- The document evaluates a music magazine project, analyzing how it represents conventions of real music magazines and particular social groups. - The magazine's front cover, contents page, and double page spread use conventions of mainstream music magazines while breaking from traditions in some areas. - It targets 16-20 year olds interested in indie music and fashion through the artist featured and creative layout. - Creating the magazine improved the author's skills with programs like Photoshop and publishing platforms.

1. EVALUATION OF MUSIC MAGAZINE PROJECT

2. In what ways does this media product use, develop, or change forms and conventions of real media products? In terms of my front cover, this media product conforms to the normal conventions of a music magazine. It has a skyline at the top, a mast head, cover lines and main article on the left (so that the magazine is easily recognisable on a shelf), it has an medium close up of an artist on the right hand side, a barcode and price in the bottom right, and date, issue number and slogo in the top left. My contents page also conforms to the conventions of a magazine cover, it is set out in a similar style to the main stream music magazine NME, with bands on the left hand side in alphabetical order, so that it is easy for readers to pick out the bands they like. It has cover lines and images on the right hand side which show the page numbers. The double page spread breaks away from traditional music magazine conventions, while most magazines will have a large image on one page with text written around it, and mainly text on the other page with some images, this double page spread has used an image of the artist as a background over the two pages, using it as a backdrop for the text and pull quotes. However it does stick to usual conventions by having text-boxes and a pull-quote.

3. How does this magazine represent particular social groups? By using photoshop brushes and photography to create an artistic and mature look, this magazines is trying to target both men and women aged from 16-20, this was effective, when a group of 16-20 year olds were asked if what age range they thought 'Cellar Door' was aimed at, 93% said 16-20. The specific social group that the magazine is targeting are young people and students who are into both music and fashion, and who are into indie culture. When the group of 16-20 year olds were asked what social group they thought the magazine was targeting, 67% chose the combination of 'Indie' and 'Students'. The devices used to make sure that the magazine attracted the right audience included using an artist on the front cover who plays alternative music, using photoshop brushes to give the double page spread and contents page a creative style and background, and including articles on the front cover and contents page which would appeal to youth interested in music and fashion, such as 'London Fashion Week' and 'Win an Ipod'. Having an artist on the front cover who is in the same age range as the target audience is the one of the most effective ways of representing the social group the magazine was aimed at.

4. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why? The magazine would be sold as a glossy in shops such as WHSmiths and Borders, I think that the market would be too small to make profit in small shops like newsagents. It could also be distributed online using Issuu.com.

5. How did you attract/address your audience? The magazine uses attractive colours and high quality photography to help attract the audience. The artist on the cover is wearing purple, this is the colour used throughout the magazine, and this helps the reader make a link between it and the artist. The layout on the cover is simple but striking, and this means that it would be eyecatching on a shelf. A group of people in my target audience were asked to give feedback on what they thought about the magazine. One person said 'Interesting photography. The contents page has a really cool layout, which is pretty different to most magazines I've seen before'. Another said 'On first glance it looks much like your standard magazine, picture of the main act, reviews etc. However I believe the style and layout give the magazine a very arty feel, its tasteful and smart'. This shows that the magazine appeals to the target audience by breaking the conventions of a main stream music magazine because of its artistic layout.

6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product? Creating this media product has means that it gives you the chance to use programmes such as Photoshop, learning new skills like using tools including brushes, free-transform, cloning and blurring. Also Powerpoint, online social sides where you can post your ideas like Blogger and Twitter, and sites where you can publish your work and create surveys like, issuu.com and survey-monkey.

7. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product? From looking at the city college magazine you can see that the quality of photography has improved greatly, partly due to the amount of time given and how much preparation went behind it. You can also see that photoshopping skills have been improved, things like making sure there is a linking colour scheme and finding more ways to appeal to the target audience were not present in the college magazine. Other things that have been improved from the college magazine preliminary task to the music magazine was use of white space, the college magazine looked bare and uninteresting whereas the music magazine was eye-catching. However, The CD cover preliminary task links directly to the music magazine, using the same artist and high quality photography, you can see that practicing on the CD cover has meant that the music magazine has kept the same simple, sophisticated style.