving into a typical magazine convention.

Q2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

I tried to make my music magazine focus on Indie music alone but with doing so, I realized that it may not appeal to everybody’s sense of style, so with this is mind, I tried to add more genres into the magazine also adding pop and R’n’B to the magazine. I wanted my magazine to appeal to everyone’s age range but because my magazine is fairly colourful and has a teenager on the front, I thought that maybe, it may not appeal to people above the age of 21. Also, a mixture of different colours would appeal to teenagers more than to adults as it is proven that people from the age of 1-21 tend to be attracted to colourful things. I wanted to make my model look calm and approachable. Not too angry looking like other rappers so I made him look to the side for this shot and straightened out any facial lines that made him look angry or stressed using the spot-healing tool to take away any unwanted lines that made him look older than he actually was; photo manipulation.
I dressed my model in a way in which I know teenagers in society now dress. Very colourful and sightly un-coordinated.

I chose what he wore for this shoot because I based his costume around the background scenery as I went to South Bank (The place in which I took the photos) before I took the photos to see whwere exactly I could take it and what style I could take it in. By his hoodie being up, I feel that that reflects the modern 21st century teenager and also depicts normallity within his status, as although he is famous, he still does things that average teenagers do, for example, putting his hood up.

Q3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

If I was to pick one publishing house to publish my magazine, I would choose
IPC publishing house as they don’t do any other magazines that are similar to mine and I reckon it would be good to distribute this amongst other media magazines in this company. I think that they would publish my magazine as it has nothing to do with magazines that they already distribute and it is a different magazine that will appeal to younger audiences, even younger audiences than NME appeals to. Also, my magazine is an all genre magazine and IPC do not have this. It would be a good addition to the range as I feel that it would stretch further to appeal to all races and ethnicities. I would definitely encourage subscription to my magazine as subscription will increase the popularity and guarantee’s that the magazine is read by at least one person every week. I would want them to be distributed in WHSmiths, corner shops and news agents and by it being sold everywhere would boost popularity and would cause a buzz around the item.
First of all, I would try to distribute my magazine for free to see if it does well then if it does do well then I will put a price to it and sell it for a price between £2.00-4.00.
So distributing it free would mean I would give it to local stores, youth clubs, new agents and colleges and have them to a small survey to see how well it is selling. If it is doing very well then the price may be a little higher than expected and hopefully, even with a price, it might sell well.


Q4.Who would be the audience for your media product?
The audience for my media magazine primarily would be teenagers although I do think that some adults that like the genres in my magazine may be interesting and may want to purchase it. My target audience initially was all ages but I soon realized (after production of my magazine) that it may only suit the younger generation due to it’s content of modern music and young celebrities. Whilst doing my audience research although most teenagers wanted the magazine, I didn’t want it to be one sided so I tried to base my magazine on everything that I thought would attract the older generations. This didn’t go too well as when I asked some general people after the production of my magazine, they said that my magazine looked as if it was aimed towards 11-19 year olds. Although my magazine may be targeted in the direction of children/teenagers, it would still appeal to adults who like the genre of music that it will include, as music is music and whether the magazine is aimed for adults or not, they will still find some use in the information that may be posted about current music and artists.

Q5. How did you attract/adress your audience?

I used mainly colours and different types of font to attract my audience to my front cover and also I feel that my background image attracted people as my model is standing in an area with a lot of graffiti around him. I also think that my use of various fonts to change the subject and to announce things on my front cover will attract people to my magazine.
I used Standard English on my magazine as if I used slang, it would limit who my magazine would appeal to and I didn’t want that so by using standard English in which everyone can understand, I feel it widened out my opportunity of sales and popularity for my magazine. I used a friendly tone and it was also most as if I wanted the reader to feel as if a woman was reading out the magazine to them by using calm language and calm tone. I also wanted to make it seem as if the reader was interacting with the editor of the magazine and by doing this I feel that it allows the reader to form a relationship with the magazine. It also allows peace of mind when reading the magazine.
I didn’t mention particular places myself, but I mentioned South Bank in the tone of Jaycee, the person in whom I was interviewing. I mentioned it as a caption of one of the Polaroid pictures as I thought by doing this gives the magazine a more realistic appeal. Also, it would have made sense to do so because South Bank is known for its amazing art scenes, one being the place in which we took the photos for the magazine, the skating rink.

I felt that selecting the right kind of font for my magazine was important as if you use a certain type of font, for example using Tines New Roman, can make things seem serious of gloomy. So for my magazine, I tried using less serious looking fonts. I sued fonts in which I feel would look good on a front cover and would reflect how I would want my reader to feel whilst reading the magazine, which is happy and jolly, so with his in mind, I chose fonts in which I know are good to the eye. For example the font that I used for my artist's name:

I also used a variety of bright colours on top of these fonts to give my magazine that, feel good factor.
The hoodie factor of my magazine front cover gives the reader a sense of feeling as if they are part of society as hoodie’s often depict bad behavior but in this case, the main model on the front cover has achieved good things; even with his hoodie up. It gets rid of that stereotype of teenagers and hoodies in society. I also chose an attractive model as I felt that by choosing someone that is good eye candy, would attract people to the front cover. In this case, the model is a boy so this would probably attract females more.

Q6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

In my photography process, I used the flash of my camera and put it on the setting “Night” as it was dark when I took my photos, so by doing that I made the image a little bit brighter. I used the camera from many different angles and directions pointing at my model as I wanted to experiment and didn’t want to stick to the typical conventions of face-on photography.
I learnt a lot about how to use Photoshop for a start and I feel that this task has helped me expand my knowledge of how to use Photoshop. I used plenty of different tools in photoshop and by doing this, I managed to change a lot of things that I didn’t want in my magazine. Like for example, my model had red eyes and I used the red eye tool to remove his red eye so it went from red to brown. I was very happy that I managed to change that.

I didn't need to use that many tools as I planned out what I wanted to do to my maagzine and the background of my magazine was intentionally like that so I didn't need to cut out my main person or use the magic lasoo or anything like that.

Mostly, I used the shapes tool and the text tool for my magazine as I used plenty of different shapes to help form a template for my magazine as seen in my double page spread.

With all this technology at hand, I feel they helped form my magazine quite well. They aided my magazine production.

Q7. Looking back at the preliminary task what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to a full product?

I feel that I approached both tasks equally and I’ve managed them both well aswell. I managed to gather up my models for both in no time and also managed my time well for both projects. I have managed to finish my evaluation and my research on time for my main task and I feel that with this time management in place, I have given myself some time to check through things in which I am not too confident with. I think that my success came mostly from the amount of time it took me to complete my front cover which was only 4 hours and I feel proud of this achievement. I used both my audience research and my own research to produce my magazine and I tried to reflect the results of both my results and the audience research results in my work. My ideas for my magazine mostly came from previous experiences with magazines and I feel that by looking back at previous magazines, I have formed my own conventions and I have led my magazine in a way in which I want it to go. The anchorage and the layout of my magazine came from typical conventions of other magazines as I tried to keep it as simple looking as I could. My audience feedback was quite good and I was pleased with what they had to say about my work. Although I did get some negative feedback about my contents page's layout, I tried to change it.

I had to change my double page spread in order to suit both genders as when I asked my audience about my first double page spread, they said that it looked as if it only appealed to females and little children so with that in mind, I changed my double page spread to suit both male and females and also to make it less child-like.
By having red-eye in my photos, I thought I wouldn't be able to get rid of it but with a little bit of Photoshop hunting, I found a tool which was perfect for removing red eyes.



Also, I found that when I was getting rid of my models blemishes, his skin would dent and it looked disgusting so this was a problem that I had to try sorting out. I over came this by stepping backwards and found out that the stepping backwards option could help me plenty of other things during my production.

Better Double-page spread

This is the improved copy of my double page spread. I decided to do two copies of my double-page spread as when I looked at my 1st copy over, I realised it looked very feminine and did nto really appeal to both girls and boys. I also realised that the colours were very bright and at some points, the text was not read-able.

So I changed the background colour and the masthead text to look more modern. Although I wanted my magazine to appeal to all ages, I also realised that it looked childish so I made the background dark to seem more serious and not to make it look so child-like.

Double-Page spread.

This was initially my double page spread. I tried to keep to the conventions of my draft but I found it difficult so I made some minor changes to it by changing the title and the layout of the interview.

The colours are vibrant and very child-like which I feel will make the magazine only appeal to certain ages. This is a down factor for me so I will try to improve the magazine double-page spread to make it appeal to most ages.

Also, I noticed that the colours were very girly. I didn't want the magazine to apear bias in any sense so I will try to improve on a colour scheme. The images I used are ofa boy so to make the magazine a girly colour, would not quite make sense.

I also noticed a lot of factors that would make my double page spread not appeal to a lot of people. The fact that the background is yellow makes the page look girlish and calm compared to the front cover and the front cover is mostly the reason why people picked up the magazine in the first place, so by making it calm is not giving the constomer what they wanted.

IMPROVED CONTENTS

Contents page

To me, when I was making my contents page, I thought it should resemble the front cover, but then I realised that after looking through other magazines, the contents page looks very different from the front cover. I think my contents page was too messy and did not have any sort of direction what so ever.

So I tried to improve it by making the images look more calm and collective and making the contents page include more than just one photo and also making it have some sort of order.

FRONT

This is my final front cover image. I decided that I should use this one as it looks like a typical front cover image and I think that the graffiti in the background would go well on the front cover. I used plenty of different varieties of text size and font styles which enabled me to make my magazine to look more 21st century-ish and like a real music magazine.

Draft of my Music magazine front cover

This is a draft the front cover of my Music magazine. I made up my own group called "EZKIMO FUNK" and they are an Alternative/Rock/Indie/Electro group.
My magazine is called "The Music Lick" I wanted my magazine to resemble a real magazine and one that I would buy if I saw it in a shop.

So with this in mind, I wanted to make the main person in the group in the middle and of them being the centerpiece. I wanted to make my magazine a special edition magazine devoted to the group and the group alone but doing this could sway away a lot of potential buyers that may not like the band on the front. So, then I tried to insert different groups into the equation and tried to make it appeal to people that like all kinds of music.

Also, I wanted my magazine to be different from other magazines on the market as if they are the same as well known and popular magazine, they may not be bought as they are just the same as the rest.






With my double page spread layout, I wanted it to look retro but not liek your typical double page spread lay out. I placed a number of fake Polaroid photo frames on the spread which I will insert with photographs of the band and I also added a film reel in which I feel adds a good touch to it.

Photos for cover

These are some of the photos that I took the first time around.
I took them in SouthBank near the skating area.
I tried to capture the essence of the area by making the graffiti visable in the background.

Graph 9

I asked this to find out what attracts people to music magazines so I know how I should sturcture my magazine around the feedback that I got. This graph shows that people tend to go for the image of the group/artist on the cover, rather than anything else.

Graph 8

Because of the latest internet technology, plenty of magazines and newspapers are now available online so I thought that making mine available online, would make it easier for people to access. But by doing this could cause financial problems for my publishers because you're not paying to see this magazine online. Although my audience research shows that people would want my music magazine to be availbale online, it is something to be thought about.

Graph 7

This was simply to find out how much people would be willing to pay for a magazine if it included everything that they wanted. I was suprised to see that more people would pay more than £3.00 for a music magazine.

Graph 6

I asked this to find out whether people would want a magazine aimed at one genre or a mixture. Most people would prefer a mixture, as you are paying a certain amount of money for more, than the same amount for one. It works out better for money.

Graph 5

“What would you want your music magazine to include?” Asking this question allows me to know what interests music magazine readers, and what they would want their magazine to include. All of the questions I asked had an equal amount in response. This shows that one is not favoured more than the other. This helps my magazine development because now, I can include all four of these factors.

Graph 4

I did this to get a general idea of what genre of music people listen to so I can adjust my music magazine to suit their needs. The top genre is Hip-hop/R’n’B with 33%, but because I want my magazine to conform to these genre’s, I will merge the most popular genre’s into my magazine as well, giving my magazine a diverse edge

Graph 3

Are you interested in a music magazine?” I asked this question so that I could get an idea of how many people would be interested in a music magazine. Considering that I asked random people at a shopping centre, I feel that this is a good generalisation. This graph shows that about 93% of people would be interested in a music magazine.

Graph 2

“How old are you?” I asked this question to see if I could get a rough estimate of the ages of the readers of magazines in general. This could also help me structure and adjust my music magazine around this age. This also gives me a general idea of what age people tend to read magazines a lot.

My results

“Are you Male or Female?” I asked this question to get a general idea of how many people male and female, would want a magazine. In this graph, females would like the magazine more, so I will try to make it appeal to both, but a little bit more to females.

Audience reasearch

Audience reasearch
In Audience research, I gave my survey out to 15 people in random and asked them to complete them. These are the questions that were included:

In this survey, I will be asking a number of questions which will inform me on how, what and why people would want/not want a music magazine. Please put thought into answering these questions as they will be useful for me in the production of my music magazine.

1. Are you male or female? (Please circle appropriate answer)

Female Male
2. How old are you?

16 17 18 19+

3. Are you interested in music magazines?

Yes No
If no, please specify your reason:
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Other (Please specify) ______________________

4. What genre of music do you like?

Pop Rock Techno Electro Hip-Hop/R'n'B Indie/Alternative

5. Aswell as music, what would you want your music magazine to include?

General information about music artists

Gossip about Celebrities

Newest Music

Newest music artists

6. Would you like your magazine to be a mixture of genre’s ranging from R’n’B to Indie/alternative, or would you prefer it if it was just one genre?

Mixture, it’s more informative One genre, it’ll be to busy

7. How much would you want your music magazine to cost if it includes everything that you want it to include?

£0.00-£02.00 £3.00-£5.00

8. Would you like the music magazine to appear online as well as in paper form?

Yes No

9. What attracts you into buying a music magazine?

Concert/gig updates

The stories in which it will contain

Celebrities/Group or artist on the cover

The lighting for this image is very low-key and is in a sepia kind of tone. The centre image of the groups lead singer, gives us a general idea of what the groups genre of music. My Chemical Romance have been recognised for being a heavy metal rock group. Their appearance in this magazine and on TV shows, tell me that they are a hard-hitting rock group. In this image of the lead singer on the left hand side, we see a very low-key lit background with the drummer in the bottom right hand corner. The lead singer, is dressed very rock-ish. He has tight fitted jeans on with a plain black t-shirt, covered with a tight fitting jeans jacket.
His rough appearance tells us, the audience, that they are indeed a rock group. The position of the drummers hands, show that the photo was taken during a rehearsal or a performance. The singer is not facing the camera. This could be significant as this could connote the idea of the band not conforming to the ideas of society. My Chemical Romance is also known for their dark and sinister meanings in their songs and this double-page spread shows this as the images are very dark. The colour red and white are used in this, setting a theme. The red could be for the “romance” part of the groups name and the white could be for the “Chemical” as chemical laboratory technicians wear white coats.
All of the images on the page are of some sort of significance. The images of other members of the group are smaller and don’t seem to be as important as the image of the lead singer. I feel that the magazine has done this on purpose to show how important the lead singer is to the group. The title “WERE BEING THE BEST MCR WE CAN BE!” is a quote taken from the interview conducted with My Chemical Romance. The different colours for the different lines of speech, makes it stand out to the reader more and makes it more interesting to look at. I noticed that (the title mostly,) the writing on the page is not straight. This could connote the groups crooked and “off the rails” life style.
In the first image along the bottom, we see the group’s bass guitarist playing the guitar, looking in the direction of the crowd and focused. His clothes are black and seem to have some sort of design on the front. This is a medium close up of him and it shows the activity in which he is enduring. The second image along the bottom is of the group as a whole, together possible discussing their next song or the production of a song. This image shows the togetherness of the group and shows the love that they have for each other. They seem to feel comfortable around each other and are smiling connoting a loving and caring community.
The third and final image is of the lead singer, once again, singing into a microphone that is usually found in a studio. There is a white strip coming from the top right hand corner that has some more information about the groups music, stating their latest tracks.

Analysis of an exsisting Music Magazine: "Vibe"

In the front cover for this magazine, the colours are very bright and vibrant. They connote a life of cash and expensive material things. Lil’ Wayne, the main image in the picture is standing on a Thrown which shows that he feels that he rules, most probably the music industry. His top half is well dressed, almost like a young American college student. His laces are undone, connoting raggedness about him and his tattoo that cover the whole of his lower leg connote his type of lifestyle. On Lil’ Wayne, there is high-key lighting on his forehead and his knee showing a light and humour filled community.
The words “Lil WAYNE” next to the centre image, tell us that the person in the centre image is in fact, Lil’ Wayne. The colour scheme is mostly, Blue, yellow, white and orange. This colour scheme gives the magazine a theme of royalty as the centre image also consists of a thrown. In the past ‘Lil’ Wayne has often referred himself as the King of Hip-Hop and R’n’B so by Vibe magazine giving his the thrown conforms to his idea of being the king.
Also the fact that he isn’t seated but is standing on what is considered as being a very valuable and respected seat in authority, also conforms to the idea that he feels that he has the moral high-ground to do whatever he likes.
The title of the magazine is in one of the most noticeable things but is in the background. The title is not directly on the top of the magazine but is lower down and is behind our centre-images head.
The “V” on vibe seems to have a medallion hanging from it stating that Vibe is the “Hottest” magazine. This makes the magazine for appealing to an audience as it has been recognised for being a good magazine. The name of the magazine almost seems to be pushing down on Lil’ Wayne’s head as he is bending his head lower down. This could be used to connote that Lil’ Wayne wants to be the centre of attention and that the name also wants to be the centre of attention.
The colour of the title stands out and makes the front cover appealing to the audience. ‘VIBE’ magazine has been recognised for its knowledge of Hip-Hop and R’n’B music so, this magazine would be directed to people that have a love for that kind of genre of music.
Around the side are the stories of which are going to be included in the magazine. Most of these stories appear to be about other rappers and other Hip-Hop and R’n’B artists. All the font on the page seems to be the same but only written in different sizes. The more important factors are written in big bolder writing and the small writing is the smaller and not so important