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

For my preliminary task, I created a school based magazine that featured a model on the front cover. I used some simple effects on the text in photoshop to make them stand out, and used transparencies at a basic level for some vector shapes.

While for my main task, I used an entire range of new tools like masking, gradients and photography manipulation in order to create an interesting and exciting front cover, I feel I have learned how an audience reacts (by using peer review throughout creation of my magazine) and how to use certain content to suite that, such as my use of colours and association.

I have learned how to effectively make my model more interesting and engage and address the audience using contrast and colour editing, and I have managed to use special effects to make text stand out on any background. More specifically my extended use of the glow tool in Macromedia Flash.

All in all I believe I have learned a massive amount since I first created my preliminary, especially regarding layout and engaging the user through readability and colours. I feel that I have improved a massive amount from when I first began creating a magazine cover and contents page for my coursework.

This is my original picture for the front cover pre-editing

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

Prior to me creating this magazine I had hardly used Photoshop and had used Macromedia Flash occasionally, after creation of my magazine I have learned various things that can be done to help make my magazine stand out, keep it interesting and help my models fit better into the magazine.

The biggest things that I learned are to do with photo editing, I learned how to remove the backgrounds of photos to make them stand out on a background that I'd created on Macromedia flash using transparency. This was basically done by selecting which points that a line would crop from, all around the picture that was needed to be transparent. This helped my final magazine a lot as I managed to combine photographs using it, simulating locations such as the wall on the front cover.

I also learned how to make photos stand out more effectively. When using gradient backgrounds, I was having trouble getting the normal skin colour to be eye grabbing and interesting, the same with the clothes that my model was wearing. In order to fix this I drastically increased the contrast and the brightness, allowing lighter colours to become lighter and more focused for readers.

In Macromedia flash 8, I learned how to add effects such as outlines and glows to my text, and worked out how to use gradients much more effectively then in Photoshop. In Photoshop you must choose a pathway and the gradient follows it, but in Macromedia Flash I could manipulate the gradient as it is a vector based program. This also allowed me to add the transparent centre gradient over the wall in the front cover, giving it a more surrealistic feel.

In my magazine I used a left to right and top down pattern to help readers associate certain things with others, I would not of been able to do this without a tool that I discovered called "Masking". With this tool I was able to add gradient effects (such as the red to dark red gradient on the title) much more easily, and then use it to help my titles stand out in comparison to a solid colour.

All in all I have learned a lot from completing this magazine, and I believe that I used these methods effectively to create an outcome.

How did you attract/address your audience?

For my front cover, I used interesting and bold contrasting colours of black, white, red and gold in order to gain the readers eye. I used the colour gold as it is often associated with hip hop artists, and I used black white and red as they are traditionally used to gain and hold the attention of a potential reader. In order to attract my audience for my front cover I ensured that my model was wearing modern/current clothes and was looking directly outward of the magazine, engaging the viewer. He is wearing a cap which is generally associated with rap/hip hop, allowing fans of this music genre to associate themselves with him as fast as possible.

I continued this colour scheme throughout and for my contents page used a red colour in the background for featured articles, this combined with the fact that I used a red/dark red gradient for my title on the front cover was intended to allow readers to associate the colour red with interesting features that are exclusive/new to the Definition magazine. Other colours were used for the purpose of association as well, for example gold for interesting hints of snippets/information.

In order to address my audiences interests and needs, I used a questionnaire to interview and record data from fans of hip hop and those interested in it, and then based my entire magazine content on these answers. My special features were only that of the artists that my audience enjoyed, and I made sure that content was based around the decisions and popularity of certain choices in the questionnaire.

I arranged text to make sure that people saw certain things first, allowing my magazine to address the audience quickly and allowing my audience to identify the purpose of my magazine. More specifically, the use of the words "EXCLUSIVE HIP HOP INFO". This informs the user quickly that it is a hip hop based magazine, and is for information about hip hop and it's artists. The articles that follow then reinforce this, using popular icons such as Eminem to keep interest.

What kind of media institution might you want to distribute your media product and why?

What Type Of Institution?

My magazine is intended to be a non independant mainstream hip hop based magazine. Because of this, the company that I might want to distribute my product is a large, multimedia company, that has access to this kind of market and already has previous research and setups regarding a hip hop magazine. Despite my interest in using a freelance or a smaller company (which is recieving funds from a larger conglomerate) I have decided that because of the massive resources, a large company would be more beneficial.

What Company?

Specifically I believe a company such as Bauer Media would distribute my product, as with other magazines such as Kerrang and Q. They own more than eighty media brands spanning many different interests, and it seems apparent that the main area they are missing is a rap/hip-hop style magazine.

Bauer Media is a very large company that was founded in 1875 and started and still remains privately owned. Worldwide circulation of Bauer Media Group's magazine titles amounts to 38 million magazines a week. As this company also has access to media such as radio, and tv advertising, I believe this would help my magazine.

What Magazines?

An example of a similar style magazine that has the same style and base as my magazine is the source. This is a magazine owned by Hip Hop Connection, which is part of a conglomerate of Infamous Ink.

Infamous Ink is a private company located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. This company employes two people and is privately owned, and despite this company being VERY small in comparison to Bauer, it has the same content ideas as I intended.

Who would be the audience for your media product?/How does your media product represent particular social groups?

P1: Who are the audience for my product?

The audience for my magazine are young people that are interested in hip hop and are aged 16-23. This is because of the interesting colours and content within the article. The feature on the double page spread and the contents page is a young person of equal age to the intended audience, allowing them to relate to him.

P2: How does your media product represent particular social groups?


The main social groups represented are the ones that my magazine are aimed at, ages 18-23. The main featured rapper, "MC Chrime" is wearing modern clothing and distinctive black and red colours of the magazine. The cap that he is wearing is often related to youth, and the modern could suggest that he is current rather than old fashioned/out of the ordinary.

On my double page spread, he is shown holding a boom box, which is intended to show that he is to be associated with those in the music industry or he is interested in current music. His eyes are looking off in the distance, with a more serious/determined facial expression rather than an angry or a happy one. This is intended to continue with the theme in the article of young people entering the hip hop scene themselves, and also attracts attention to the article by following his eye pathway. He has a modern slightly waxed haircut that is medium to short length, this is a common haircut associated with teenagers/young people. As MC Chrime is meant to represent younger people by allowing himself to be associated with them through clothing, this would also suggest that the social group of young people are being represented as determined.

For the rapping community represented in this article, generic interviews with famous artists are used to attract attention on the front cover and the contents page. This allows them to easily associate themselves with it being a hip hop based article and represents the rapping social group as related to the articles shown, for example most articles are related to music rather then disruptive/party related behaviour.

For the interview, MC Chrime does not speak of any illegal activities or antisocial behaviour, which is the opposite to the current stereotypes of young people that are interested in hop hop, this helps represent the youthful social group as a dynamic interesting group of people that are interested in studio/the big time for music, rather then concentrating on immoral behaviour. MC Chrime is set up through the magazine as almost a representative of hip hop fans who have turned famous, and his views and determination are intended to be associated with this group.

In what ways do you intend your media product to use, develop or challenge forms and conventions?

Evaluation - Media AS Question

View more presentations from thomasager.

I used a presentation for this question, in order to use text and pictures together more effectively.

My Magazine

This is my finished magazine.

Click to enlarge any pictures

Magazine Pricing and Content

For my magazine pricing I've decided to make it a special offer of just £1.20, rather then a higher normal price. As the magazine isn't that well known I believe this will interest new buyers and possibly allow them to choose Definition over another more well known magazine.

As for the content I have decided to include a feature about Eminem, a feature about Dr Dre and a feature about an upcoming artist. The double page spread will be about the upcoming artist and these three features are intended to be the main ones, so they will probably be emboldened on the contents page to keep people interested.

Final Font/Colour Choices

I have decided that the main themes of my magazine are going to be red, white and gold. I am going to apply a mask within the text and then colour them with a gradient from top to bottom with that colour. This will make the magazine look much more interesting and eye catching. As shown in some of my examples, I am also going to apply a black outline to the text. This enables the text to be seen with any background choice, and is very eye catching.

The main text that I'm going to use is Impact, I will either use calibri or arial for the secondary bulk text such as the text that is going to be in my double page spread. I will also look into some development regarding different fonts on dafont.com.

Texture/Background Photos

I have taken some photos to use as the background of background removed models or just as a texture for an overlay.

Photo Shoot Planning

For my photos I have decided that I will have a clear white background, or no background at all. This is because I want to add my own backgrounds of either textures or something related to music that will improve the overall picture. For example my idea for the front cover of my magazine is to use a picture of a wall, and a picture of a person, and cut out the person and place them on the wall.

For the mise en scene of my models I am going to follow current fashions, more specifically for the front cover, jeans, a t shirt (probably black) and a baggy hoody. For other pictures I will probably follow current fashions such as a black coat and jeans or tracksuit. These will have the background cut out and either a gradient or a photo used as the background.

I will be using two lights from opposing directions in order to light my model, and then increase the contrast using a program in order to make the photograph astand out and be more interesting.

Magazine Name Choice

After viewing the following magazine names, The Source, Scratch, Vibe, XXL, Rago, YO!, USGMAG, Bomb, Arize, Rapzilla, Respect, Stealth, Bassline, Grindin, Urb, Sikk, Rime, I've decided to choose the magazine name of "DEFINITION".

This is because the name suggests that the magazine Defines Hip-Hop, and is very distinctive. I believe it will attract attention and relates to Rap.

I have tested some fonts with the magazine name.

Institutional Analysis

XXL Magazine: XXL Magazine is a hip hop magazine published by Harris Publications. They work as a large part of the magazine industry, producing magazines such as Juicy and King. They also produced the Vampirella comic. One major division, Harris Outdoor Magazines, publishes several titles on hunting, fishing, and firearms.


KERRANG Magazine: This magazine is published by Bauer Consumer Media. Bauer Consumer Media is a massive media company, publishing millions of magazines and distributing them worldwide. Their magazine labels include Q, Take a Break and TVChoice. They are a perfect example of a massive company that practically dominates markets in the magazine industry. 


Bauer Consumer Media also have radio stations dedicated to the same content as their magazines.

Genre Choice

I have decided to choose Hip-Hop as my genre choice, as I believe there is a massive gap in the market for solely rap based magazines. I will further this genre choice by interviewing people who have this kind of interest.

All photos I use will have their backgrounds removed, so the best choice for a background would be something plain. However, I may want to use a background that doesn't have a very large impact and then set the photo as the entirety of the background of a page. This would be following what KERRANG usually do on their double page spreads and what many other magazines do throughout.

After researching typography, I believe that the font Impact would be the best for my titles, due to its versatility when effects are applied to it (in comparison to bleeding cowboys) and it's more modern look.
When looking at the FX normally applied to titles in magazines, I've decided that on my front cover and on some of my other titles, I am going to be using a solid black outline around some text. This not only draws the users eye, but also allows text to stand out from almost any background. I could also apply a small amount of shadow to titles, which would result in less emphasis but would still allow it to stand out more.

My colour scheme will be a black/darker background with light text that has a black outline, and my target audience is 13-18.

Hip Hop Questionnaire Results

I have decided that the my target audience is between the ages of 13-18, so I decided to interview people between those ages that have an interest in hip hop/pop music.

* = One Vote

M/F?:
M**********
F****
Age:
13
14
15*
16********
17***
18**

Favourite Music Magazine:
KERRANG
The Source*******
Q***
Vibe Magazine***
XXL*

Favourite Artist:
Eminem*******
Dr Dre****
Professor Green*
Kanye West*

Darker or Lighter Colour Scheme:
Darker*******
Lighter******

Two Favourite Colours:
Black*******
White**
Red*
Blue*
Yellow**
Green
Pink**
Orange
Purple

More Text or More Pictures:
Text***
Pictures*******

Choose your Favourite Font:
Calibri
Jungle Life*****
Impact***
Bombardier***
Bleeding Cowboys*

I have concluded from these results that I should orientate my magazine towards a male audience, attempt to imitate The Source's style/ideas. I have also concluded that a feature including Eminem or Dr Dre will be popular, and a more dark scheme would also prove popular.  Also red yellow and blue would be a nice text for titles, with the favourite fonts being impact jungle life and bombardier.

Double Page Conclusion

Almost all double page spreads that I have seen have used a photo as the main focus and text as either quite small with lots of information or short paragraphs that try to remain interesting. A house style and colour scheme are consistent with the contents page and the front cover, unless it is a special feature, which will not happen in my magazine.

Sans serif text is always used for the main body as it is much more readable then something like times new roman. Contrasting colours are used for almost all text apart from some of the titles.

Most pictures are either used as the background or the background is removed and a self created background is added.

In conclusion, I believe that for a double page spread to work it needs to be more orientated around pictures rather then text, and a picture with a CGI background is used more often and works better in comparison with font styles.

Contents Page Conclusion

All contents pages have picture inserts, with either a border or without, although a border is placed more often then not. The pictures are used to associate with page numbers and in turn interest the viewer. There are usually three different types of titles in contents covers, the main title at the top, the secondary title which is placed to separate between contents or additional information or text, and the actual titles that describe the contents.

For each page number there is lots of text to describe what’s happening on that page, this is done to keep the viewer interested. It’s usually a summary so the contents page doesn’t get crowded but it still informs the viewer.

All titles are either serif or sans serif and bold so they can be easily distinguished from the informative text, with interesting features applying the magazines colour scheme of red, to ensure that it is seen as different or special.

The contents page, like the main page also seems to have a “main” picture that takes up lots of space on the cover.

My favourite contents page is probably the “DRUMMER” one because it is simple, but also interesting because of the way the page numbers are laid out, the symbols used and the font used. Again I think I would prefer to do something less cluttered then KERRANG with a more Q approach.

Magazine Cover Conclusion

There are several consistent conventions that I am going to imitate in my magazine. Each cover uses a singular colour for related items on the front cover, for example on KERRANG the colour green is used to associate things to do with green day, and for VIBE the colour pink is used to associate things to do with Kanye West.

Titles on the front covers are always bold text that have a high impact on the viewer. This draws attention to the magazine and helps view ability.

All titles seem to use a special effects if there is a chance that they cannot be read properly, for example in KERRANG the text WTF has a black outline and the words GREEN DAY have a shadow effect, but in the magazine VIBE there is no need due to the white background and the soft pastel colours used.

Most photos used on front covers seem to mid shots or close ups, usually with the person facing towards the camera. All photos I’ve looked at on front covers have had the background removed and replaced with either a solid colour or a gradient, which is something I will try to imitate.

My favourite magazine that I’ve seen was SCRATCH, because of it’s simplistic bold sans serif fonts and colours. It clearly manages to get across it’s points without having a almost cluttered effect as seen in KERRANG. I believe the reason SCRATCH is so effect is because of the contrast between the text and the background, with the background being a solid black and the front colours being light yellow, blue and white. Also, the text has a black outline which results in the text having the ability to be seen even when layered above the picture.

Front Cover, Contents and Double Page Spread Analysis

Music Magazine Analysis Media AS

Target Audience Research

I've decided to look at what the target audiences of certain magazines are.

Scratch: 

Scratch was a magazine about hip-hop. It featured articles regarding producers, musicians and DJs that make beats for rap records, and details the secret methods, stories, partnerships, philosophies and equipment behind the music. The target audience are people who are interested in hip hop and DJing, probably teenagers or young people from the age of 16-25. They achieve this target audience by using modern typography and icons.

Vibe:

Vibe is a music and entertainment magazine that was very successful because of it’s broader interest range of articles. The publication predominantly features R&B and hip-hop music artists, actors and other entertainers. I believe that this magazine is aimed at the ages of 21-30 because of it’s broader range.

Kerrang:

KERRANG is a rock music magazine with a teenage audience, it often features the current rock bands and people that are popular within a teenage society, although because of the versatility of its genre it could quite easily gain interest from anyone who enjoys rock.

Q:

Q was originally published to appeal to a much older target audience then other music magazines. It uses sans serif fonts to give a more traditional feel rather then something like scratch. All titles are very clean cut and there is almost no mess or clutter on contents pages or front covers that might interest teenagers.

Plan

Using the online web tool "Tom's Planner" I've created a plan for my project.

Preliminary Task

For my preliminary task I created the magazine cover and a mock up of a contents page for a school magazine. The cover features a photo with the background removed, text with outline effects, glow effects and shadow effects. The schools house style is currently a light cyan type blue, so I tried to imitate that with my design.

I wanted to attract attention straight away, so I decided to use capital letters so the eye is drawn, and a mid shot of someone looking directly out for the same thing. The text used is Calibri, which is a clear sans serif font that allows bolding without a skew of the text.

By creating this I have learned how to manipulate images to remove the background without skew, how to add outlines and shadow on text in PhotoShop, and an improved idea of how to layer text and images effectively.

Introduction

I'm Tom Ager, a student at John Cabot Academy. I'm currently studying Media Studies, Art And Design, Computing and ICT and I enjoy designing,

For my AS level media coursework I must produce a music magazine which includes a front cover, double page spread and contents page. I'm currently thinking about producing a heavy metal based music magazine with lots of photography and typography as the main basis for content.