This document summarizes a student's media evaluation project creating a music magazine. The student: - Produced a magazine front cover and contents page as a preliminary task to practice Photoshop skills and magazine production. - Created a full music magazine for the main task, using conventions like cover images, contents listing, and double-page spreads but also challenging conventions in some ways. - Learned important Photoshop and design skills to enhance images and layout the magazine professionally.

1. Media Evaluation Print/Music Magazine Rebecca Pearson

2. Preliminary Exercise This is my prelim. The task was to produce a college magazine front cover and contents page. The prelim allowed me to have a practise of using Photoshop and producing a magazine. However my knowledge on Photoshop and producing a magazine was limited. I have learnt a lot from this point and I am happy with my final piece.

3. Main Task To produce a front page, contents page and double page spread of a music magazine following the traditional conventions.

4. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? My magazine is a general music magazines and includes all styles of music, so this challenges forms of real media products as usually the magazine only covers one music genre. I have used a similar ‘balloon’ in the corner of my page to highlight exclusive news which is like this version of NME. I have included the price, issue and barcode and underneath ‘mix it up’ is the date. These are conventions of real magazines which makes my magazines more realistic and like a real magazine Most magazines now use a high contrast image on the front cover to make the pictures stand out. Therefore I have used a bold, high contrast image to fit with contemporary magazines.

5. All magazines follow a colour scheme and style. I think the colours of red and black are used in most music genres so I decided to use black and red and have a ripped paper look to connote a ‘teenage’ style. I have continued the same style throughout my magazine. My contents page challenges usual contents page styles as many follow a bar down the side but I have chosen to do it all the bottom instead and have another larger photo on the page to show who the main focus of the magazine is on.

6. Like Q I have used the logo, wrote contents and included the date. Q also has an every month section, likewise I have chosen an Every week section and includes the page numbers of where the content is. On the other side ‘an exclusive to shuffle’ which is content just for this issue, this uses and develops magazine forms and conventions. Like NME in the corner of the page I have put one of the main features in the corner to draw attention to it and if readers want to turn to that page quickly they can easily see it.

7. My inspiration for my double page spread comes from this one the killers. I used a quote instead of a title and began my interview on the right side divided my a red band. My own version suits the style of music by artist and I used an extra photo. Many magazines use quotes for headings so this uses magazines forms and conventions. Keeping to magazine conventions I have used page numbers, logo and the magazine web address in the corners of the page.

8. I produced an extra page for my double page spread continuing the same style and using another photo from the same shoot. Like many magazine I have put the questions and answers in different colours so what is being said can be easily recognised. Text fitting around the image is what some magazines like to do.

9. How does your media product represent particular social groups? I’m going to focus on how the image of Vic my model represents social groups. This image represents girls with attitude, as she is a blonde and attractive and wearing a dress yet she has dramatic dark make-up, wearing black and red, her body language is open and her face expression is quite fierce which suggests the magazine does not represent the typical girly girl but a more contemporary girl with attitude.

10. Who would be the audience for your media product? My magazine is aimed at 15 to 22 so my social group would be young adults and teenagers. My magazine is aimed at both genders. The colours are house colours and not specific for a certain gender and the style is standard. This issue may appear to be aimed more at girls because of the main feature of the magazine being a girl and a poster of The Killers is included which may encourage more girls to buy it however boys may also buy for different reasons like the festival news, guitar comp and the features which appear every week. How did you attract / address your audience? As my audience is teenagers and young adults I have included news which would suit this audience. Festivals are usually more popular with a younger4 audience therefore fits well with my magazine. Having a young model on the front cover targets my audience more over having an older model on the cover as my target is the younger generation, they are more likely to buy a magazine with a young person on than an older person.

11. The content of the magazine is aimed at a younger generation. Posters, winning a guitar, photo of the week etc are articles which is preferred by a younger audience. The magazine is a reasonable price therefore can be afforded by teenagers, students, the younger generation.

12. ‘Mix it up’ a catchy, slogan. Also suggests that there is variety to the magazine. Younger generation enjoy competitions Stylish clothes, attractive model will attract the target audience. Both boys and girls. Creates intrigue

13. What media institution might distribute your media product and why? As my magazine resembles Q magazine, I thought that the media institution to produce my magazine would be the same one as they know Q is a very popular music magazine so one similar is likely to do as well. The cover price for Q is £3.90 however my magazine is £2.00 so it is a cheaper version of Q which would attract my younger target audience who may have budgets and may choose to buy mine over Q to save money, therefore the same distributor will be targeting a wider audience with both magazine, with one having a premium price, the other a budget price. Also Q is produced monthly whereas mine is weekly so customers from Q may buy mine weekly and Q monthly, so they will have more choice. The producer is Publisher Bauer Media Group. It is a large German publishing company and Worldwide circulation of Bauer Media Group's magazine titles amount to 38 million magazines a week.

14. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product? I used Photoshop to adjust and enhance my photos to improve quality and give them that ‘professional’ and ‘magazine’ look and style.

17. Photoshop allowed me to cut out the background so it has a seamless look and blends into the background.

18. During the process of creating my magazine, I have learnt and used a variety of Photoshop skills. These would include:-. Text effects eg drop shadow, outer glow and rotation, spacing ect. Adding banners and shapes and erasing parts for a 'ripped paper' effect.. Using the lasso tool to cut around images. By using the lasso tool and I created layers of parts of my pictures to go over text/banners for a more professional look.. Editing photos to improve quality and create a style suitable for my magazine, I liked to have high contrast images to make sure they are bold and stand out and this type of image is often used in all contemporary magazines. Also removing spots/blemishes and adding features eg eyelashes and eye shadow.. The use of layers and its important to order them in the right way.. Adding sections of text for my article.. Picking out colours so I stick to the 3 colour rule.

19. Structures of magazines How to target my audience How to organise and plan my time and get tasks done. Lots of skills and knowledge on Photoshop Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full production Planning and research is essential. How to use a photography camera and the studio and adjust lighting and positioning