This document summarizes how the student's media magazine product uses and follows conventions of real music magazines as reference material. Specifically, the student researched magazines like "We Love Pop Magazine" and "ID Magazine" to include typical elements such as a barcode, masthead, date, and price on the front cover. The contents page was also influenced by "We Love Pop Magazine" in featuring the cover star. The student aimed to attract a target audience of females aged 13-18 interested in music news and gossip by using pink as the main color, choosing attention-grabbing cover lines, featuring a strong female cover star as a role model, and adopting an informal, chatty tone in the writing.

1. Alice McIntosh
AS Media Studies
Evaluation

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

3. In my magazine there is examples of generic conventions
such as a barcode, mast head, dateline price etc. Also to
ensure my knowledge of the basic codes and conventions of a
magazine I completed analysis's of music magazines. In all the
magazines I researched for this particular genre of pop the
barcode, dateline and price were relatively small and steered
away from the centre of the page as you can see in my
magazine this is what I have done to follow the conventional
layout.
http://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/magazine-
analysis.html My magazine follows the codes and
conventions as there is no challenges visible on my front page
as you can see the use of direct mode of address has been
used showing again the conventions being followed. I was
mainly influences by ‘We Love Pop Magazine‘ due to the
roughly the same target audience. The age range for my
magazine is aged 13 – 18 years which is similar to ‘We Love
Pop Magazine‘ which is 13-16 year olds. Another magazine
which I was influenced by was ID magazine.
http://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/possible-
front-cover.html

4. My contents page has mainly be influenced by ‘We Love
Pop Magazine’ as on the contents page the cover star is
the main focus who was on the front cover which is
shown in my magazine. This is an example I found in ‘ we
love pop magazine’ of The Saturdays who were the main
cover stars on the front cover and continued to stay the
main image on the contents page. There are also other
exampleshttp://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2012/1
1/analysis-for-front-coverof-status.html
http://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/analysis
-of-contents-page.html I have also added an editors not
to my contents page as when I was researching into
similar magazines I realised that this was constantly
occurring, especially in ‘We Love Pop Magazine’.
Another magazine in which
I was influenced by the layout
was ‘Mizz’ magazine as they
advertised there front cover
in the contents page which I
thought was useful and effective.

5. My double page spread was mainly influenced by ‘We
Love Pop’ Magazine, both the layout and the language. I
particularly like the layout with the article on the left
hand side and the cover star posing on the right which I
think suits my demographic as there is not awful lot of
writing which could be off putting towards the target
audience which is relatively young. I have also
highlighted her name at the top of the page and used a
quote from the article as the heading which as you cans
see has been used in ‘We Love Pop Magazine’ There
many magazines that I researched into to write my
article mainly ‘Top of The Pops’ Magazine, I realised that
the language had to be simple and chatty as complex
words would be off putting to read. I also found that in
many there were interviews with the cover star not just
Have you ever been in love? a load of information written up as I felt this would hold
[laughs] ‘I have never been in a stronger connection between the cover star and
love with someone but I can say I
have had relationships where I audience if it was the cover star actually answering the
have loved and cared for that questions. I found when reading magazines especially
person but its everything has just ‘Mizz’ magazine hat during the interview when the cover
became so hectic and crazy there is
literally no time and it would be star laughed or used their body language it would be
silly to consider a relationship written in brackets to help the audience visualise
now.’ actually being there.

6. 2. How does your media product represent
particular social groups?

7. The image used on the front cover is a young female who
is not viewed in a stereotypical way as she is shown to be
dominant and in charge, ‘We Love Pop’ magazine usually
portrays women on the front cover as very girly however
I have choose to challenge this as the cover star on the
front of my magazine is shown to have an attitude as all
of the pictures used in my magazine are not the typical
images you would see. Her facial expressions in each
image represents her character as being feisty and in
control however the costume, hair and make-up reflects
he feminine side of being classy and sophisticated . ‘Top
of the Pops’ magazine as you can see represents women
stereotypically viewed as they are smiling and shown to
be having as the demographic is slightly older for my
magazine I thought it would be useful to challenges these
stereotypical views and represent women as strong and
independent almost like a role model for young female
teenagers who are the main target audience. The fact
that there is no use of direct mode of address signifies
her rebellious strike as she is purposely not looking at the
camera there no hint of shyness simply by her facial
expressions this is visible emphasising most teenagers
personality.

8. 3. What kind of media institution might
distribute your media product and why?

9. Major distributors
IPC Media - is one of the biggest magazine distributors, they
only do two music magazines, NME and Uncut, however
NME is possibly one of the best selling music magazines
in the UK. Uncut on the other hand appeals to a niche
market but still is extremely popular.
http://www.ipcmedia.com/
Bauer - they have a bigger magazine portfolio
then IPC, but they both offer the same type of category's.
Bauer has music magazines such as Kerrang and Q. These are some of the biggest
music magazines around. http://www.bauermedia.com/no_cache/willkommen/
http://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/music-magazine-distribution-
analysis.html
Top of the Pops magazine is a monthly publication produced by
BBC Magazines. It was originally based as a supplementary
magazine for the BBC television programme Top of the
Pops, however when the show was taken off air, the
magazine still continued to be produced. As my magazine is
similar to ‘Top of the Pops’ and has a similar target
audience magazine I feels this would be the appropriate
distributor for my magazine.
http://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/publication-plan.html

10. 4. Who would be the audience for your media
product?

11. My magazine has a target audience of mostly females aged
13-18, its for those who are interested in the music industry
and the latest gossip on artists who are topping the charts.
We Love Pop is targeted at 13-16 year old girls which is very
similar to my magazine. The target audience for my magazine
are obsessed with music, pop stars and gossip I wanted my
magazine to come across as chatty and funny but never
patronising or preachy. There’s exclusive backstage
access, photos & interviews. To design my specific target
audience I created a questionnaire and handed it out to those
in my year and below and gathered evidence to distinguish
my target audience before hand I have tried to follow there
answers given in the questionnaire for example the magazine
is a monthly magazine and I have also made it at the price of
£3.50 which was the most popular in the questionnaire. I also
created a target audience profile to what my audience might
be this helped me to get started on my magazine and give me
a rough idea of what I am catering for.
http://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/blog-
post_8739.html

12. 5. How did you attract/address your audience?

13. Colours
The main colour that I have chosen through out my magazine is pink as the target
audience is mainly females I felt this was an appropriate colour and suitable as it
displays a girl feminine side to the magazine. However there is other uses of
colours such as yellow and black, I used these combination of colours to highlight
and exclusive in the magazine to indicate an importance.
CoverLines
Cover lines are one of the main aspects in the magazine as they offer information
of what is going to be included in the magazine therefore I had to think carefully
and choose the most suitable for my target audience, as the magazine is mainly
aimed at women I choose the specific cover line ‘Women can rap’ as I felt this
really stands up for women rappers who are stereotypically viewed as not very
good and males outnumbering them. I felt by displaying this gives young female
rappers who are interested in the music industry a female rapper to look up to.
Pictures
My first attempt of original photography showed to lack of good quality due to
the camera that the images were taken on did not have a flash, therefore I had to
repeat this task with a camera that did have a flash.
http://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2012_12_01_archive.html
I wanted to convey a strong, independent look as I wanted the readers to look up
to the cover star as a role model who they can take inspiration from. The images
that are shown in the magazine are not very girly like showing a rebellious
attitude as I felt that teenagers were more able to connect with this type of
attitude however still showing her sophisticated look through here clothing.
http://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/images.html

14. Language/Tone
The language that I decided to use was a chatty, formal attitude as I didn’t
want the magazine to come across to serious as the target audience is aged
13-18 year olds, there is moderate use f slang as through research I found
that magazines such as ‘We Love Pop’ magazine had uses of slang on their
front pages and abbreviated words. I wanted the language to be
fun, energetic and easy to read.
http://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/language.html
Masthead
At first I wanted to name my magazine WHAM as I did a mock up of a music
magazine but then after thinking about the target audience I realised that the
name related to much to the 80’ band.
http://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2012_12_01_archive.html
I decided that the mast head had to have a clear indication that it was a music
magazine therefore I chose the word ‘LIPS’ as I feel this shows a clear link
between the music industry. Also from researching into magazines I
specifically chose this name as I was able to rein act this through my original
photography. As the pouting of the lips links to he masthead ‘LIPS’ This idea
was found through researching into ID magazine which also has a similar link
between their mast head and cover star.
http://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/possible-front-cover.html

15. 6. What have you learnt about technologies
from the process of constructing the product?

16. The main programme that I used was paint.net this was specifically used to
edit my images, and neaten them up more to make them look more
proficient.
Strengths
• It is very easy to discard the background by using the magic wand, this was
also relatively easy to get to grips with considering I had never used the
software before
http://alicemcintosh96.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/draft_8.html
• Another strength was the amount of effects that was included on the
software as you were able to highlight the image using a variety of colours
even though I didn’t use this n my magazine I found it useful to
experiment with.
Weaknesses
• If you have never used the software before in which case I was in that
position it is hard to learn how to work the soft ware for it to benefit your
work
• On lots of occasions I had to restart my computer as errors kept occurring
of not enough memory available.
• It is also easy to use to much editing and cut of half of the image which
does not look very good as it is very visible.

17. Publisher
Another software that I used to make my magazine, mainly my
double page spread was publisher. This was much easier to use
as I was able to work on two pages instead of two single pages
on paint.net. The main advantage that think publisher has is it
is very easy to use and work with, its very easy to edit your
text and images with out the hassle of inserting a new layer.
Also by using the preview button you are able to look at you
work and see how well it looks and any improvement needed
to be done.
However there is also a disadvantage using publisher which is
mainly that it does not have the amount of editing effects that
are included on paint.net.
Blogger
The other main programme that we had to use was blogger to
upload our research it was very easy again to use as you were
able to change your posts if you changed your mind or delete
previous ones. Never the less time management was a big
issue for me as you could not insert a blog between dates
therefore time management had to be accurate.

18. 7. Looking back to your preliminary task, what
do you feel that you have learnt in the
progression from it to the full product?

19. Preliminary Task At the start of the course we were all given our
preliminary task in which we had to create a
front cover and contents page for a school
magazine. I have compared the two together
and it is clear that there has been drastic
improvement. Especially the use of editing as
in the ‘STACS’ magazine the image used has not
been edited very well as he looks like its just
been cut off and also the arm of one of the
Front Cover females has been cut off showing that in my
Contents Page
recent front cover the images are all edited to
good quality. The contents page for ‘STACS’
Final Proof
magazine has also shown improvement a there
is no title to say that it is the contents page
where as if we look at the recent contents page
it is very clear that this is the contents page. I
think that my recent magazine shows more
experience of research as there are more
things relevant that have a meaning for
example the link between the mast head and
cover star. I also think I have improved on the
Front Cover Contents Page house colours used, they are show a link
together and reflect the target audience.

20. How successful do you feel your end product is
in fulfilling the task? How well does it fit the
brief?

21. Positives
• I really like the fact that I was able to come up with the mast head a show a clear
indication that there is a link between the cover star and the mast head through her
facial expressions.
• I think that my front cover has had a lot of improvement from my first proof , as the
colours are consistent through out and the final image I used shows hat it is a music
magazine.
• The cover lines included are appropriate and show how dedicated the magazine is to
music.
Negatives
• My weakness for me would be my contents page as I feel the main image has been
enlarged to much however this shows the main cover star is the centre of the magazine.
• Another weakness would be my double page spread as I would of liked to of added
more colours on to the double page spread as mot magazines I have researched have
used vibrant colours throughout.
• Also I would of like to include more images through out the magazine as I thing the
target audience will more enticed to looking at pictures rather than reading lots of text.
Over all I think have followed the codes and conventions of a music magazine sufficiently
well as it is clear and obvious on the particular genre of a music magazine of pop. There is
consistency through out on the house colours and fonts used. I have researched into similar
magazines and reinforced this into my own magazine. I think that the original photography
that I have used works well with the magazine challenging the typical views on women
being advertised in magazines.