This document contains an evaluation of Bethanny Lee Reiss' media product. It discusses the intended audience for the product, how it represents social groups, the type of media institution that might distribute it, how it uses or challenges conventions of real media, and how it attracts its target audience. Reiss learned about various technologies through creating the product, including digital cameras, Adobe Photoshop, Microsoft Word/PowerPoint/Publisher, and using a website builder. The evaluation provides details on the design choices made in developing the magazine and how they compare to real media products.

1. EVALUATION
REISS BETHANNY LEE

2. Question 1 - Who would the audience
for your media product be?

3. The audience for my media product will be people from the ages of 16-25, this is a wide age variety but I
think it quite accurate for my media product. I think that this would be the age range because of the
artists involved, not only are the artists new but there are old artists included inside my media product
like ‘Mary J. Blige’ for example and she hasn’t really brought out much music recently so the people who
will be reading the magazine will know of her because of their age.
I think the sex of the person that would buy my magazine or pick it up in a shop would be female and I
think this because it is Hip-Hop and generally more of a feminine magazine. But on the other hand I don’t
think just a female would pick it up and I think that the colour scheme does this, a girl would usually go for
the colour pink but my front cover doesn’t include the colour pink so it wouldn’t just attract females. As
you can see on my front cover there is a trip which you can win and this wouldn’t be available for the
younger audience of the media product but it would be available for the over 18’s.

4. My ideal audience
People who listen to
R&B
People who socialise
Men and women that
go to concerts
Both men and women
People who know about
music in general

5. People who are most likely to use some of these social media and music apps (on phones) are
most likely to be the people that would be my audience. This is because for people to know
about music and want to know more about music they must listen to it. Then social media to
keep up with music artists that they are interested in, on twitter for example.

6. Question 2 – how does your media
product represent particular social
groups?

7. Representation means picture: a visual depiction
of somebody or something
fact of being served by representative: the fact
or right of being represented by somebody,
especially of having a member in a legislature
with power to vote or speak for an electorate

8. To appeal to the correct target audience, my star
would have to represent an idealised version of
the reader. In order to appeal to as many
consumers as possible, the star must appear
mainstream and nonthreatening.

9. • In all the photographs of my star, I tried to
make sure she would be aspirational for the
readers. She is the same age and gender as my
ideal reader, therefore would attract the
target audience. The mise en scene of the star
represents a slightly rebellious young
woman, and the use of glasses connote a
sense of confrontation.

10. Question 3 - What kind of media
institution might distribute your
media product and why?

11. What is an institution? An
institution is a company that
disperses a media product for
audience consumption.

12. I would chose SpinMedia to distribute my media products because
they distribute one of the biggest R&B magazines which is ‘Vibe’ I
think that both Vibe and Lush would go well together.

13. My magazine will be a monthly issue
which will go out mid month, so the
15th. The price of Lush will be £2.50
which is a lot cheaper than sister and
rival R&B magazines.

14. This is Vibes official website and as you can see they have a lot to offer. As soon
as you go onto their website you can see that they have videos and pictures
that can be viewed by any user. Then at the very top they have icons for social
networking sites and other things, this is to widen the audience and therefore in
the long run they will sell more magazines overall.
Below that they have 4 sub headings which are links, news, music,
entertainment and style. These are all things that match the genre, news on the
magazine and stories on R&B artists and so on..

15. Social networking sites
to bring in a wider
audience
Pictures and Videos which when
clicked on are linked to stories
which are in the news section
Sub headings which
are links where you
can get a further
insight on what’s
happening in the R&B
world including who’s
dating who and who is
wearing what
This section has the latest news coming in which will be
updated every hour, including new gig dates, stories about
upcoming pop stars and much more

16. There are other ways which you can distribute your
products and this could be through;

17. Question 4 – in what ways does your
media product use, develop or
challenge forms and conventions of
real media products.

18. Billboard uses three different colours on the front
cover excluding the colours used in the image, I used
four on mine and this was to break it up from all
being the same. My magazine cover compared to the
real life magazine is a lot different and in many
different ways. On my magazine I have a white
background unlike the other magazine, I did this
because I wanted it to be different, I didn’t want it all
to be coloured, white is part of the colour scheme
that I chose.

19. With my image I wanted it to be placed to one side of my
cover and not central, I picked out three real life media
covers and all three of them were central, even though
you lose more space to write more information for the
magazine it seems to work rather well. Usually on a
magazine you would get the barcode at the bottom of it
but I wanted my magazine to be different, it is still at the
side of the magazine but its been rotated and moved up
so it isn’t situated at the bottom. One thing that you
usually get with a R&B/Hip-Hop magazine is posters, so at
the bottom left I included three pictures which were
“exclusive”.

20. Overall I think that my magazine uses some of the
conventions that are usually used in real life
R&B/Hip-Hop media magazines but I also added
some ones that are used in other magazines to
make it a bit different compared to a normal one.
Like the button for example where you can win a
free trip, you wouldn’t usually use this on a R&B
magazine. I also included a special offer which also
wouldn’t usually be used but I think that it all works
well together.

21. My media magazine portrays some of the conventions that would be used in real
media products; magazine based. I am going to compare my front cover to another
front cover which is from the R&B/Hip-Hop magazine Billboard. First of all my title is
bold, stands out and takes up a big proportion of the page and is situated at the top
of my magazine just like other magazines. On my front cover you can see basically
the whole word of my title where as on the real life media magazine half of the
headline is missing, this is because it’s a popular magazine and people who buy it
would probably by it every week. Behind my headline I have a block colour, this is to
make the headline stand out even more, the colours go well together so it also
makes it look good too. The colour red which I chose to be the block colour is used
in a lot of real life media magazines and this is why I chose the colour red.

22. The name of my cover star goes over her body just like Rihanna’s does on Billboard. Below the cover
stars name on Billboard there is a quote of what she has said but on mine I didn’t want a quote because
later on in my magazine where my double page spread is there will be an article on Frankie where she
talks as an interview where quotes will be included.
Although I didn’t use a quote from my cover star I still included quotes on my front cover which were
from celebrities but made up to sound realistic.

23. As you can see with the two pictures below they both have quite
similar conventions and this would be some of the text that is
included, I have used the words ‘upfront’, ‘features’ and ‘music’ just
like Billboard have. This is because I wanted my magazine to look more
like a real life magazine. Underneath the subheadings there is text
which has a page number followed by what is on that page. Under the
‘features’ section you can clearly see that the name of the celebrity
that the article is about is in bold on both, the real and my contents
page.

24. Both of the magazines also use the section music to write
more about but we both did it slightly different, although
I took that connotation from a real life media magazine I
didn’t want it to be the same I wanted it to be slightly
different so I changed it and just wrote down some R&B
singers/group with the page number where as on the
Billboard contents page they haven’t just wrote artists
names they have included other things related to music
such as ‘charts’ which will talk about music that’s in the
charts and not just artists that are making music, like
mine.

25. Overall I think that my contents page looks more
like a real life magazine compared to my front
cover, I think that the conventions that I have
used are very similar and make it look more
professional. One thing I would have changed on
my contents page would the font, I think that
this doesn’t work that well on the page.

26. My contents page uses a lot of conventions that
would usually be used in real life magazines. At the
bottom of my page there is a large image standing
out, usually in magazines on contents pages there is
one big image then with text placed around it.
Usually the picture is put with text but on mine I just
added a caption with the photo. “introducing R&B’s
new star!” draws in the reader because they will
want to know more about this new star and it also
breaks up the picture from being so large and
dominating the page
Above this image there is another image which is
about half the page, sometimes, well, usually
contents pages include more than just one picture
and again I think this is to break up the text that is on
the page. On both of the images there is a page
number and this tends to happen in real life
magazines too and that’s why I did it. This is so that if
someone opens it and sees a picture they like then
they can go straight to that page to see more about
that picture and read more about it.

27. Seeing as though it is a contents page this needs to be clear and it is on my magazine this convention is
also something that is always used in Billboard and other magazines. It tends to be quite big and quite
bold and mine is this is to make it as much as a real life magazine as it can be.
Another convention that usually occurs on a contents page is the name of the magazine but I didn’t
want to include the name of my magazine because I wanted to use the space for other stuff so instead I
just took the first letter of my headline which is ‘L’ and I put it on Photoshop and make it a bit opaque so
that I could put it over a things and still be able to see what is behind this. I think this works well.

28. Although I haven’t added the text to my double page spread you can still tell what
similarities there are and then also the differences. As you can see on both of the
double page spreads there is a picture dominating half of it, but you can also see
that they are totally different. On the real life media one you can see that the
picture is more revealing and a shot taken from far away, probably a mid
shot, where as on my double page spread there is nothing that is revealing but the
picture is a close up of my stars face. I put my picture in black and white because I
think that it fits better than with colour, this wouldn’t usually happen in real life
media but occasionally it does.
The double page spread on the left which is the real life magazine is just black and
white where the text is concerned but on mine which is on the right I added colour.
Underneath the stars name I added a red line and this was to separate the name
from the interview.

29. My double page spread is an interview where as the real
life media one is an article. I chose to do an interview
because as it is made up it will be easier to write the
answers that are being asked rather than having to make
up a whole article.
I put the stars name on my double page spread and I did
it in quite a big font and bold, I did it in black because
later on the colour changes. I didn’t use the convention
for this like a real life magazine because people who
would be buying the real life magazine will know who the
picture is of usually whereas because my magazine isn’t
real we have to introduce the star with a name.

30. This is my finished double page spread, with all the finished text because on
one of the previous slides I hadn’t finished the text part of my double paged
spread.

31. Question 5 – how did
you attract/address
your audience?

32. I attracted my audience by a range of features in my
magazine:

33. Masthead
Unique
selling point
Extra
added
pictures
Cover star
Main
image
Quotes
Features
Free give
away
Barcode
and price
Date and issue
number

34. First of all I attracted my audience with the
language that I used throughout, because of
the genre of my magazine I had to use formal
language because of the audience that would
be reading the magazine and then just because
of the magazine itself. But its not formal all the
way through, on my double page spread which
is an interview I used informal language and
this was to pull the readers in because it is
more up to date. If I talk in a chatting language
then they can relate to the magazine and can
understand it better than if it was very formal.
It also makes the text more interesting and less
boring. I used some forms of slang in the
magazine to make the text seem recognisable
to the audience. On the front cover all of the
language is formal and this tends to happen on
this genre of magazine.

35. Secondly the font I used was different to a normal boring font, it was a font that is barely
used, I didn’t want the font to look too unprofessional because my target audience isn’t
the kiddie kind. The text I used was big, bold and bright to make it stand out above other
magazines. I didn’t use the same font throughout the magazine and this was to make it a
bit different from being just the same all the way through.
Frankie JamiesonThis is the font I used for my
cover stars name on my front
cover.
LUSH
This is the font that I used for the masthead of
my magazine and it is different to the font
above, although they both look bold when
made bigger, they look different like this and
adds more range to my media product.

36. The images that i used in my media product were big and bold especially on my front cover this is
because the front cover is the thing that pulls the buyer in. The first thing that they look at is the
front cover and it is usually the picture that pulls them in so it is a good idea to make sure that the
main image is big and in colour, it’s not compulsory that the image has to be central so I didn’t make
my image central just to make it different from typical magazines. She is looking into the camera
addressing the audience. This technique is done by lots of popular magazines so I did this is mine to
make it look more professional.

37. The masthead on my magazine was made big and bold and covered up
a proportion of my front cover this is because it is the main thing on
the front cover and if it is bold it will catch peoples eyes.

38. Question 6 - What have you learnt
about technologies from the process
of constructing this product?

39. During the creation of my media product,
music magazine, I’ve learnt a great deal about
technologies and they have vastly helped, and
improved, my media product had I been without
them

40. To make my product I used a number of
different technologies. Needless to say, I used a
computer but below is a list of other
technologies I made use of for the task; -Digital
Camera, Adobe Photoshop, Internet
Explorer(Weebly) Microsoft Word, Microsoft
PowerPoint and finally Microsoft Publisher

41. Digital SLR Camera This was used for taking
pictures for my magazine and proved
extremely helpful. The fact that it was digital
rather than a traditional camera meant that
instantly I could see what I’d taken and had the
option whether to keep it or not.

42. Due to the large amount of space on the camera
I was able to keep all of the pictures until I could
see them on the larger computer screen. The
fact that I could see what I’d taken however was
very useful as I knew if I was along the right lines
of what I’d envisioned or whether I needed to
change the camera angle to achieve a different
end photograph.

43. With this camera I learnt a number of things,
mainly how to use it but also how to use the
features of the camera to get different effects
for my photographs.

44. Adobe Photoshop is an image manipulation
programme that allows me to edit the photo's I'd
taken, it was extremely useful in the
development of my media product and made
possible images which simply couldn't have
happened previously. I had never used Adobe
Photoshop before taking media so it was all new to
me and I had to learn everything from how to put a
picture on to it to editing it so the picture had no
background.

46. Internet Explorer The internet was
immensely helpful to me during this
project, not only during the research section
of the project but also through the creation
of the blog which allowed me to document
the work that I'd done. During the research
stage the internet was extremely useful as it
allowed me to look into the forms and
conventions of magazines and do some
basic research about magazines before I
went to look at three during my detailed
research.

47. The internet enabled me to go on to my
blog. The blog was also used to keep a track
of the skills and experience I've gained
through the production and post-production
stages of making my magazine. This proved
extremely helpful when coming to do the
evaluation.

49. Microsoft Word and Publisher, this
specific technology has allowed me to
prepare the written feature for my
double page spread and also to write
down any information that I needed to
add and to make notes on to edit my
evaluation.

51. Microsoft PowerPoint, this programme
has been extremely useful during my
evaluation, as shown by the fact they're
being used for this answer and one other.
I've learnt these help to make the pages
more interesting not only because more
pictures can easily be included but also
because people have to interact with the
slide to read more and are therefore
more engaged.

52. PowerPoint helped me, especially when doing this, my
evaluation

53. Overall technology has helped me with my
task of creating a front cover, contents page
and double-page spread in numerous ways
and without it; the end product I created
would be considerably less professional and
of a lesser quality. It would have also
resulted in me being less organised and
showing less cohesive and clear research,
planning, skills and evidencing.

54. Question 7 – looking back at your
preliminary task, what do you feel you
have learn in the progression to the
full product

55. In the progression from one magazine to my
other magazine I have learnt a great deal.
I have learnt how to use different types of
technology to make the product more
professional such as Photoshop.

56. I have also learn how complicated real media
products are and this is because;
-They try there best to make it look good
-They rarely leave any free space
-They use bright colours, bold text and a
catchy title

57. And this is all to draw the reader in, so when
going from my Aquinas Mag to Lush which is my
final media product I learnt that I had to add
more things to make my magazine look more
professional and more eye catching. To do this
research was included and a lot of thought and
planning went into my final media product.

58. I also learnt that you cant get anything perfect the
first time so that planning is essential when doing
something like this because you will find on later
that you will have a better idea and that it will
need changing. Also when planning you have a
rough idea of what you’re going to do, without
planning you will have to start from scratch and
that is never easy. Finally when planning you can
research and see what you will need to add to
make your product look good overall and I learnt
this on both, especially my final media product.