AS media

AS Media Foundation Portfolio Music Magazine Log Book Daniel Parker-Smith

Section 1 Research

Research On The Magazine, Kerrang
Kerrang! is a weekly released rock music magazine.
It is produced by Bauer Media Production
The name is an onomatopoeic representation of the sound made when a guitar power chord is played “Kerrang!”
Kerrang! commenced publication on 7 th June 1981and was initially a one time supplement in the Sounds Newspaper.
AC/DC were the first band to appear on Kerrang’s first front cover

Conventions Of Kerrang Magazine Selling Line Main Cover Line Masthead Banner Main Image Image Image Banner Barcode and Price Button, Selling Line Anchorage Text, selling line

Research On Classic Rock Magazine
Classic Rock Magazine is a monthly released rock music magazine
It is produced by Future Publishing
Firmly focusing on bands between 1960’s and 1990’s, the magazine also includes articles and reviews on new, upcoming bands
The magazine started off as a small project but is now in bigger circulation than NME
Geoff Barton is the editor at large for classic rock magazine, who was the first editor of Kerrang! magazine

Publisher of Classic Rock Magazine
Classic rock magazine (my main magazine I will be focusing on for my research), is published by Future PLC. Future PLC is a media company founded in 1985 by Chris Anderson that's industry focuses on magazine publishing but also internet publishing. In 2006 it was the 6th biggest publisher in the United Kingdom. It publishes more than 150 magazines in fields such as video games, technology, automotive, cycling, films and photography.
“ Chris Anderson, a guru of the information age” – guardian.
Chris Anderson, 2007, making a speech, “ I have a Dream”.

Conventions Of Classic Rock Magazine Main Image, Black and White to show a vintage and classic look Barcode Main Cover Line Masthead Flash Button, Selling Lines Jimmy Page, Iconic to classic rock music Cover Lines Banner Anchorage Text Flash, Button Subheading, selling line Iconic name, Cover Line Price, month, issue number Anchorage Text

Analysing Classic Rock Magazine Contents Page
Classic rock magazine has very simplistic magazine contents pages.
They focus on the main article image and have small text towards a small portion of the screen.
The contents page would also have the page number, issue number and date in a corner of the page.
In this case the magazine is focusing on a singer as the main image as the front cover image reflects this and the main article of the magazine is “The 50 greatest singers in rock”

Analysing Classic Rock Magazine Double Page Spread
Classic rock magazine has very simplistic double page spreads for their articles. This formal approach appeals to their skewed older audience. This contrasts to than young adults who would prefer a more informal font, however this house style does still appeal to them but primarily an older audience.
Classic rock also uses few images and lots of text as the skewed older audience prefer more in detail accounts of the article rather than lots of pictures.
Large first letter of paragraph Quotes from the interview Few images to lots of text

Analysing Classic Rock Magazine
Images and Layout: The layout of the magazine is very eye catching with subtle colours across the banner and mainly black and white text and images makes it stand out among many other rock style magazines. They also include many selling lines that are quite bold to emphasise the key selling points of the magazine, “Free 16 track CD”. The main image is of Jimi Hendrix, and rock and roll icon. The image is in black and white to show the raw emotion of the photograph and to signify his death.
Font: The Masthead of the magazine is typically white and a bold retro font to make it stand out among the other cover lines and images. Under the masthead to the right is a small selling line, “High Voltage, Rock and Roll”. This shows the genre of the magazine to anyone who doesn’t recognize Jimi Hendrix, an iconic figure in rock music.
Design: The design is very but effective. It has a very formal approach in its design and shows its sophistication of the magazine and the genre. The overall mise en scene allows it to full fill its purpose and appeal to and audience of rock music.
USP (Unique Selling Point): Classic Rock magazines unique selling point is its established brand. It is one of the few rock magazines which focus on classic rock and have a good reputation in doing so. The magazine also have a website, http:// www.classicrockmagazine.com / .
Main Image, Artist representation: The main image of Jimi Hendrix infers him to be a rock musician that is very edgy. We know from the picture that the artist isn’t going to be a member of a pop group.

Section 2 Planning

Market Research
I have decided to produce a questionnaire that is designed to produce quantitative data, therefore the data will be much easier to collect and understand. It will produce an audience demographic for each sub genre of rock magazines and let me understand the audience and their product.
My questionnaire should tell me about my audience: Information Such As:
-Gender
-Age
-How often they purchase a music magazine
-If they do, where they buy a music magazine
-Their preffered genre of music
-Where they read about music news
-Would a free gift convince them to buy the magazine, if so which?
-Are they likely to start a subscription to a magazine if they like it
-Would they be interested in an album of the month/week idea?
-What is missing from current magazines that would convince them to buy a magazine

Questionnaire
This is a sample copy of my questionnaire that I have asked my audience to fill out to gather research on what audience I should be targeting and to find out more about the audience of a rock music magazine.
When I had collected my data I used Microsoft excel to produce a series of tables that featured my results. Once these had being completed I created 3 graphs and charts from the data. The first graph represents preferred music genres. From this I will. I next produced a table and graph for my target audience for rock music/classic rock music. Lastly I produced a table and graph to determine my audience’s preferred free gift in a classic rock magazine.

Graphs and Charts
This graph adds up to 108 total participants. Therefore to work out percentages I will multiply the values by 0.92.
This graph demonstrates that from my research the preferred music genres were Dance, Chart Hits/Modern/Pop and Rock. The least popular genres were Folk and classical. This shows that if I am targeting a rock music audience it is going to be approximately 22% of the total music magazine buyers.

Graphs and Charts
This graph adds up to 74 total participants. Therefore to work out percentages I will multiply the values by 1.35.
This graph proves that rock music magazines appeal to people aged from 13-61+. However the majority demographic age for the audience is 31-50. This can be broken down as 32% of the audience aged between 31-40 and 28.35% of the total audience aged between 41-50.

Graphs and Charts
This final graph presents evidence that suggests the audience of a rock music magazine would prefer a free gift of a CD rather than a digital download. I think this is because the primary age range (31-50) are more likely to have a CD player and use it regularly in comparison to a younger audience such as 13-21 who would rather have the MP3 download for easy transfer to an iPod or Mp3 player.
As my research Indicates various characteristics of my audience I can use this to build a profile for my target audience and base the magazine around it so it is aesthetically pleasing to the audience and the content is what the audience would like to read and find out about.

Design Ideas For My Front Cover Page
My front cover will be simplistic but have a very eye-catching image to get the audience’s attention.
The image will be from the concert and a close up from the singer to conform to other media texts of the genre.
I will have a main cover line and sub cover lines below and of a smaller font, this is typical of a music magazine.
The main cover line will represent the main double page spread and the main image on the front cover.
The masthead will be at the top of the page and slightly masked by a button offering a free CD to the reader.
Below the masthead will be a statement for the magazine and the price.
In the bottom right corner will be a barcode.
Cover lines Main Image Barcode Giveaway ticket Masthead Button Main cover line

Design Ideas For My Contents Page
My contents page will be very simplistic to follow the conventions of similar media texts such as classic rock magazine.
It will have one main image of a guitar, it will be in black and white to attract more attention to the set list and page numbers.
I will list the magazine articles (content) similar to a set list style, this will fit the rock genre mise en scene
There will not be any other content on the page (editors notes, etc) other than page number, date, etc.
The set list will have encore written at the bottom under the article list to follow the conventions of rock as a style and genre.
The text will be quite bold to attract the audience’s attention to the articles within the magazine. It will be red with a black outline, similar to the main cover line on the front cover
Text, “Contents” and issue number. List of articles in the magazine. Page number boxes.

Design Ideas For My Double Page Spread Images
My double page will follow similar conventions of other magazines of the genre.
There will be much more text in comparison to images (similar to this article).
I have included a link to the magazine website where there will be more photos and videos of the double page article feature.
It will have 4-6 images included on the two pages of the article. Some of these will be black and white and some colour, this is because the audience will be more likely to visit the website for more images and videos.
The text will be quite formal to fit the genre appeal of “Classic” rock rather than “Punk” in which the text would be much less formal.
I will also include quotes from the interview in larger text at sides of the page, this would entice the reader into reading more of the article if this was not the reason they purchased the magazine.
image Article Text Quote Quote Article Text Band Logo Article Headline

Ideas For My Photos/Images
For my photos and images I will be taking photos of a concert to convey the “indie” side of the magazine. However they will be shown in a way that still infers the message of a classic rock feel.
All of the photographs will be from live events, none will be studio photographs.
The shots will be mainly close ups and medium close ups to infer the intensity and feel of indie and classic rock. Also as the band is quite small and not as established and corporate the close up shows till convey the raw emotion and struggle involved in becoming a new upcoming band.
This will be emphasised in the facial expressions of the band used.

Double Page Spread Article
My article for my double page spread will be based on a band called Sound Of Guns.
I have arranged to go to the concert at Leeds Cockpit on the 23 rd February.
I will take some photos at the concert from the audience’s view (this will convey quite an indie yet classic feel to the magazine if I use audience based photos).
After the concert I have arranged to meet Lee, Lead guitarist and Andy, Lead Vocals.
I will have a short interview with them which I will record and type afterwards to produce my double page spread article.

Section 3 Production

Production Of Front Cover
This is the initial Idea I had for my front cover of the magazine and initial photo I had planned for the magazine. I decided to change it based on the fact I had very limited photos of the person on the front cover. To conform to current magazine of this genre, I would need the same person on the front cover in the double page spread and therefore I would be inable to complete this.
However I did still like the colour scheme and layout so this remained similar.

This is the initial layout for my magazine with the photo I have chosen
I will edit the photo so that it looks more interesting for the audience and a better image.
I will also change the text colour so that it does not blend in with the image and so it is clear and easy to read.
The colour scheme I will choose will be black and red

I have made some of the changes but I still have to make change to the text colour and insert the text for the headlines and cover lines
Also, the “FREE CD” circle covers part of the title and as this is a new magazine, nothing should cover the title until it is more established.
If something like a button or banner is going to cover part of the masthead it should be at the end so that most of the title is shown and the beginning is established to the audience.

This is the finished front cover of the magazine.
The colour scheme it black and red but with a white title in bold so that it stands out in comparison to the rest of the text.

Production Of Contents Page
For my contents page I decided to use a set list as the contents page.
I think this will appeal to the audience as a “gimmick” relating to the rock genre.
It will also display the articles clearly but still included in the context so it does not look too obvious and patronising to the audience.
At the end it says, “ENCORE”. This is another gimmick and relates to the rock genre, which will appeal to the audience.

I will use this photo for the background of my contents page as it is a good photo and represents the genre and band but still is not as distracting as a photo of a person or member of the band.
To emphasise this further I will make the photo black and white.

This is my finished contents page.
It includes the set list idea and the black and white photo from the concert.
I have included the text “Contents Page” and the list of the page numbers next to it so it still conveys with the rest of the magazine and does not look separate from it,
This mix of and “indie” type contents page with parts of the house style of the magazine fit together to create an iconic design that appeals to the audience.

Production Of Double Page Spread
On 23 rd February 2011 at Leeds Cockpit I met sound Of Guns as planned and took lots of photos for the production of my magazine.
I also had an interview backstage with them for the article of my double page spread.

I initially decided to have a background like this for my magazine to give it an “edgy” feel.
However after researching into other magazines, it was clear that a background is not used within double page spreads as it distracts the audience from the actual article.
As this was the case I decided to produce a simple yet effective double page spread that was quite formal.

This was the initial idea for my double page spread
It has some images and the article has been inserted in draft form, it is taking a basic shape and form of what I would like the magazine to look like
However I think that the images on the left page look to cluttered and are distracting to the audience Also the quote is not clear in the middle of the left page at the top. It could be emphasised with large speech marks (like they use in classic rock magazine).

This is my finished double page spread with the article on the band Sound Of Guns. All of the magazine article has been included with the interview, the photographs have been edited and placed in correctly with the text.
I have also included a small part in the corner of the right page that advertises “the rocker” website to the readers and gives details of the content included (more photos and videos).

The majority of the photos are black and white in this article for several reasons.
Firstly, to convey with other media texts such as classic rock magazine that also have a similar style by using black and white images.
Secondly, it conveys the edgy feel of rock music and gets this concept across to the audience.
Lastly, it also makes the images less detailed and therefore by advertising more photos on the website, people are more likely to visit the website to see the images. This creates more revenue for the magazine as advertisers will pay for adverts to be placed on the website and if more people are visiting the website due to extra content, more visitors=more expensive adverts.
Also in terms of audience, the older audience prefer more text and less images and are less likely to use a computer in comparison to younger people. Therefore by including a link to a website the younger audience have a place to access the photos and the older audience have more detail within the articles.

Section 4 Evaluation

In what ways will my new media product follow forms and conventions of real media products?
I plan for my music magazine to follow some conventions of current music magazines of the same genre (including, Classic Rock Magazine).
My magazine is similar in the fact that it has a similar layout, a barcode, the price listed on the cover, one main image, a central masthead, etc.

In what ways will my new media product develop forms and conventions of real media products?
My magazine also has developed some of these conventions further from traditional media texts of the genre.
It has done this by having more cover lines at the sides of the front cover to advertise the content of the magazine further.
It does have more cover lines but does show more of the front cover main image than classic rock magazine and this development of conventions appeals to my target audience of younger and older adults, skewed to older adults of the male gender.

In what ways will my new media product challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
My magazine will challenge the conventions of an existing media product such as classic rock magazine as I will include a free giveaway ticket competition to my magazine readers that will be advertised on the front cover. Classic rock magazine doesn’t advertise such competitions on the front cover and rely solely on the main cover lines, anchorage text and side cover lines. Some other magazines do have this feature but they are more indie rock orientated rather that classic rock.
My magazine will challenge the conventions of an existing media product as current front cover images lack in post production editing whereas my front cover will be edited and look

Representing Social Groups
My magazine will be representing the members of Sound Of Guns and adults of a similar age group. I will also be representing older adults within other parts of the magazine but these will not be included within the pages I have created.
My magazine will represent this age group as having a strong musical life and being with other musicians in a band for the majority of their time.
I will represent this through the pictures on my double page spread, front cover and through 2 quotes I will use from the band members interview that infers this representation.

Distribution Of My Media Product
My media product is primarily based upon Classic Rock Magazine and so follows some of its key forms and conventions.
I think that because of its similarity, Future Publishing is a company that is likely to be interested in publishing a monthly issue of my rock music magazine product.
I will market my product at £4.50, as I feel that this is an acceptable price for a monthly magazine of the classic rock genre. It also competes with the classic rock price of £4.99 which fits in the current market.

How I Can Attract My Audience
The audience for my magazine is primarily male adults, skewed towards older adults 40-60. I have researched my audience and their needs and attractions for a classic rock magazine and followed some of these conventions but altered some to cater for my younger adults market as well. An example of where I have catered for my older adult audience is to offer a free CD rather than a download as my skewed older audience are more likely to prefer a CD due to the fact that they would struggle to download music and would prefer a “hard copy” of the songs as opposed to a digital one.
An example of where I have catered for my younger audience is to offer a link to a website that has more videos and photos from concerts. This appeals to my younger audience more than my older audience due to the convergence of new technology.

Proposal Of My Product
My new media magazine is of a classic rock genre that keeps in touch with old music and searches to find new bands of the genre.
It will have detailed accounts on the new bands and their progression but continue to “stay in touch” with old band members and new ventures they may be taking. The product will also reminisce of old music and include galleries of old photos.
My magazine will also offer giveaways of free gifts including concert tickets. These will be primarily for new bands to raise awareness of them but will include ticket giveaways for more established bands as well.
As well as free ticket giveaways, the magazine will sometimes offer CD giveaways to attract new audiences and customers and cater for the current customers of the magazine.
I propose that my magazine should be sold within specialist music shops such as HMV as this would allow them to be sold in collaborate shops with the same company such as Waterstones. I also think the product should be sold in some supermarkets but primarily specialist shops. Lastly the magazine could be bought online and delivered as a convergence of new technology that appeals to the younger and older audience of the magazine.

Preparation and Creation Of Photography
As I took all of my photos at a concert there was little preparation for the photographs as they had to have an edgy feel with normal lighting (no artificial lighting).
I did have to make sure the camera would take good photos under such conditions (dark closed areas) so I did some camera tests before the concert to adjust the settings.

Using Photoshop To Manipulate Images
I have used Adobe Photoshop to edit my images to make them a higher quality. I chose to edit the front cover quite a lot so that it would attract the audience’s attention for the front cover, where as the double page spread images would not be edited as much.
This is the original image from the Sound Of Guns Concert This is the edited image from the Sound Of Guns Concert

Analysing My Front Cover
I think my front cover is fit for purpose as it is appealing to its audience, looks aesthetically pleasing. It also has clear and concise text that is easily accessible to the audience (easy to read). The page also has a distinct house style that is representative of the rock music genre.
The cover lines give enough detail of the actual article content and do not overwhelm the audience with information on the articles.
The button in the corner offers a free gift that is easily visible to the audience and is appropriate for the audience as a gift.
The giveaway of tickets to a reader is clear and so attracts the audience to the magazine further.
The price and magazine slogan/motto is clearly visible to the audience below the masthead which is also clear to see and read for the audience.
The front cover also has a high quality image that is clear, sharp and not blurred. It is also edited to appeal to the audience to make it more aesthetically pleasing in comparison to the original.
Overall I think my front cover could be placed in the music magazine market as it is appealing to the audience and looks fit for purpose and professional.

Analysing My Contents Page
My contents page is a simplistic style yet informative. It lists the magazine contents clearly to the reader yet displays it in a format that is representing the rock music genre and is aesthetically pleasing to the audience.
The text, “Contents Page” and the page numbers is the same as the front cover to make the magazine flow from the front cover to the contents page, and into the magazine further.
By creating a simple flow of the magazine style it makes it easy for the audience to read and attracts them into reading more of the magazine almost seamlessly.
The image quality of the background photograph is clear and sharp. It is black and white which gives it the rock theme yet doesn’t distract the audience from the actual contents page text.

Analysing My Double Page Spread
My double page spread is a classic, formal style that gets across all of the information in the article without distracting the audience with adverts, bold backgrounds or any other images and text that are aside from the article.
The images are high quality for the audience and have a photographic style that follows the conventions of other magazines such as classic rock magazine
The written article gives an accurate representation of the band within the photos and raises awareness of their band, current songs and new, upcoming album.

Audience Reaction
Before my magazine began production I surveyed 100 people (50 men, 50 women) to determine my target audience and what they would expect from a rock music magazine (photos, articles, content, overall look, style). Now that my magazine has been created I will now survey 100 people on the product.
I will ask the participants if:
-They think the magazine has a realistic front cover and mise en scene for its genre
-Does the front cover advertise the magazine as a good product, does it show links to the key features of the magazine content
-Is the contents page clear and easy to understand
-Whether they enjoy the content on the double page spread
-How do they rate the quality of photos out of 10 and whether they reflect the magazine mise en scene and content
-Would they pay £4.50 a month for the magazine if it were to be fully completed and sold in a shop?

Audience Reaction
Quotes From Audience Feedback:
“ I thought the mix of old classic rock bands with upcoming rock bands was a good idea, worth the £4.50”.
“ A good magazine but some fonts were out of place for the magazine”.
“ The photos were really good, very clear and more to appear on a website”.
“ The article was detailed and had lots of information on the band. Definitely a magazine I would buy”.
Overall I think my magazine production was professional, aesthetically pleasing and attracted my target audience. I also feel the price was acceptable and the audience would be willing to pay for the finished product.

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