Media Coursework

1. Kellie Nee

2. Masthead:
‘The Ark’ is the name of my music
magazine. The masthead is included at the
top of the page like most magazines. I
decided to position it to the left so that the
image could be seen clearly. Some
magazines choose to overlap the picture
and the magazine but with my colour
scheme, this wouldn’t of worked as well. I
decided to make my masthead black as this
fitted in with my colour scheme and
allowed the text to stand out and be seen.
Cover Lines:
I decided to add three cover lines on my
front cover to show some thing's that were
featured in the magazine. Most magazines
have these featured on their front cover to
try and persuade people to buy their
magazine and let them know what is
included in the articles and interviews. I
have also chosen to keep them all one
colour, because it allows them to connect
together and when I was looking at other
examples, I think this worked well.
Quote:
I decided to include a quote from my
main article because it is a quote from
the celebrity that is featured in the
interview and it may persuade people to
want to read the full interview. I also
chose to place the text in front of the
main picture because this is something I
have seen in other music magazines
which has worked successfully.
Picture:
I included a large image on my
front cover of the main celebrity
featured in the interview. Most
magazines include a large
picture on their front cover of
the person featured in the main
article. This person is usually a
well known celebrity which will
persuade people to buy the
magazine. The main picture is
placed as the background and
everything is placed on top of
the layer as this is a common
convention in music magazines.
I also chose to position the
model to the right so that the
information can be placed next
to her and can be seen clearly.
My Front cover
Example of a front
cover
Plug:
I chose to add a plug to my
front cover because this was
a common feature that was
included on front cover of
magazines. I decided that this
would work well because it
adds colour to my front cover
and I stands out as well. The
plug on the example front
cover is also in a different
colour which allows it to
stand out, I think this effect
works well.

3. My contents page
Example of a contents
page
Contents Title:
I added this title to the top of my
page to let the readers know which
page they are reading. A title for the
contents is included in most
magazines to show some kind of
order in the magazine and to keep
the pages structured. This helps to
keep the magazines professional
and organised. I also decided to
choose black as the text colour
because it fits in with my colour
scheme and allows the text to stand
out.Plug:
On my magazine contents page, I decided
to add two plugs because it lets the
readers know some of the things featured
in the magazines. I decided to link the
plugs to the pictures on the page so that it
was easy to locate. A plug is a common
convention in a magazine and this is
especially common for the genre of
magazines which I have been looking at.
Magazine title:
Most magazines include the name of
their magazine on the contents page
because this is a common feature. I
chose to place this in the top corner
because from research, I found out that
this was one of the best places to put it
because it works well and helps to keep
the page organised.
Text:
The text on my contents page
includes all the information of what
is included in the magazine. It gives
the readers the page numbers so
that they can find certain articles or
interviews. I chose to put the page
numbers in bold so that these stood
out more than the text. Every
magazine includes a contents page.
The majority of contents pages
include images that are featured in
the magazine as well as text.
Images:
I added 6 pictures to my contents
page of images that are included in
my magazine. Most contents pages
in magazines include a selection of
pictures to show the readers what is
featured. The images vary in size
and also include the page numbers
so that they are easy to locate in the
magazine. This helps the page to be
organised. I also decided to keep my
images all the same shape because I
think this also allowed the page to
look structured and organised.

4. My double page spread
Example of a double page
spread
Main picture:
I decided to add a main picture
which took up one side of A4
because I thought that this allowed
it to stand out and this would work
because this is the main article. I
chose a medium long shot for this
image because I thought this
helped to fill the page. A lot of
magazines use this technique
because it allows the page to look
organised and will persuade the
reader to read the article.
Pull Quote:
I decided to add a pull quote to my
double page spread because this is
a common convention which I saw
in current magazines. I think that it
works well and allows the text to be
broken up. The pull quote may also
be used as a technique to persuade
the readers to read the full article.
Text:
The main selection of text
included on my page is my
main article. Most articles
include a main article or
feature and these are
usually advertised on the
front cover. I chose to split
the text into three columns
because I thought that this
worked well when looking
at other current
magazines. The text is in
black which allows it to
stand out against the
background and fit in with
my colour scheme.
Pictures:
I chose to add three images
on the second page but these
images are much smaller.
The images used are from
the same shoot which was
specifically done for the
magazine. This is something
that I have noticed when
looking at other magazines,
including the example on the
right. I decided to place them
at the bottom of the page
because it separates them
from the text and allows the
page to be structured.
Header:
I added a header to show the
celebrities name and I added a
coloured background to the title to
allow it to stand out. From the
example that I looked at, they also
chose to use the celebrities name
as the title. This is a common
technique used in magazines as it
keeps the page structured and is
easy for the readers to follow.

5.  Gender: Most of my images featured in my magazines are mainly female
based. This is because the genre of music which I have looked at are often
female based. The females in my images are represented as girls who like
to look after their appearance and wear stylish clothes. They are also seen
as very confident in the images as well, which is well known for females
rather than males. There is also a clear division between boys and girls in
my images. The girls are seen posing in each picture but the boys are seen
playing instruments and the images aren't set up. This is because girls are
usually seen to take images a lot more than boys, and this is especially
specific for teenagers.
 Age: All of my images featured in my magazine include young teens. In
most current magazines it is mainly the younger generation that is
featured on the front cover of magazines or featured in the articles. It is
also mainly the younger generation that buy these types of magazines as
well. The younger people are represented in my magazine as stylish,
people who look after their appearance and confident. This is a typical
representation of younger teens. They also care about friendships as well,
as this is a common theme that can be seen in my images on my contents
page as well. A lot of my images include groups of teenagers, which helps
show this representation.
 Ethnicity: The chosen genre of my music for my magazine is mainly
dominated by white people. The genres I chose were pop and Indie so
this is why I decided that all the people featured in my images are white as
this would be something you would typically see in this type of magazine
and also something that would be common to see in the genres of music
which I chose. Also, due to the conditions of production and the location
where I live, I don’t know a lot of black people and therefore, it wasn’t a
conscious idea to not include different types of ethnicity.

6.  Class: The majority of the people within my images are mainly
middle class. This is because it reflects the genres of my music
magazine, Pop and Indie. These music genres are usually associated
with mainly middle class people, so I thought that it was important
to show these types of people within my music magazine.
 Genre: The genres of music associated with my magazine are pop
and indie. The people featured in my magazine represent these
music genres because, they are all wearing stylish clothes which is a
well known feature which pop stars would wear. The female's in my
magazine all have their makeup done nicely and take care of their
appearance, this would also be something that you would see
within the pop and indie music industry. A lot of students look up to
people within the music industry and these include a lot of the
younger generation, therefore, I have included mostly younger
people within the pictures in my music magazine.

7. ‘Hello, we are Egmont and we’re here
to encourage more and more children
to enjoy the sheer pleasure of reading.
That aim drives everything we do,
whether it’s books, magazines or
digital media and it has made us the
UK’s leading children’s publisher, for
babies through to teens.’
‘Quality is our No.1
objective. Every month we reach
multi-million highly educated
people and over 1.3 million
active subscribers. People read
our content across 50 websites,
34 magazines and over 70
brands.’
‘Bauer Media is a division of the
Bauer Media Group, Europe’s
largest privately owned publishing
Group. The Group is a worldwide
media empire offering over 300
magazines in 15 countries, as well
as online, TV and radio stations.’
I have looked at three different publishing companies that I could choose for my music magazine. I
have looked at each of the companies websites and researched what other brands they publish and
work with. Egmont works with a lot of pop magazines, Immediate also works with a lot of pop
magazines and Bauer works with a variety of different magazines and music companies that offer a
range of music genres. Therefore, I think that Bauer would be best for my magazine as it looks at a
variety of music genres that fit in with my magazine.

8.  ‘Bauer Media is a division of the Bauer Media Group, Europe’s
largest privately owned publishing Group. The Group is a
worldwide media empire offering over 300 magazines in 15
countries, as well as online, TV and radio stations.’ (Bauer
Website)
 I decided to choose Bauer as the company that would publish
my magazine because I think that they have a small gap within
their company which would fit my magazine. They publish
some music magazine, for example, Q, but I think they would
benefit from a magazine that includes pop and indie music. I
think that this company offers magazines that only focus on
one specific music genre and I don’t have a music magazine at
the moment that included the two genres of pop and indie in
one music magazine which I decided to include in my music
magazine. I also decided to choose this publishing company
because they have some experience in the type of music
featured in my magazine because they work with companies
like Kiss and 4 music. These companies play and advertise the
type of music which would be featured in my magazine,
therefore, this would be beneficial as they have some
experience working with this type of music. Overall, I think that
my magazine would be suitable for this publishing company as
there is a gap in their market for my magazine and also they
have some knowledge which would benefit my magazine as
well.

9. The target age for my music magazine are
mainly students, 16-20 years old. The majority
of my readers will be female and I decided to
make the price £3 as this is a suitable price for
students to pay monthly. The two genres of
music which will be included in my magazine
are pop and indie. The readers of my magazine
are typical teenagers who have part time jobs
and enjoy spending time with their friends on
weekends. My readers also like using social
media and are up-to-date with technology.
They also like going to festivals and seeing their
favourite artists at their concerts. I think that
my target audience would be interested in my
music magazine because I have thought about
the design of my magazine and what is
included so that they would be interested in
the look and the content. I included
information about festivals, clothing, interviews
and a lot of information about current music.

10.  I wanted to make sure that my music magazine was suitable for my target audience and
included everything that they wanted to see in a music magazine. When planning my
magazine, I looked back at my surveys and interviews, and made sure that I was including
the right things for the target audience. Some of the things which I included were…
Lots of images: I decided to include a lot of
images in my music magazine because it
makes the pages look more interesting and
it is something that would appeal to my
target audience because they want to see
what is included in the magazine and want
to see what they are reading about. The
images that I have included show who is
featured in my magazine and show some
pictures from events.
Colour scheme: I decided to create a colour
scheme of Blue, White and Black. I thought
that this was a simple but effective scheme
that would appeal to my readers. I decided to
choose Blue as the main colour because my
readers are young teenagers, so I chose a
colour that is bright and vibrant that would
make the pages look very interesting. I
thought that choosing black and white for the
other two colours within my scheme would
work well because this allows the main
colour of blue to stand out and the scheme
would be easily recognisable for the
magazine.
Information about events: When I carried out my
research, I found out that one of the things that
people most liked about music magazines, was
finding out about past and future events. When I
was designing my contents page and flat plan, I
made sure that I included events pages in the
magazine and I also decided to include a picture
from a local event. I thought that this would
appeal to my audience because it is something
that they like in current magazines and my target
audience are mainly students, so they would be
wanting to know of any events to attend.

11.  Interviews: Another one of the things that I found out that
people liked the most in music magazines were interviews.
I included a main interview on my double page spread and
several smaller interviews throughout the magazine
because I knew that this is what my target audience would
want and therefore, the magazine would appeal to them. I
decided to interview well known people in my music
magazine because this is what people look for and this is
something that they would enjoy reading I also found out
that most current music magazines, feature their main
celebrity interview as the front cover as well. This is a
common technique which persuades readers to buy
magazines. I decided to do this because Interviews was the
aspect that my target audience liked the most, therefore I
thought that this would be suitable.
Suitable Price: When I did my research on current
music magazines, I looked at all the different prices
and when magazines were published. I also asked a
question in my survey about prices of music
magazines and what they thought would be suitable. I
found out that the most popular price which people
would pay is £2-£3. I decided to go with £3 for my
magazine because it would be published once a
month and my target audience were mainly students,
so I wanted to make the price reasonable so they
could purchase the magazine every month without
worrying about cost issues. The grade which would be
the majority of my readers in the National Readership
Survey would be grade B as this is the working class
section and would fit the category for my readers.
Entertainment: When I evaluated the results of my survey, I
found out that people mostly like the entertainment that is
included within the music magazines and this is something
they would expect to see a lot of in the magazines. Therefore,
when I was completing my planning I made sure that I included
a lot of entertainment within my magazine, I thought about
this when writing my cover lines on my front cover, information
about the pages on my contents page, my main article for my
double page spread and all the information on my flat plan. I
decided to include a variety of entertainment in my magazine,
including interviews, events, competitions and lots of celebrity
information. I also included quite a lot of females within my
magazine because the majority of my readers are female, and
they look for role models within magazine and this is
something that persuades them to buy a magazine.

12.  I have learnt a lot about technology in the process of making my music magazine. For example, in the all the different stages of
my process, I used a variety of websites or programmes to help me with my research and planning. I have also learnt that it is
important to back up my work all of the time and remember to constantly save it. Sometimes when you are working on
something, the computer may shut off, or freeze, therefore it may not save your work. Backing up is important because you may
loose a memory stick or forget where you saved your files. This can help you keep on progress with your work. Another thing
which I learned through this process is that all technology is easily joined up. For example, I took my images on a digital camera,
then uploaded them to the computer, edited them on Photoshop and uploaded them to my blog. This is very useful when doing
these projects because it makes the uploading easier and quicker.
Survey Monkey- We used survey monkey to
set up a questionnaire for people to fill out
online, so that we could gather information
about what people like and dislike about
magazines and also begin to collect data
research. We started by setting up an account
on survey monkey and then we planned and
constructed our survey on the website. After
we had finished we got given a link which we
could send to people or add to our social
media, so that people could fill them out. The
answers were then collected and finalised on
the website. The advantages of survey
monkey are that it collects all the results and
answers for you so that it is easy to evaluate.
The disadvantages are that the link that it
gave me for people to access my survey,
didn't work for some people and they found
it hard to locate.
Blogger- We all set up a blogger
account through Google so that
we had our own page where we
could post all our work so that it
could be marked. Using blogger
allowed us to keep track of our
progress and keep all of our
work in the right order. The
advantages of blogger are that
it is really easy to upload my
files and you can customise
your blog to make it your own. I
didn't really find any
disadvantages with blogger
because everything was easy to
do and easy to understand.

13.  Photography- As part of the planning stage, we had
to plan our photos which we were going to take for
our magazine. We had to plan, costume, camera
shots, location, sets, lighting, etc. This was
important for keeping us organised and allowed us
to plan our front cover, contents page and double
page spread. We needed a minimum of four photos
which we had to take ourselves. I also used a digital
camera to take my images for my magazine. I had
used a camera before in my other course for
photography but I was able to develop my
understanding further on taking set up images in a
studio.
InDesign- I used InDesign to make my final double
page spread. I added my pictures which I had taken
and I also wrote and article on word and added this
text in as well for my main interview. The advantages
of InDesign are that it was very easy to add all of my
pictures and text onto the layout and I could easily
change them to how I wanted it to look. The
disadvantages of using InDesign were that I found it
difficult to locate certain tools that I wanted to use.
For example, I wanted to make an edit to my text and
I found it hard to find the tool which I was looking for.
The difference between using InDesign and
Photoshop was that it was a lot simpler on InDesign
because the content I needed to include was very
simple and everything was already edited already. So
I found this easier to use but Photoshop was slightly
more complicated because I had to edit the photos
and also make my front cover and contents page
without any layout to start with.

14.  Audio Recording- For the research for our own music
magazines, we needed to construct an interview so that
we could begin to make a reader profile and understand
what the readers would like best. I decided to use an
audio recorder for my interviews as I thought that this
was an easy way to get all of the answers which I
needed. I planned out a series of questions and recorded
the answers from a few of my friends. I then used Adobe
Premier to edit the recording and put it all together on
my blog. Although Premier was a video editing
programme, I decided to use this for my audio recording
because I thought that this was easy to import my files
into and I found it very simple to use for what I was
intended to do. The advantages of audio recording is
that it is an easy way to record answers for my research
and all the answers are in one file. The disadvantages of
audio recording is that it may be difficult to upload to the
computer sometimes and the sound may not have been
as successful as you had hoped.
Photoshop- I used Photoshop a lot throughout the
process, I used it for the planning stage and the
construction stage. I planned out my front cover,
contents page and double page spread on
Photoshop and I also made the final outcomes on
Photoshop as well. I learned a lot of techniques
while making my music magazine and I also
developed some skills as well. The advantages of
Photoshop are that there are a lot of tools and
edits that you can do to make your work look
professional and organised. You can edit your
photos to look more professional if you needed to.
The disadvantages of Photoshop is that it can be
quite confusing to use if you have never used it
before as there are a lot of things to remember.

15. Research and planning:
One of the main things I have learnt in the process of making my music
magazine, is learning different techniques on various programmes. For
example, Photoshop, InDesign, Premier. On Photoshop I have learnt how to
crop images, select areas of an image, adjust the image, edit particular areas
of an image, add in text that I have downloaded. Through this process I have
been able to develop my organisational skills. I had to research a lot at the
start of the process so that I could begin to plan my own work. For example, I
researched current music magazines and I have learnt a lot more about them
and the amount of people that read them. I have also learnt about what
people like in music magazines and what people want to see more of. This has
been done through survey monkey. The research was an important part of
the process and I think that I have learnt a lot about magazines in further
depth, for example, marketing and publishing. I have also learnt a lot through
the planning stage of the process. I had to be very independent and plan what
I was going to do each week. We had to think about every aspect of the
magazine and work out if everything that we wanted to do, was achievable.
For example, taking our own photos. We had to find a location to take our
photos at, think about costume, camera shots and we had to find models who
were suitable for the look of our magazine. I have been able to develop many
skills when doing my own planning as I have been a lot more independent and
had to make all of my own decisions about what I wanted to do.
Move Tool
Rectangular Marquee Tool
Quick Selection Tool
Crop Tool
Healing Brush Tool
Eraser Tool
Gradient Tool
Text Tool
Shape Tool
Zoom Tool
Colours
I also used some of the adjustment tools
on Photoshop, for example, Brightness and
Contrast. This was to help refine my images
and make them look more professional.
There was a variety of tools to use to help
make my images look suitable for my
magazine.