Question One

1. In what ways does your media
product use, develop or challenge
forms and conventions of real media
products?

2. My media product follows many media codes and
conventions as does it challenge many. The magazine I
have produced, ‘AURA’, has developed the current R&B
music magazines that exist. I used Vibe as my main
research and this gave me the knowledge as to what
R&B magazines codes and conventions are. My target
audience also had particular codes and conventions
that they would have expected and I have tried to
achieve these conventions when producing ‘AURA’ but
it isn’t always possible.

3. Here is one convention that can be seen on my front cover. This is a
facebook and twitter logo featured above the barcode. I have included
these as an indication that there is more information and things to find
on social media to relate to Aura magazine. This is typical of a
magazine targeted at a younger audience of teenagers and young
adults because they will more likely be using social media. Especially
an audience interested in R&B because they will have smart phones
and be interested in following certain ‘celebrities’ on twitter and
instagram. If I could add more to my front cover I would also include an
instagram logo graphic feature because I believe that instagram is the
app/social media of this current time and the younger generation
cannot get enough of it. So adding a link to instagram would help to
pull the intended target audience in even more.
Here is the next convention that I have found through my research and decided to use on my own magazine.
Every issue of Vibe magazine has a band running across the top of the page above the title. This usually
includes the names of some artists that are featured in the issue. Many music magazines include text above
the title so I wanted to incorporate this idea into my front cover. This is key for my target audience because
young people will want to know straight away from the front cover who they are going to be reading about.

4. My contents page challenged forms and conventions because it hasn’t
got columns of information. I have split the page up by a triangle so
the page is divided into three triangle columns. I have decided to do
this because it creates a DNA across the whole of my magazine.
Triangles was a theme that ran through the whole of magazine and I
wanted to incorporate this design into my contents page. Many
magazines, especially Vibe challenge typically forms on the contents
page. I challenged the convention because it gave Aura magazine some
edge which I think represents the intended target audience. A
stereotype associated with R&B is ‘rule breaking’ and ‘rebellion’, so
challenging conventions is something that an R&B magazine would do.
On my contents page I have included a graphic feature. This follows
typical codes and convention of every magazine. The graphic
feature is linked to one of the articles that are featured in this issue
of Aura. I made a collage of different pictures and I believe that this
is developing existing conventions as it involves more skill than just
featuring one image which is what normally happens. Also instead
of having more than one graphic feature that are smaller I decided
to just have this one because it was four pictures combined.

5. Here is another convention that I have followed when producing my
magazine. On the contents page, next to the article headings I have
included the number of the page where these articles lay inside the
magazine. Across all magazines this happens, mainly out of
practicality for the reader. However, I have still used this convention
for my magazine.
Across my whole magazine there is blank space, which is space on
the page not occupied by image or text. This is defiantly challenging
the usually codes and conventions of magazines. However, after my
extensive research I have discovered that R&B music magazines are
very minimalistic and often have vast amounts of blank space
throughout the magazines, especially Vibe magazine which was my
main source of inspiration. I have made the text on my front cover
larger to cover more of the space but this is covering more space
than normal R&B magazines fill. Many would say that blanck space
is a weakness but I believe that it represents the genre well and is
actually following the genres conventions even though this may not
be the norm.