For this project, the brief was to research, plan, design and evaluate my own music magazine for a genre of my choice. The final product had to contain at least 4 original images that I had taken myself, as well as following and challenging the typical conventions of music magazines.
Before I started to even design my Front cover, Double Page Spread and Contents Page, I spent a lot of time making sure I did a lot of research, both into music magazines which have been published, and also into the different genres. By doing this, it developed my knowledge of the conventions of music magazines, as well as teaching me how to actually develop and organize the layout of each page myself, instead of just knowing what they should include and not applying it. I’m going to discuss each of my products, including my Front Cover, Contents Page and Double Page Spread individually to ensure a thorough and detailed evaluation.
The Front cover was the first thing I was going to produce. After researching and analysing for a long time, I had a good idea about what it needed to include and what typical conventions it should follow.
So by doing this, the very first thing I learned was how much of an impact the Masthead had on the front cover. Not just the placing of it, but the design potentially sells the magazine. Every magazine I studied, had a masthead which screamed out to the reader, grabbed the attention of everyone who walked by and was bold enough to own the front cover. Apart from the image, the masthead would the one language feature which would sell it. The boldness and also the snappiness of it ensured that it got purchased and for me, ‘NME’ probably did the best job at this. I immediately liked how the editors used the three initials as the title, which carried a whole wider meaning- of course it stood for: “New Music Express”. “New Music Express” is not exactly catchy, and if I personally walked by it in a shop, best chances are I wouldn’t buy it- unless I knew more about it. However, the three initials: “NME” on the other hand are snappy, bold, quick, effective and just sound good on the whole. I then used this influence to create a masthead of my own, although not copying the original source. I chose “ETM” which stood for “Express the Music”. I liked this because it too was short, quick and snappy and also stood for something wider and more ambitious. To me, the genre of music a person listens to, expresses their personality and inner-self, so this masthead is telling people to express themselves and what they believe in. When it came to designing it, I wanted something which caught every eye of people who passed by, looked bold, solid, big and dominated the page by the impact it would give off. I tried many designs (which can be found on a blog post called: “NAME DESIGNS”- posted at 14:16, Wednesday 15th December 2010) and finally decided to choose the second one (can be found on a blog post called: “CHOSEN NAME DESIGN”- posted at 14:22, Wednesday 15th December 2010). I liked this one the most because I thought it stood out over the others and would relate more to the house style I later chose. Turns out, when I inserted it on my Front cover, it did in fact look better than I thought it originally would. In the past, when I have read magazines myself, I’ve noticed how you often see the masthead elsewhere, such as the Contents page and Double Page Spreads. I took this into account, as you can see and used it on both my Contents and Double Page Spread. If you look on my Contents Page you will be able to notice that I have placed the exact same masthead under the picture in the top left hand corner. This not only shows continuity, however adds to the impact originally created.
I also learnt a lot about the Strap lines and how to use them the best way I could. By investigating other magazines, it made me realise that you don’t need to necessarily have the cover filled with irrelevant strap lines just to make it look adequate. Instead, it showed me that as long as I used relevant, interesting ones which related to both the genre and style of my Front cover, it would look equally as sufficient, if not better. When it came to choosing the stories to place on the cover, my main one was obviously going to be related to the leading cover artist- Oliver Perry. Because it was in fact what the edition was focused upon, it had to stand out over the others, look bold, be bigger and dominate the whole page. I chose a design which screamed out whilst relating to my house style- however not being the same, just similar. It provided the front cover with a jagged look but interesting. When I inserted this onto my front page, I placed it over the main image, making sure it was in the centre of the page. This then made it obvious that it was the main cover line. I also transformed it so it was a lot bigger than the others, making it dominate the cover like I said I wanted it to. Because the colour red was becoming the main colour of the house style, I wanted to show continuity, therefore I changed some parts of this cover line to red, making it look more alluring than just black which it originally was.
It’s obvious that with any magazine you come across, whether it being fashion, music or celebrity related, the main image on the front cover has to be the thing which attracts the audience to buy the product in the first place. If the image was small, boring, un-centred and unedited, it probably wouldn’t sell the magazine. Whilst researching other magazines, this was really highlighted to me, whether it looks like a studio shot, or a natural shot- it is vital that the photograph owns the page. The image which ends up on the front cover, basically informs every reader what the main story is in the edition that day, week, month or year, so lets face it- it has to make a good impression! If the reader doesn’t like or know of the person on the cover, best chances are they won’t buy it. On the other hand, if the artist or celebrity on the cover is popular and well known, more people will buy it: guaranteed. So when it came to take my own images which would place on my front cover, I took most of them full shot or long shot, which I then had the option of using them like they were, or editing them to medium shots or even close-ups if I had wanted to. This was useful. As you can see from the very first draft of the front cover, I used a full shot and moved the image slightly to the right- making room for cover lines and smaller images to be placed. Also on the very first draft, I used an image where the artist had his back to the camera- this didn’t work at all. It looked silly and didn’t really follow a typical magazine convention. When it came to doing my second draft of the front cover, I used a very similar image, however I made sure the model was facing the camera. By doing this, I was creating that connection between the audience and the featured artist. When it came round to editing my second draft and constructing draft 3, I got advised to changed the full/long shot in draft 2 to a more medium sized shot. This was because a typical magazine wouldn’t use a long shot to promote a singular artist, long shots are generally used when promoting a group, as there is more people to fill the page with. So on draft 3, I edited the image from draft 2, and changed it to a medium shot, simply by scaling the image to be bigger- I ended up with an image from waist upwards, and closer as a whole to the camera and reader. When it came to editing my main image, I edited the image a lot more on the second and third drafts I did- as opposed to the first draft (editing is highlighted further on in the evaluation). You can compare all 3 drafts and the images I used from the following posts: “Friday, 17 December 2010, at 02:43- headed ‘Front Cover- First Draft’ ” , “ Sunday, 13 March 2011, at 14:51- headed ‘Final Products’ (top image)” and also: “Saturday, 9 April 2011, at 07:36- headed ‘New Products’ (top image).
Smaller and genuine conventions of real music magazines consist of things such as the barcode, edition number and date of edition. Every single magazine has all of these conventions. The barcode obviously makes it possible for the product to be bought, the edition number keeps track of how many different issues have been published, and could also help the reader single out any edition which they have missed buying. The date of the edition, tells everyone, either it being the buyer, friends of the buyer, the publishers, editors etc which date or month the edition is aimed for- for example is it the march edition? Or the autumn edition?. So when it came to adding these basic conventions onto my own magazine product, although they weren’t the main thing and what the reader looks for, they still required thinking. Both thinking into where to place them, and sizes of the features were also important. On my first draft (can be found at: “Friday, 17 December 2010, at 02:43- headed ‘Front Cover- First Draft’ ”, I was advised to reduce the size of my barcode because when the page got printed out, the barcode size was ridiculously huge and over-sized. It just wouldn’t happen in real circumstances. As you can see in draft 2 (“ Sunday, 13 March 2011, at 14:51- headed ‘Final Products’ (top image)”) – I reduced the size considerably from the first draft.
When I was doing my research into published music magazines, it became clear to me that a lot of them somewhere include puffs. Puffs do the job of grabbing the attention of the reader and drawing their eye-line in. They also work very well at highlighting and pointing out a particular story or competition that maybe wouldn’t stand out otherwise. For example, on my ‘Kerrang’ music magazine analysis posted on ‘Tuesday, 14 December 2010- at 09:33’- you can see that this magazine does in fact have a puff pulling in the readers attention: “Huge 7-Day Rock Guide”. The brightly contrasting colours in which Kerrang used (red and yellow), work perfectly at attracting eyes- exactly what its job is for! So I decided when it came to sculpting my own magazine that I would too use a puff to highlight information which may appeal to the audience. I used a solid, red puff which contrasting well with the white writing I put it with. It did indeed highlight the information I wanted it to, and made it so much more visible than if it wasn’t highlighted. I used it to advertise a competition, something which a lot of magazines also do, so by doing this, I was following a typical music magazine and showing continuity with the house colours I mainly used- red.
Typical magazine conventions don’t just apply to the front cover. Contents pages also, the majority of the time, all follow and share the exact same conventions; just use and apply them in different ways.
The most obvious thing which Contents Pages should obtain, are page numbers. Page numbers are essential, as they tell the readers where to find things and of course what’s in the magazine. Instead of the reader trawling through every article and advertisement in the entire magazine, the page numbers make it quick, direct and extremely easy for the reader to navigate their way through the magazine- skipping the stories they don’t wish to read. Every single magazine, to do with every single topic imaginable will always have page numbers- so I followed the convention and applied it to my own magazine. At first I went through the process f writing: ‘page’ before every single page reference- as you can notice from a post a posted on: ‘ Saturday, 26 March 2011- at 13:15’. It was when my teacher highlighted the fact that magazine don’t necessarily write ‘page’ all the time- in fact hardly ever! So once I had taken them out, it did look much better and also not so cluttered and shabby. It could also come across quite patronizing and also maybes lightly child-like to include- ‘page’ with every number reference I wrote- so I deleted it and found it also cleaned up the page a bit.
As the contents page is a very important page in any magazine, it has to be noticeable whilst standing out and being easily identifiable as the contents page. Practically every magazine will have the header: ‘Contents’ or something along the lines of : ‘Inside this week’, ‘Featuring’ etc. For example, this can be demonstrated through my music magazine analysis’s posted on: “Tuesday, 14 December 2010- at 09:33- headed ‘Kerrang’” , “Wednesday, 8 September 2010- at 14:17- headed ‘NME’ “, and finally: “Wednesday, 15 September 2010- at 13:07- headed ‘Clash’”. All three of these magazine which I analysed have either ‘Contents’ or ‘Inside this Week’- whilst probably speaking for and relating for every magazine ever published. This particular convention of a contents page also has to stand out and be bold- or of course the readers may not notice it and just skip past it- mistaking it for an advertisement. Magazines make this a lot bigger than other factors on the page unless taking into account the images used. But basically, this has to stand out, has to be noticeable and has to look appealing and effective. So taking into account the big fonts and bold styles used in all three of my analysis’s, I wanted my own to do similar things. As my house style was obviously basing around the colour red, black and yellow: to show continuity, the contents page had to follow. On my first draft however (can be found on a post posted at Friday, 11 March 2011- at 01:10- headed ‘Things to Adapt from Draft 1- Contents Page’) I didn’t do this. This first draft doesn’t relate to my house style or colour in any way, style or form possible. I did change this as it looked terrible, it didn’t match any of my previous products and didn’t show continuity- it was in fact a…huge disappointment! The title used to head the page didn’t stand out and looked bland. It wasn’t designed in a large font, didn’t look exciting and most certainly did not grab my attention- never mind other peoples. So when it came to developing my second draft, I changed the style and format completely. For the new title which I continued to use throughout till the end, I used the two colours which were becoming the house colours for the magazine- red and black. I designed it as though a repeating pattern of the word ‘Contents’, and laid them out side by side, both on the left side and right side of the page (later, I slightly changed this). This can be seen on a post at: “Friday, 11 March 2011- at 02:32- headed ‘Things to adapt from Draft 2’”. When I had finished designing draft 2, I was pleased with the way this worked, as it was a lot more obvious and made much more of a statement than my first draft. The contrasting colours definitely drew the readers eye-line much more than the previous, and the bolder and bigger fonts worked much better at standing out. For draft 3, which can be seen on a post at “Friday, 11 March 2011- at 03:53- headed ‘Contents Page- Draft 3’”, you can notice that I changed the actual size of the sheet from A3 to A4. As I did this, the ‘Contents’ labels down each side neither fitted or looked right anymore. So as this was the case, I simply rotated them around and moved them to the top and bottom of the page rather than each side. This too, I think worked well so I was pleased with this!
The images used on a contents page, are another vital language feature that practically every single magazine will have. They can either illustrate what’s featured in the magazine or highlight articles. Generally, as I found from doing my research, there is normally more than one image used on contents pages, as opposed to maybe one image on the front cover. I also found out that whatever the main feature on the front cover is more than likely to dominate the contents page- shown through the use of continuity. This can be seen from my three analysis’s of past music magazines. For example, NME portrays this, posted at- “Wednesday, 8 December 2010- at 14:17- headed ‘NME’”. You can see from this post how the main article on the front cover is based around ‘Festivals’ with the main image being of a stage, at a festival- subsequently, the largest and most dominating photograph used on the contents page, is of a singer at a festival. The use of this continuity really puts emphasis on the main purpose of the edition and keeps it fresh in the readers mind what, and who the highlight is. I knew that when it came to producing and designing my own contents page that I would have to attempt at showing this continuity through the use of the images I chose to use. So on the first draft I did, the main image which was also the only image I used was in fact of the same person on the front cover- showing continuity. The image I used on the first draft has actually ended up on my final double page spread. You can see draft 1 of my contents page on a post posted at: “Friday, 11 March 2011- at 01:10- headed ‘Things to Adapt from Draft 1- Contents Page’”. The image here hasn’t been edited a great amount, and as a result looks dull, un-interesting and definitely not something which would stand out to the reader. With it being the only image on the Contents Page, any reader would expect it to have involved more of the white background or to even be bigger. But the first draft image is neither, and it doesn’t look good. Taking all this into account, when it came to producing draft 2, the image was definitely one of the main things in mind. Draft 2 wasn’t that much better. As I had changed the canvas size to A3 size, it made a lot more room for more images. I changed the image of the main artist firstly, as you can see from a post at: “Friday, 11 March 2011- at 02:32- headed ‘Things to Adapt from Draft 2’”. I now had an image of the artist walking forward (similar to my front over) which dominated most of the page. As I had more space, I took the opportunity to add a picture of a concert crowd, relating to one of my cover lines from the front cover. I placed this top left, slightly smaller than the dominating image- this brought the contents page to life and added a lot more colour, showing continuity following from the front cover. At his stage also, I added a picture of the ‘editor’ which was really my sister with artist Olly Murs. I thought this added a personal touch to the page whilst also bringing a more professional vibe to the production, at the same time maybe suggesting a higher status and quality of the magazine. I changed this again in draft 3, when I rotated the canvas and changed the page size to A4. As you can see from post: “Friday, 11 March 2011- at 03:53- headed ‘Contents Page- Draft 3’” I again changed the photo completely. The photo I used here, as you can see is a lot smaller and is no where near as noticeable as the previous one. This doesn’t work so well as it doesn’t dominate the page like a typical convention would do. The final draft, draft 4, for me works the best. After receiving feedback after draft 3, I was strongly advised to make the featured artists on the cover the domineer of the contents page. This was one of the first things I changed for the last time, and went for a whole new image. I chose one of the artist- Oliver Perry lying down and facing the audience. I thought this created a welcoming atmosphere, and as I chose to select it in greyscale and also removed the background, this created a professional touch.
Other typical conventions of a music magazine which you would expect to find on a contents page, consist of things like quotes and puffs with page numbers in. I tried to include these conventions when I came to doing my final product. You can see this on a post posted at “Saturday, 9 April 2011- at 07:36- headed ‘New Products’” (second image down). You can see from this how I used puffs to highlight page numbers that matched with images taken from different articles. Most magazines do this, so I was pleased when this worked well. I also used a quote from the Lilly Allen article that was advertised. This would work as a sort of teaser and enticer to make the reader read on and view the whole article. I was pleased with how these conventions looked on my own product. Little things like the date of issue and no. of edition were also added onto my contents page for reference, and to also show more conventions that you find in a typical magazine.
Double Page Spreads, like the other pages again follow typical conventions. Double Page spreads hold the stories which feature on the cover, and also the ones that don’t. When I was doing my research into the three music magazines, I found that the image used, practically always covers half or even more of a page. You can see this is my analyses at: “Wednesday, 15 December 2010- at 13:07- headed ‘Clash’”, “Tuesday, 14 December 2010- at 09:33- headed ‘Kerrang’” and finally: “Wednesday, 8 December 2010- at 14:17- headed ‘NME’”. You can clearly see that with all three of these double page spreads, the image does in fact cover at least half of the article. When it came to putting my own double page spread together, I wanted it to look as if it were in a studio. I took inspiration for this from Olly Murs album cover. He has several different images all of himself, standing with each other as if they were different people. My first draft, I tried to embrace this,, and to be honest, I really liked the final outcome (Sunday, 13 March 2011- at 14:51- headed ‘Final Products’ – third image down). I liked the way the actions of the model reflected the cover story that matched the article- ‘Music’s an Adventure’. For example I had him swinging from the title, walking a tightrope, sitting down, leaning etc. I did this in grey scale at first because I wasn’t too keen on it in RGB. I thought it looked quite amateur and wasn’t as professional as it in greyscale. I really liked my first draft. When I handed this in, I got several pieces of advice which I had to take. As my front over and contents based around bright colours, it looked odd that my double page spread lacked colour. I agreed that it did lack continuity also, which ruined it slightly, the images on draft one were also quite small, so I was told to increase the size of them and involve more of the white space surrounding it. On my second draft (Saturday, 9 April 2011- at 07:36- headed ‘New Products’ – third image down) I tried to change these the best I could. I did make the images bigger, which do look better and actually made me realise how small they were in the first place! This worked well. As advised, I changed the images back to RGB, and like before, I didn’t quite get the same effect: although it did demonstrate continuity which wasn’t shown at all before. It added colour and life to the article which was good and worked well from a bigger perspective. I still kept them as a group of the same person as I liked this effect, but deleted the hanging one, as I had to change the title. After a few touched up like blurring the edges of the image to help it blend in, I was actually quite pleased with the new product.
The leading title for any article has to stand out and stop the readers- making and enticing them to read it. You can note this from the posts I listed above, and see they are all big, bold and exciting to look at. On my first draft, the title I used wasn’t that big, bold and stood out a little, but not overly much. I did think it was quite bold, as I had used black font against a grey/white background. Again, when it came to getting teacher feedback, it again lacked continuity with the title. I was advised to change it to the font face I had used on the cover because that’s how the readers identify the article with the cover. Of course they will the expecting to see this huge red and black font which was on the cover- to find its not actually anywhere. So I simply copied the title from the cover to this, and it did look better. I moved it from the top of the page to over the image, which I thought looked quite effective.
The actual text of an article can come in many different forms. Either it being a story, an interview, a biography or other- it has to be interesting. I chose to do mine in an interview style, as it was the easiest to do. Feedback didn’t suggest I make any changed to the article, however the teacher did recommend that I maybe add in an introductory paragraph introducing the article and the artist. Most magazines do do this, and as I wanted to follow typical conventions: I added this in.
My final product could represent particular social groups. For example, on the front cover, I have advertised festivals a lot by writing cover lines such as: “Line Ups Revealed” and “Glastonbury Tickets”. The fact that the mention of festivals are on the cover, this could appeal to students and young people such as teenagers, or even the older generations. I also have a cover line saying: “Exclusive access at the Brits 2011”. This could represent the people who enjoy watching music related programmes whilst staying in. The fact that my cover artist is young himself, is representing the younger social groups rather than the older generations.
In terms of institutions, I think Bauer Media would distribute my media product. I think this because it doesn’t, at the moment publish a magazine similar to the one I have produced. If they did publish and distribute my product, this would mean it would compete with institutions such as IPC Media, which publish NME- one of the three I analysed. I would say my magazine is along the same lines as NME, therefore they would compete with each other.
During research, I came across the actual statistics of NME from their ‘Ignite Media Pack’ (http://www.nme.com/mediapack/) and it was really interesting to see. According to the above site, 65% of NME’s total audience is males. If mine was published, I would make it more approachable for the female audience, making it a big competitor or even more successful. It also states that 50% of the audience are in the age bracket of 16-24. I would say this matched my own magazine, again making it a huge competitor to NME. Bauer Media is a global distributor, offering over 300 magazines in over 15 countries- so this would mean audiences from all around the world. Like I stated earlier, my main article is focused upon a young male. This could attract both males and females in different ways. For example, the females may be attracted to him and the males may just like him and his music- or the other way around. I’d like to think that both males and females would be the audience for my own magazine. In terms of age groups, I would say my magazine, like NME would be aimed and published for the bracket of 16-24 year olds, give and take a few years each way. I say this age group because it matches both my own age group, and also the artist’s age group featured in the edition- so of course everyone would have similar interests to each other. It would be unusual for people in the 60+ age group to buy my magazine, because of the age of the model and also the cover lines do reflect the younger generations- for example, would 60+ year olds want to go to Glastonbury
I tried to attract my target audience in different ways. By either the cover lines advertising festivals or the image of the model. The cover lines would attract teens and young people who want to go to festivals with their friends, so I think this would draw them in and make them want to purchase the magazine. The images themselves, I think would attract both the male and female audience. The fact the main article images are focused upon a male, this could attract more of a female audience rather than the males, I knew this so in order to attract the male audience, I made the colours quite manly- instead of pinks that would stereotypically appeal to girls. They are very colourful, so they’re not dull and boring; I think this would catch the eye of passers by and stop them in their tracks. The bright colours also create a sense of excitement, possibly making them choose this magazine instead of a TV guide. I tried to dress my model in clothes and costumes relating to the indie genre. For example, on the double page spread I dressed him in skinny jeans and a waistcoat- something in which many indie artists tend to wear. These also looked normal, unlike maybe a pop magazine where the cover artists are wearing bikinis or next to nothing- it creates a sense of reality and doesn’t intimidate the audience. This was the same for the contents page. On the front cover, as you can see, the artist is wearing a denim jacket- quite an ‘indie’ item. I didn’t necessarily use any props; this is something which pop magazines would tend to use. I deleted the background in every shot and simply placed the remaining image over a white background. I wanted this to look like a studio shot- creating a sense of professionalism and higher status- I hoped that this would attract the audience in as they would be impressed by the standard. When it came to editing the photos, I made the one on the front cover a medium shot. This allows the audience to feel close to the artists whilst also creating a more personal vibe. The picture of the artist on the contents page is a full shot, so the audience can see him in full. On the double page spreads, I have again used full shots to allow the audience to see him as a whole person. I think this would attract the audience in as they can see he’s just a normal person as opposed to being different as people would expect a superstar to be-also creating a sense of realism- attracting the audience.
I feel like I have learnt loads and loads about Adobe Photoshop, during this project. Like any programme, t first it was difficult and also annoying to get my head around. I didn’t really know much about the programme at first as I was never equired to use it. But now, 8 months later I am much more confident and feel like I can experiment a lot more without worrying its going to delete or change the format etc. I can now quickly use the ‘magic wand tool’ or the ‘background eraser’ and even the ‘lasso tool’ without any problems and even know shortcuts, so that’s really positive! This project has definitely developed my Photoshop skills, as I practically did everything in Photoshop- from creating plans, to drafts, to final products- its great! Before I literally didn’t know a thing, now there’s not much I’m not sure on- I can now apply this knowledge to future tasks. Google Blogger is another thing I now feel comfortable using. When we first got told we had to use this blogger I hated it. I could work it and basically didn’t understand it; I couldn’t see myself doing this entire project on it. Now after ages simply just using the site, I wonder what I hated. It’s now easy and quick to use and doesn’t create any problems at all. I also feel better at taking photographs and knowing what I want to get out of them. I used my own camera, which was really easy and the resolution was great. My camera and photography skills have improved for the better which is really pleasing.
When I had finished, I created a questionnaire and handed it out to 15 people- all of the ge bracket 16-24. It asked them a range of questions in the style of mulitple choice. The questions were on my magazine and asked how well it did the job it was supposed to. Here are the results:
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| I was very pleased with this outcome for this one in particular, as the last thing I would have wanted was it to not look like a music magazine. 100% on this one, which really bootsed up my confidence. |
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| I was also really pleased with ther sults from this question. As I said from the beginning, I always liked my masthead design, and seeing that other people did too was really exciting. Nobody circled: 'Not Very Well' which was also very pleasing to see. |
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| This question was a little bit dissapointing but I knew it could be noted as pop-related. On the positive side, over 50% of the people doing my questionnaire thought it did relate to my chosen genre so that's good. |
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| This question brought in mixed views, which is good in its own way, as I now know what to improve if i was to ever do somehing like this again. On the whole, more people said good than bad which was confidence raising. Nobody said it was bad also which cheered me up. |
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| Another question which I was very satisfied with was this one. 100% of the 15 people i asked, said my straplines related to my magazine which was great! |
