For our main coursework our task is to design and produce a magazine front cover, contents page and double page spread for a new music magazine. We have to produce our work using Adobe Photoshop and InDesign. We must decide on the genre or genres of music our magazine will feature and who the target audience is. when producing our magazines we must pay attention to design decisions such as text, font and imaging.Also our understanding of generic codes and conventions must be thoroughly displayed and we should show our ability to communicate through messages and meaning to our target audience. We also need to research existing magazines that have a similar target audience and genre to our magazine.
The genre of music i have chosen for my magazine is a combination or pop and rock. I have chosen this genre because it has a wide range of music that i can write about. I am going to aim my magazine at a target audience of about 16 to 25 and will be aimed at both a male and female audience.
This task is a development of our skills from the preliminary task in which we had to produce a magazine cover and contents page for a new college magazine. Below are the links to the blogs i made for the preliminary task.
Preliminary coursework: http://sdcmediadilysashton.blogspot.com/2009/10/introduction.html
Target Audience - Blog 2
When designing a magazine one of the most important things to think about is target audience. If you do not design your magazine around the interests of your target audience and just randomly design it without thinking about the audience then your magazine will not sell.
Using the website www.NRS.co.uk i have looked at the target audiences of a magazine of the same genre as my magazine. The website shows the figures of different target audiences of magazines over the last year. I have looked at Q magazine because like my magazine, it looks at lots of different genres of music. On the website it says that Q magazine's total audience is 666,000 people. Out of that the largest target audience are from the ages of 15 to 44 which is an audience of 572, 000. Their second biggest audience is of 444,000 who are either high ranking professionals, middle ranking professionals or office workers. The website also shows that their audience of men is a total of 513,000 and their audience of women is a much lower 153,000. However, it shows that, skilled manual workers, semi and unskilled workers and people who are on benefits and unemployed are half of that of high ranking professionals and are an audience of 222,000 people and that their audience of 45+ is only 94,000. This information shows me that the most popular target audience for this genre of magazine is males between the ages of 15 and 44 who are high ranking professionals to office workers. This means that i should be aiming my magazine at a similar target audience in order for my magazine to sell.
I have created a profile for a typical reader of Q Magazine to give a clearer view of their target audience and my potential target audience. This reader is a 30 year old male and is a middle ranking professional. He is the manager of a record shop in Brighton. He is very interested in music and it is a huge part of his everyday life. He listens to retro and current Rock, Hip Hop and Alternative music. He reads Q because it includes most genres of music from old and current artists and is more sophisticated than any other music magazine. This means that he can read about music and artists work rather than what the artist is wearing or who they are dating. Unlike some magazines who focus more on the gossip side of music celebrities lives. he often discovers new and obscure artists when reading Q and likes to read about music events and gigs that he may want to go to. He mostly enjoys this for the news, articles, reviews and interviews, which Q has a good variety of.
Analysis of existing magazines - Blog 3
The two magazine covers i have decided to analyse are Q magazine and Rolling Stone magazine. The issue of Q magazine is from March 2004 and the issue of Rolling Stone is from January 2005.
The masthead for Q Magazine is a large white Q in a red box. It is in serif font which suggests that the magazine is for an older audience. The white Q against bold red makes it stand out so one of the first things that you see is the mast head. The mast head is in the top right hand corner which is traditionally where the mast head is on magazines. However, unlike many magazines, the name of the magazine is a letter rather than a word. This is said to be because the title was going to be 'Cue', as in cue the music, but the writers of the magazine didn't want it to be mistaken for a snooker magazine, so they changed it to the letter Q to make it unique and recognisable.
The mast head for Rolling Stone is large and is placed at the top and in the middle of the cover running from the left to the right. The typeface is a serif font and looks almost hand written as it is slightly slanted and the lettering flows together like a visual onomatopoeia. The R at the beginning of the name swoops under the O and joins onto the first L like a visual onomatopoeia as the R looks like it is 'rolling'. This R, which is in the top right hand corner, also stands out as it is the largest letter in the name and it dominates the rest of the lettering. This makes the magazine very recognisable as the mast head is unique and more complex compared to many magazines. The masthead for Q and Rolling Stone are similar because they both use a bold and prominent letter to make their magazine more recognisable.
The main image on the cover of Q Magazine is a photograph of the singer Pink. She is posing in a leather outfit and leaning against a blue wall. She has a spotlight on her so that her face is slightly more highlighted than the rest of the photograph. This the target audience. The photo of Pink uses dark colours and her expression is serious and her body language is provocative. This suggests that the target audience is more men than women and that women who do read it are probably not very girly. Looking at this magazine cover I would say it appeals to 18 to 40 years which means that Q target their audience well with the use of image.
Q magazine usually use a studio taken photo of a star on their covers. However on special issues such as the August 2004 issue, which celebrates the '100 Most Powerful People in Music', they use a selection of photographs of artists and the main sell is large and in the centre of the magazine. Q often have special issues with a selection of images on their covers and their standard covers often have smaller images to show what else is featured in the magazine. Unlike many magazines, Q does not seem to follow the same layout patterns for each cover. Almost every cover has a very different layout. Most use the typical layout of a photo in the middle of the cover and sells down both sides, however other issues use different layouts like strap lines, writing just in the middle or down one side and some special issues have hardly any writing at all so that the focus is on the photo. another thing I have noticed from looking at Q magazine covers is that they also use different fonts on each cover, unlike some magazines who use similar fonts on each cover. Sometimes they use Serif and sometimes they use Sans Serif. Every cover looks totally different. However I would say that the two main things that make Q recognisable is the mast head and the 'rough' and 'rebel' look that the magazine portrays on every cover.
The photograph used on the cover of Rolling Stone is of singer Gwen Stefani. She is standing against a white and light grey background and is wearing a hoodie, with the hood up, and a white bra top. Her facial expressions and her body language with her hands in her pockets connotes a layed back image for the magazine and although her torso is showing, the image is definetly not as provocative las Pink on the cover of Q. It is fun and sexy in a sophisticated way. The photos that rolling stone use always look airbrushed wich gives the magazine that 'perfect and clean' look whereas Q's photos don't look airbrushed wich give it that scruffy look. The clothes, facial expressions and body language that Q use look provocative and agressive whereas photos on Rolling Stone look more sexy and fun.
The layout is the typical magazine layout. The image is a studio taken photo wich is placed in the middle of the cover and the sells are down either side. There is no strapline and no extra pictures and the fonts, font sizes and colours are co-ordinated which gives it a very neat look, unlike the cover of Q magazine which is less co-ordinated. Rolling Stone uses this layout for most of their magazines apart from special issues when, like Q, they use lots of smaller images, sometimes photos and sometimes drawn or painted pictures.
The colours on this cover are mainly white, black and yellow. These colours have been taken from the photograph so that the everything on the cover is colour co-ordinated. Most magazines do this so that the colours of the text are simular to the picture. The colour used the most on this cover is white; the background is white, her bra is white, there is white in her hoodie and the titles of each sell is in white. The black in the photo is her hoodie and jeans and is also used for the text in the sells, the backdrop of the mast head and the outline of the titles of the sells to make them stand out. The yellow, which has been taken from her hair colour, is used for the mast head and yellow lines to seperate the sells. These colours go really well together; the black stands out aginst the light colours and the whites and yellows connote calmness and innocence. However the use of black contrasts this and suggests that the magazine has a naughty side to it too. I think that the use of image and colour appeals to an audince of both men and women. It isn't overly sexy so that it just appeals to men. It is sexy in a subtle way and is still innocent enough to appeal to women as well. I think that the target audience is similar to Q and ranges from about 16 to 40.
Both of these magazine covers have a simular layouts. They both have the image in the middle with the sells down either side. Q has slightly more though and has a smaller photograph of a featured interview and also has a strapline. On Rolling Stone the sells have a main heading and then smaller writing about the story underneath. The main sell says 'Gwen Stefani, A Rock Goddess With Major Issues' and other stories like 'Mr. Bling, Big Pimpin' With Raps Top Ice Man'. These sells don't explain much but say enough to make you want to read on. Q also does this. They have sells such as 'COLDPLAY, The album you'll never hear' which makes you want to know more if you are a Coldplay fan. The main sell almost runs down the length of the right side of the cover and names and certain words on the cover have been made bigger, capital and highlighted to make them stand out. Words like 'Raw! Crazy! Hot!' and PINK laid bare' have been used for the main sell rather than sentences. This again doesn't give much information but uses persuasive words to make you want to read the article. Under this there is then a list of other celebrities that are feaured in the magazine. This makes you want to read on because it doesn't say specifically what its about so you want to read on to find out. Q has alot more information, uses more colours and more sizes of text than Rolling Stone does. Q looks more rough and busy compared to the clean-cut, co-ordinated look that Rolling Stone has. I think that having lots of celebrity names on the cover helps to reach a wider audience because if you are a fan of Christina Aguilera for example and you see her name on the cover then you will want to buy the magazine to read about her. So having lots of names will appeal to lots of fans. When i first looked at Q and Rolling Stone i thought that they were so simular but after analysing them both i have discovered that they are very different and appeal to different types of people with the use of image, text and colour.
The contents page i have decided to look at is from Q magazines 2004 issue '100 Most powerful people in Music'. On the first page of the contents there is a white strip at the top of the page where it says 'Contents August 04'. This stands out as it is bright red and black text on a white background. The rest of the page is taken up by a photo of the lead singer of Foo Fighters, Dave Grohl. The photo is a midshot so most of the page is just the background of the photo wich is mainly cream and black. This makes the contents page look very simple and un-crowded. There is not much text on this page. In the top left corner it has the page number of the article to go with the picture with his name and a small caption. Then in the bottom right corner it says 'Features' in red and has a list of 5 articles featured in the magazine. each one has the page number in red, a short title in bold and underneath, in smaller text, a caption about the story. Each piece of text doesn't give much information but just enough to make you want to read on and they are written in a way then makes you wonder what they are about. All the text stands out as the colours contrast with the backgrounds. In the very bottom of the left corner is a box with arrows indicating to turn over and the contents is carried on on the next page. The background is all white and in the top left hand corner is the same title as the page before. There are much more text and images; In the top left corner and down the right-hand side are images of featuring articles. Each picture has the page number and a caption in one of the corners. Under the first photo on the left-hand side is another list of featured articles and like before it has the page number, the title and a caption. This time its all in black to stand out against the white background. In the bottom left corner is a box wich says 'Q Review' using the Q logo. This is in white with and highlighted in red and black wich again stands out. In the box is two lists of reviews featured in the magazine. In each list Q has used the same layout but with slightly different fonts, sizes and the variation of black, white and red. This makes it easy to tell each section apart and gives the page different dimensions. The page would look very bland and probably confusing if all the text was the same font, size and colour. These three colours have been used frequenly throughout the magazine, for text a background, because they are good contrasts and are the same colours as the Q masthead.
On page 86 is a double page spread wich is part of the article '100 most powerful people in music'. Along the top of the page is a black strip with the title of the article on the far left in white. This is on every page of of this article so when flicking through it is different to other pages. Each page has a fairly thick white boarder to make the other parts of the page stand out. In the top left corner is the number 57 in a large white font on a black background and in a yellow box. This stands out well so you know where you are in the article. next to this is a red strip and in white it says Gwen Stefani with a caption about her in smaller writing. The rest of the page is split into a typical article layout of three columns. The writing on Gwen only takes up a small box at the top of the first two columns. Then on The third there is a chart showing her achievements over the years. This is a yellow box with small black writing and although is small it holds alot of information about the star with its use of words and images. The rest of the page is taken up by a large photo of Gwen with a red background. I think they have chosen this photo because it goes so well with the colour theme. In the top left corner of the image is a quote, from the article, in a large white font and a silly caption in the corner of the picture. Most magazines put a short caption in the corners of their pictures but Q's are usually humourous.
The second page of the spread has the same layout of three columns. Each number is in a bold white font on a black square with the name of the artist in bold, black capitals. Followed by a caption underneath in slightly smaller red text and the story of each artist in smaller black text. Just like the contents page the text is all in the same font just with different sizes and the variation of three main colours. There is text in all three columns. The first column has text over half way down with a photo at the bottom to go with one of the pieces of texts. The last two columns start half way down the page and just consist of text. Between these two columns is a smaller one with two small photos of featured artists. in the top right of the page is a large black box with a red border. This consists of a medium sized photo of Keith Richards and Mick Jagger with a small caption in the corner, like all the other photos on the page. The left of the box is all white text to stand out on the black and follows the same rules as all the other text with the heading in a larger and bold font. At first look at this double page i thought it looked well layed out but didn't realise how many dimensions and detail there were to a page. Every part of it has been designed to make it co-ordinatd and a appealing to the audience as possible. It looks well designed and sophisticated.
Flat plans - Blog 4
This first flat plan is for my front cover. First i started with the main image wich I knew i wanted to be the size of a typical main image on a magazine cover; midshot showing down to about knee level. I also had an idea of what I wanted the photo to look like as i knew i wanted to take photos of my sister as a pop star in the style of many of the Rolling Stone covers. My main influence was the cover of Gwen Stefani wich i have annotated above. I then thought about the type of font i wanted to use for the masthead. As i mentioned before i liked how the masthead for Rolling Stone magazine used prominent lettering to be recognisable. I wanted mine to have the same effect. I looked at a few fonts and this was my favourite look. I have drawn a rough version of it on the flat plan and used the colour pink as a possible colour theme. i may not use this font as when creating the magazine on InDesign i may find that other fonts will look better. its also very likely that i wiull change the colours that are in my flat plan depending on the colours in the main image; i want my magazine to be colour co-ordinated like most magazine covers.
i decided i wanted the main sell to be very prominent on the cover and i wanted the artists name to stand out as much as possible because she is a new act. I have used the colour blue for her name because i think it will stand out well but i have not yet decided on a font. I will decide on the font for this when creating my cover on InDesign. I have decided that i want it to say 'EXCLUSIVE' and then 'NEW SOUND, NEW ALBUM, NEW QUEEN OF POP'. I think this is a catchy caption wich will get the readers interested and the word exclusive makes the article seem important. The colours i have used are not final but i used them on the flat plan because i think they go well together. I have highlighted part of the main sell in grey so the words look almost cut out of a magazine. This is a technique wich Q use regularly. I think this will give the magazine a more casual look wich should appeal to my target audience. i have also placed the main sell on the left hand side of the cover because people read from left to right so it will be one of the first things they see on the cover. This will hopefully make my magazine stand out more on the shelf.
On the right hand side of the cover i have made a list of other artsist featured in the magazine. I have written plus in big writting and then a list of several artists underneath. I have used the colour orange, which is not a final decision but still looks good, and have again highlighted each name in grey. Q magazine often do a list of names featured in the magazine and also usually hightlight those names. I have listed popular artists of today but also picked artist of different genres which will hopefull appeal to a wider audience so get more magazines sold.
i thought the cover looked a bit bare but there was not much room left to do another sell or list so i decided to do a strap line. I knew three other stories that i wanted to feature in my magazine and i think they go well together so i think having them on a strapline will work well. I also thought the strapline should be slanted so it fits in the given space better and looks more fun and casual. I also had the idea that the strapline itself could be a pale transparent colour so that it is more sublte than the other two sells. I dont want it to draw attention away from the rest of the cover but i still want it to be noticable so i think i will do the text in a simple black font. I think the articles in the strapline should also appeal well to my target audience as i have included articles about new artists of 2010 and acts revealed for this years glastonbury. I think if i saw this on a magazine it would make me want to buy it as i like finding out about new artists and i would be interested in reading about glastonbury and the acts playing this year. Hopefully my cover will have the same effect on my target audience.
Under the masthead i have decided to have a subheading. I thought this would be a good idea as many magazines do it to make there magazine more rememberable. like Q magazine wich reads 'The UKs Biggest Music Magazine'. i think it should be smaller than the other fonts on the cover and shouldnt take attention away from the rest of the cover, so i will have mine small and in a simple font. I think i will also have it in the same colour as the masthead so there are not too many colours on the cover. I have decided it will read 'Your Monthly Music Fix'. This is simple but catchy as it uses alliteration and is a spin on the magazines name.
i have put the barcode, price and date in the bottom right hand corner. It think this is a good place to have them as it looks descreat and although it is important information for a magazine cover it shouldn't stand out. Most magazines make the barcode as descreat as possible because its not very attractive and can spoil the look of a cover. Infact looking at Q and Rolling Stone covers i have noticed that allot of the time they dont even include the barcode on the cover, its probably on the back. Some magazines put the date and price at the top of the magazine under or next to the masthead so a reader can easily see them but i want it to be descreat on my cover which so that it doest draw attention away from the other elements of the cover or make it look to crowded. This is why i have chosen to put these three elements in the bottom right corner.
My second flat plan is for the contents page. i wanted my contents page to look simple and clean cut but still use the same elements as on the front cover like the fonts and highlighting. i decided i would have the magazine name at the top of the page in the same font and colour as the front cover. I wanted this to be large but not ass big as i had used it on the cover. I then wanted it to say 'CONTENTS' underneath this in a large font aswell. Under this in the same font but smaller i decided to have the date. i decided to have the top of the page like this because i think they are important pieces of information that should be seen first on a contents page. Looking at other magazine contents pages it seems that most magazines use the headinbg and the word 'contents' but not neccesarily the date. However i want to include the date as one of the first bits of information. I knew i wanted a list of the featured articles and stories but i also wanted to include a couple of photos, so idecided to have the list of pages down the left side of the page, a medium sized photo on the right side of the page and another smaller one underneath the list of pages. The main photo will be of the artist on the front cover as this is the main article. I will then take pictures of a band or another aritist to represent the artice 'New Acts Of 2010'. This will be the smaller photo. The list of pages will include the stories that are on the front cover. These will include: 'the best acts of 2009', 'new acts of 2010', the main cover story on Alice Ashton, 'glastonbury acts revealed' and an article about the comeback of No Doubt. These articles will then have a caption underneath each one to give the reader a bit more information of what each article is about. i will write some of these in a humerous way, some with puns and play on words and some i will write a simple overview of what the article is about. I have noticed that Q do this allot. This should appeal to my target audince as it gives it a laid back feeling. I want the text on the lists to be about size 12 and in a simple font. The colours of the text on the flat plan are not final decisions and i may also highlight the text like i did on the front cover. I will decide these two things when i am creating my page on InDesign so i can experiment with different colours, fonts and highlighting.
In the bottom corner of each photo i will write the page number that the photo goes with so that the readers can find the articles more easily. Most magazines do this so that if a reader likes the look of a photo or recognises the artist they dont have to find the article on the list they can simply see the page number and turn straight to the page. I will also write the page number in a small black font in the bottom right corner of the page. Every magazine includes page numbers in the corner of their pages so that the reader can look through the magazine easily. It is an essential part of a magazine.
My third flat plan is of the double page spread. I decided i would have a border along the top of the left page and the bottom of the left page. in the top left border i wrote Article.This is something that magazines often do so when the reader is flicking through the magazine they can go straight to any section of the magazine they want to read like, 'article', 'review', 'interview' and so on. i then wanted to have at least two photos on my double page spread so that it makes the page look more interesting and also because i have taken my pictures for the magazine and there are lots that i would like to use, however i am not sure yet wich ones i will use on the double page spread. i wanted one to almost fill the first page so that the reader knows straight away that they are at the beginning of a new article. I will then have another photo on the facing page which will be smaller. In the bottom right corner of the large photo i will write a caption that will introdouce the article like a title. This will be in large bright writing so that it stands out and will be one of the first pieces of text the reader sees. It needs to be written so that it sounds interesting and makes the reader want to carry on reading the article. I have not decided yet what i want it to say.
The article will be written in three columns. This is a layout that many magazines use. This is because it makes it easier to read and probably looks alot better too. The first letter of my article will be in large font to stand out. Many magazines and books do this so you know where to start reading. I think it also looks nice. The text for the article will be in about size 12 and will be in a simple black font so it is easy to read. The article will be about a new female pop artist called Alice Ashton. It will be about her new album and artists she has worked with to create it and about how successfull she has been so far and how she got there. I have not yet decided weather this will be an article or an interview as i think an article about her would work but an interview may be easier to write. However, wich ever one i choose i will definately include a quote on the page that is seperated from the rest of the article. This will be in a larger font than the rest of the article and possibly in a different font. It will also have large bright quotation marks to make it stand out. Most magazines do this, they pick out an interesting quote from the article or interview and write it bigger so that the reader will see it before they read the article and it will hopefully make them want to read the article. I will pick a quote that is interesting and not quite clear what its about so that the reader wants to read the article to find out what the quote is about. In the bottom right border there will be an arrow sight to signify to turn the page for the rest of the articel. This is helpful for the reader as they may not realise otherwise that there is more of the article. I am not sure of the colours and fonts i will use on my double page spread. I will decide when creating the pages on InDesign so that i can try out different combinations. None of the designs i have made on the three flat plans are final. I may find that when creating the page i find some of the designs don't look right and i may come up with better ones.
Fonts - Blog 5
When i was designing the front cover of my magazine i knew i wanted the title to have a prominent first letter like Rollling Stone and be original. I looked at a few fonts on fonts.com but couldnt find any that i liked enough. I then looked at the fonts that were already on InDesign and found a font called Harlow Solid. I like how it looks like an ultra violet sign and looks quite modern. When i was creating my cover on InDesign i decided to make the masthead pink to match the colour of the skirt in the photograph. I also made it so that the outline was pink but the rest of the font was white so that it stood out more.
I then chose the fonts for the sells on the cover. I knew i wanted them to be simple so they were easy to read. two fonts i found on InDesign were Century and Prestige Elite Std which are both serif fonts. I liked both so i used both of them on the cover for different sells depending on what i thought looked the best. I then highlighted the words so they look like they have been cut out of a magazine. This gives my magazine a more casual look wich should appeal to my target audience, it also makes the words stand out more. Most magazines use simple fonts so that it is easy to read. I used serif fonts for my sells because most magazines use serif. I also made the text all in bold so that it stands out more. For the name 'Alice Ashton' i used a font called Stencil wich is bold and prominent. I made this font fairly large on the page and made it blue with a black border so that it would catch the readers attention. i wanted it to stand out as it is the cover story. The majority of magazines make the cover story bigger than all the other sells so that the reader knows it is the main story. For the contents page I used the magazine title at the top of the page. I did this because Q magazine have the Q on their contents page and i tried it without on my contents page and it looked better with. For the word contents i used the font Prestige Elite Std which is a serif font, i made it blue and bold so it stands out well on the page. Under this it says Jan.10 which is also in Prestige Elite Std but is not bold and is black. it isnt as bold but still stands out as it is the darkest text on the page and it looks sophisticated. For the contents list i used Century again. For the page numbers i used font size 14 and in bold so it stands out. For the title of each page i used font size 14 and made the text yellow and bold and highlighted in grey. This stands out and the colours work well together. For the captions for each page i wrote a small summary for each page. Many magazines do this and i made some of them humerous and fun which is what Q does in every issue. The text for this is in size 12, black and not in boid. This is because the information is less important.
For the double page spread i used Century for all the text. Although both Century and Prestige Elite fonts are very simular are very simular, i used Century because i think it is looks better and is easier to read. I used size 10 for the main article text. I wasnt sure what size to use at first so i tried different sizes and printed the text to see which one looked the most like a real magazine. 10 seemed to be the right size to use. For quotes and the title i have used bigger text and made them bold so they stand out more. Most magazines do this so that when you first look at the page the quotes stand out and they should intise you to read on. I have taken interesting quotes from the article to make my audience want to read on. For one i wrote "my life hasn't been the same since", this should make the reader wonder what shes talking about so they will read on. In the top left and right corner i have written interview and exclusive. Most magazines including Q do this so when the reader is flicking through the pages they can look in the cornewr and know what section of the magazine they are on such as interview, review or news.
Photos- Blog 6 + editing of photos- Blog 7
When i knew we had to write an article i had the idea of using my sister and her being a new pop star. She is a fan of lady gaga and gwen stefani so i used that as my inspiration for the pop star. I didnt really have a plan of what she would be wearing i just knew i wanted to use bright colours and make her look modern. We got together lots of bright clothes and i set up a white backdrop and spotlight in my room. I wanted the photos to make her come across confident and fun. I took lots of pictures of her in different outfits and positions and kept coming up with new ideas as we went on. We even tried wrapping her in fairy lights as we had seen lady gaga do it in a magazine but it didnt look very good. Overall i was very happy with my photos. There were a few i didnt like but there were lots that i did and i had taken so many it took me a while to choose wich ones to use in the magazine. I think my photos go well with the genre of my magazine because they look modern and i tried to be creative with the positions and lighting. I also did some of them in colour and some in black and white. I also think that she reflects the target audience well as she is in the middle of the target age and i think she looks like the sort of person who would read a music magazine.
These are some examples of the photos
This photo is my favourite out of all the photos i took. I really like the lighting and the colours. I also like her facial expression and hand possition. It looks laid back and confident. I didnt include this photo in my magazine in the end because i tried it on the contents page but because it is landscape it didnt fit on the page well. I also wanted to include one of the black and white photos somewhere in my magazine and they were portrait so fitted better on the page.
Above is the photo i used for the front cover. There were others that could have worked on the cover but i liked the body position, the facial expression and i liked the colours and outfit. I like how she looks laid back and confident. Out of all the photos this stood out the most for being the cover photo because i think it looks the most like a cover photo. The bottom right corner is quite dark so i had to make it lighter before putting it on the front cover. I opened it in Photoshop. I then went to adjustments-brightess and contrast and i made the brightness higher. I think it worked well as the cover photo.
I used the photo above for the contents page. I like the lighting and facial expressions in the black and white photos because they look more innocent compared to the coloured photos which look more condident and laid back.
I used these two photos in the double page spread. i like the lighting and the contrast of the dark top against her face and hair. I also like the body position how she is leaning forward in both photos and she looks innocent in them. I think they go well together wich is why i chose them for the double page spread.
Planning and evaluating of the article- Blog 8
I looked at articles from Q and NME. The one in NME is a small article about Dizzee Rascal playing at the Carling Acadamy in Glasgow and how the audience wont understand what he is saying. The whole article is sarcastic and has jokes throughout. The first line of the article is a joke about celebritys who dont 'Travel well'. It then goes on to say "But few things travel as badly as hiphop. Generally, this has nothing to do with music, and more to do with your average rapper's reluctance to indulge in anything as outlandish as, like, actually turning up". This sounds very sarcastic and is definately written in an informal way. The whole article carries on like this and every other sentence has a sarcastic sound to it. I think it is quite a pointless article because it doesnt actually tell you anything. Basically it starts by saying that Dizzee wont go down well in Glasgow because he is a rapper and has a very different accent and ends saying that the gig did actaully go well and the audience loved him. I looked through the rest of the magazine and found that the whole magazine is laid back and informal. I read another article from NME about Britney spears wich is written in exactly the same way. The article strarts with the sentence "Pops relentless freakshow has turned out more than its fair share of celebrity casualties, but the descent of Britney Spears must surely be one of the most sad and gory of recent times." I think both these articles show that NME is aimed at an older audience of mostly men and who obviously dont like pop or hip hop. its definately a rock magazine and is a light read as it is very chilled out and sarcastic throughout. I dont like the way NME is written i think its to sarcastic and not jolly enough, there didnt seem to be much positive in any of the articles. I think this shows they target their audience well though. I then looked at an article with Will Smith from Q magazine. There is an introduction to the article written by a Q writter. The way it is wriiten is sarcastic but in a completely different way to NME. The humour is very light hearted and up-beat. Another thing i noticed is that each question in the article has been sent in by different Q readers. I really like this because it gets the readers involved and makes the magazine seem very friendly, the questions are also quite fun and silly. The main thing that makes the article is the fact that most of it is the answers given by Will Smith. He comes across very friendly and jokes in his answers, but not in a crude way like NME. One of the questions was "Did you ever think that uncle Phil from the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air looked like (rap mogul) Suge Knight? and Geoffrey the butler always seemed to have a dark side. Was he a perv?". All the questions are silly like this and Will Smith always answers back in a jokey way and at the end of some of his answers it even says he laughs in brackets. Some other questions asked were "What's been your weirdest fan experience?" and "What's your favourite swear word?". This interview is definatley written in an informal way. I really like the way its wriiten because every bit of it made me laugh and i liked the humour used, whereas with NME i thought the humour was a bit to sarcastic and just sounded like they were dissing people the whole time. I looked through the rest of Q and the whole magazine is the same, sarcastic and funny but in a light hearted way. I like how they have funny captions in the corner of every picture just for the sake of it. I think this proves that Q can definately appeal to a younger audience range from teenagers all the way up to about 45. I also think it appeals to men and women, i think there are jokes and articles that everyone can enjoy. Both magazines moslty use reviews as their articles and include lots of quotes, the interviews tend to be mainly for the main cover story or other big stories. At first i found it very difficult to come up with the concept for my article. I knew i was writing about a new artist that has made it big but i found it hard to write it even after looking at other articles. I decided to do a spider diagram of different things i could include. That quikly helped me to come up with lots of ideas. I knew i wouldnt be able to fit the whole article on to one page so i only had to write half the article and i tried my best to get lots of interesting information into the article. I started with an intro about the new star and how 'MusicFix' wanted to hear more from the star herself. I tried to write in the way that i ahve seen so many magazines do before. often in an interview the interviewer will say where they met up with the star, like a cafe, so my second paragraph starts by sying "Sat in the cafe opposite me on a big red sofa drinking a mug of coffee, hair down and scruffy and wearing a long chquered shirt Alice Ashton looks like a normal 23 year old... but not many 23 year olds can say they have Pharrell Williams' number saved on their phone, is good pals with the Sugababes and has a Brit Award sat on the shelf at home." i think this sounds very laid back and relaxed. I have writen the whole article in this informal way to appeal to the audience. I have written most of it as quotes from Alice Ashton. Its written like she is telling her stroy of her rise to fame. I wanted it to be an interview but i haven't written it like a script like most magazines do. Ive written it like Alice is talking to the audience herself. I think this is good because it makes the reader feel more involved and closer to the star.
Evaluation of the finnished magazine- Blog 9
The first thing i started with for this project was coming up with a name for my magazine. i wrote down a list of possible names and kept thinking of new ones as i went along. I came up with about twenty names. I then narrowed it down to about six that i liked the most and asked friends and family which they liked the best to help me deccide. I named my magazine MusicFix. When choosing the font for the title of my magazine i noticed i liked the way Rolling Stone magazine had a very original font that you dont see anywhere else. I also liked the prominence of the first letter wich makes it recognisable and stand out on a shop shelf. I wanted mine to have the same effect so chose a font called Harlow. I think it works really well.
When designing and creating my magazine i tried to stick to the forms and conventions of real magazines. I put my masthead at the top of the front cover running from left to right. I could have been more creative like some magazines and done it down one side at an angle but i think this suits my magazine. i also did a list on the cover of artists featured in the magazine wich is something many magazines do. I also included the main sell wich has the artists name larger than the rest of sells so it stands out as it is one of the mostimportant pieces of information on a cover. Most magazines make the cover story bigger than any other stories. I included a strapline with other articles wich is something qlot of magazines do. On the cover and throughout the magazine i have used simple fonts wich are easy to read but made them more interesting by using colour and boldness. I think my magazine differs from other magazines because it looks alot more simple than other magazines but still looks interesting and I think it would stand out on the shelf at a newsagents because it has a white background but then has lots of bright colours in the photo and text as well as bold writting. This stands out against the white and catches the eye. I think the name alice ashton would also catch the eye because it is large bright and uses alliteration.
I think my magazine appeals to and represents a young, fun and laid back audience. this is reflected in the use of colour in my magazine. Although at the beggining of the project i wrote that i want my magazine to appeal to both a male and female audience, i think that the end product would appeal to women more. The colours are bright and there is pink on evey page wich suggests it is targeted at women. I tried to make it more masculine with the use of blue colours and bold lettering but i think if i were to do it again i would do a bit more to make it appeal to males. The age range i wanted it to appeal to was the same as Q, from teenagers to mid 40's. Again i think i havent achieved that very well. I think it looks like it is for a younger audience so again i would try and make it more mature. I also think it looks very pop like but i wanted it to be a bit rocky too. If i had to do my magazine again overall i would make it a bit more masculine, mature and more rocky. However saying this i am very happy with the outcome and wouldn't want to change much about it.
When writing my magazine i have tried to make it as main stream as posible, using a combination of Q and Rollling Stone as my inspiration. I have also written about a new brittish star who has been very successful inm britian. I think that because of this my magazine would be be published by a fairly big uk publisher and my magazine would be sold in lots of different shops and newsstands, like WHSmiths, Tesco and other supermarkets, Boots, Superdrug etc.
When designing a magazine one of the most important things to think about is target audience. If you do not design your magazine around the interests of your target audience and just randomly design it without thinking about the audience then your magazine will not sell.
I used the website www.NRS.co.uk to look at the target audiences of a magazine of the same genre as my magazine. The website shows the figures of different target audiences of magazines over the last year. I have looked at Q magazine because like my magazine, it looks at lots of different genres of music. On the website it says that Q magazine's total audience is 666,000 people. Out of that the largest target audience are from the ages of 15 to 44 which is an audience of 572, 000. Their second biggest audience is of 444,000 who are either high ranking professionals, middle ranking professionals or office workers. The website also shows that their audience of men is a total of 513,000 and their audience of women is a much lower 153,000. However, it shows that, skilled manual workers, semi and unskilled workers and people who are on benefits and unemployed are half of that of high ranking professionals and are an audience of 222,000 people and that their audience of 45+ is only 94,000. This information shows me that the popular target audience for this genre of magazine is males between the ages of 15 and 44 who are high ranking professionals to office workers. This means that i should be aiming my magazine at a similar target audience in order for my magazine to sell.
I have created a profile for a typical reader of Q Magazine to give a clearer view of their target audience and my potential target audience. This reader is a 30 year old male and is a middle ranking professional. He is the manager of a record shop in Brighton. He is very interested in music and it is a huge part of his everyday life. He listens to retro and current Rock, Hip Hop and Alternative music. He reads Q because it includes most genres of music from old and current artists and is more sophisticated than any other music magazine. This means that he can read about music and artists work rather than what the artist is wearing or who they are dating. Unlike some magazines who focus more on the gossip side of music celebrities lives. he often discovers new and obscure artists when reading Q and likes to read about music events and gigs that he may want to go to. He mostly enjoys this for the news, articles, reviews and interviews, which Q has a good variety of.
When creating my magazine i always tried to think about the target audience. When creating the front cover chose a photo that looked fun, modern and confident. I wanted it to appeal to my target audience because it is one of the first things you look at on a magazine cover. I chose fonts that were easy to read but tried to make them a bit more interesting and asthetically pleasing on the page by using different sizes, bold fonts, thin fonts, use of colour and highlighting the text. I think this works well as my magazine looks contemporary wich will appeal to my audience. I made the masthead pink to match the skirt she is wearing in the photo. This made the cover look a bit to girly so i then used blues and bold text so that it appeals to both men and women. On the contents page i mostly used the colour blue and theres lots of black and white with some of the text and the photos to make it look different from the front cover and again i wanted it to look more masculine. However i also used yellow and pink in the magazine title. i think this makes it appeal to both genders. When writing the contents list i tried to do what Q does and make the captions sound a bit humerous. I think this will appeal to my target audience and will make the magazine enjoyable to read like Q is. On the double page spread, mlike the front cover, i used simple fonts but then made the quotes stand out by making them bold, colourful and using bright exclamation marks. I also used photos that were simular and the colours i used in the text are taken from her fake eyelashes in the photo. This keeps the page colour co-ordinated and makes it look nice to look at.This will appeal to my target audience because it is consistant but not boring, i think i have made it look fun and interesting so the reader will want to read the article. The way i have written the article should also appeal to my target audience because it is easy to read and is quite straight forward. However at the same time i have included lots of information and quotes and tried to make it have a bit of light hearted humour like Q does. I have tried to write it in a way that the reader wants to carry on reading and find out what happens next as it is written like the artist is telling a story to the audience.
When creating my magazine, at first i didnt really know how to use in design and i found i had to ask for help alot on how to do certain things. However as time went on i discovered different tools and by the end found it very easy to use. Im glad i learnt how to use more tools as the project went on because that enabled me to improve my magazine and work quicker when i was doing it. I knew how to use Photoshop before we started this project so when i had to edit the title and the photos it was easy for me to do it quickly. At first i didnt like using InDesign at all because i found it difficult to use, but after using it i now would deffinately use it again for other projects.
Comparing this project to the preliminary coursework where i created a college magazine i think it is very obvious that my skills have improved. The college magazine is very simple and there was alot i wanted to do to it that i couldn't because i didn't know how to use InDesign. I think this project is better than the preliminary coursework partly because we had more time to do it so it gave me time to learn the programme and make improvements. I learnt lots of new tools on InDesign and felt more creative whilst creating my magazine wich i hope comes across in my work.
I am very pleased with the final outcome of my magazine. I like the front cover and the double page spread the best because i know i put the most work into them and i think they look good. I am also pleased with the article i wrote as when i started it i found it really hard to come up with ideas and i am pleased with the photo shoot i did for my magazine. My highlights during this project were the photoshoot which i really enjoyed and creating the front cover and double page spread in InDesign because as the project went on and i got better at using the programme i found it made me more creative. I showed some family members and friends my magazine and asked them to give me some feedback on what they thought of it.
My sister Alice who is 23 on the front cover says "i really like the front cover because you have kept it colour co-ordinated and i like the photo you chose for it too. I also like the name because it really stands out on the page. I agree with you that you could have made it a bit more masculine to make it appeal to men and women but it does look really good the way it is."
My brother who is 24, so also in the middle of my target audience said "my favourite part of your magazien is the double page spread. I really like the photos on the page and how you have layed it out. I think it looks like a real magazine with the quotes you have used and the layout. I like the article and i like the way its written but its a shame you couldnt have included more of the article because i wanted to turn the page and carry on reading it. i think the colours and look of it would appeal to the target audience of men and women and it looks quite grown up too."
i also asked a couple of my friends who are both 18 and say "i think the whole thing looks like a real magazine. I really like the front cover because of the way you have used different colours and i like the layout even though its quite simple. I like the contents page lots too but i think it doesnt go with the rest of the magazine very well, i think you could have used some darker colours because it looks like a pop magazine for a younger audience. The same for the front cover, it does look really good but it could look more grown up." and "yeah i agree i think its good and looks like a real magazine but could appeal to your target audience more by looking a bit more grown up. I think that only goes for the cover and contents page though, i think the double page spread will appeal to your target audience well because of the layout and colours and i really like the article too. I love your photos i think your sister looks like a popstar."
Below are the hyperlinks to my magazine pages-
https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0BxOiCXgF2drhNDQzMGJmNTYtNWZjOS00N2EzLTkzZjAtYWIwMjVlNDgwYTM5&hl=en
https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0BxOiCXgF2drhZGNlMDViYTgtN2ExMS00NTVjLWI3M2YtMzUyMzljYWM3ZTkx&hl=en
