2. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge
the forms and conventions of real media products?
• In order to evaluate my work and compare it to other media products I had to glance at
other music magazines such as Q and NME in order to find out what to include in my own
media product. I gained a great understanding of the forms and conventions included in Q
magazine, this was the genre of music magazine that I wanted to focus on so studying a few
different issues of Q really helped to enhance my understanding if what to include. In
terms of the front cover of my magazine I got my ideas from an issue of Q with Cheryl Cole
on the front of it- it included a close up picture of her which took up about 80 percent of
the front cover, a small enough masthead in the top left hand corner which is where I have
placed my masthead. This is my front cover compared to the cover of Q magazine that I
have talked about.
3. • The front cover also included simple cover lines down both sides of it, they were short, snappy and really
captured the attention of the reader. This is what I wanted to achieve with my own front cover. I also
noticed that a lot of music magazines advertise competitions, this is a great way to lure in their target
audience and persuade them to purchase the magazine. This is why I chose to include a competition on my
own front cover. My analysis of the contents page, also from Q magazine really helped to enhance my
understanding of the basic layout for a contents page. I learned from this that most contents pages have a
regulars column, a features column and some sort of advertisement for their radio or television station. I
also noticed that quite a lot of contents pages have letters from the editor so I chose to include all of these
things to give my magazine a more professional and real look. I also realised that most contents pages have
the issue number, date the magazine was released and a thumb nail image of the front cover in the top
corner – I chose to include all of these things in my contents page as well. I also put the titles of the stories in
bold to make them stand out and the writing underneath explaining briefly what the story is about in italics,
this is a common theme with most magazines.
• Here is an example of a typical music magazine contents page beside the one that I have created.
4. In terms of my double page spread I wanted to create a very professional and sleek
look. I had previously seen in other music magazines such as Q that the first page was
just an image of the artist who was featured in the article so I took this approach and
sued a close up of my artist smiling to create a casual look so that it wasn’t intimidating
to my target audience. I used a report kin of outlook where I told the story of the artist
and stuck in quotes that she had given to me in a previous interview. I also used a long
shot image of the model for the second page and used a small simple font so that the
writing was casual and inviting to my audience. I wanted to address my target auidence
ina friend mannerism. Over all, I tried to stick to all of the codes and conventions of a
basic music magazine in order to make all three of my products sleek and professional
looking. This is an example of a normal double page spread from Q magazine alongside
mine.
