Improved media evaluation

Media studies
- Evaluation
Katie Hurley

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

Question 1- In what ways does your
media product use, develop or
challenge forms and conventions of
real media products?
After completing this task, I continued to analyse
codes and conventions on other music magazines, this
not only helped me gain knowledge into generic
conventions but also helped me to apply them onto
my own magazine. Using generic codes such as
barcodes, date and times, makes the magazine look
realistic and made professionally.
Front Cover
In my music magazine I have tried to include all the generic conventions.
I have developed my understanding of these conventions during the
process of making this magazine. I made an analysis of all the codes and
conventions within
the ‘Billboard’ magazine, which is an America music magazine located in
New York. This can be viewed on my blog:
http://katiehurley447.blogspot.co.uk/2014_09_01_archive.html

Question 1- In what ways does your media
product use, develop or challenge forms
and conventions of real media products?
For the masthead, I thought it was essential to have a
bold font, in large text to give a clear view to the
consumers of the magazine, the brand. Then I had
the date and price published along the top of the
barcode, this came from the inspiration of VIBE
magazine. I then had the image wrapping the text to
get the image as the main focus. The different cover
lines give a short insight into what the magazine will
be featuring and allow the customer to decide
whether its worth buying.
By doing the generic conventions task and developing my knowledge on
codes and conventions within a layout of a front cover, I applied these
conventions in my front cover of my magazine shown below. When
creating the layout of my magazine I tried my best to display it similar to
other typical music magazines.

Influences:
For my choice of layout I researched into a
variety of different magazines, however two
stood out to me, which was NME and VIBE.
VIBE matched my genre of music, hence
where the inspiration come from. This helped
me develop my own ideas of how I could
present this specific genre. The influence of
NME came from the positioning of text and
layout of images, their structure was great
and clear to read, this is how I wanted my
magazine to look.
For the main cover line of ‘Serena Gold’ I used the same style of
writing as the masthead, this was to show to main important sections
of the magazine; The brand and the main artist who the magazine is
mainly talked about.

Influences
I got the influence of the genre of music I wanted to present in my
magazine through VIBE, I also got their style of writing from them. I thought
their text was catchy, clear and easy to follow, so I decided to do a similar
font and style which enabled me to get a cool pop music style of my
magazine. When I researched different VIBE magazines the one below
really inspired me, by the colour co-ordination, the idea that the ethos fits
in with the style of magazine and the main artists is the main focus. This is
how I developed my ideas onto my magazine. I got my magazine to have
a colour scheme to make it look attractive and professional.
Also the different poses were deeply thought
and researched about, seeing Niki Minaj, with
her hands on her hips, makes her look a dominant
female and confident. This look inspired me, which
I then applied to my photography.

Contents
The style and layout of my magazines content page was inspired by
VIBE’s contents page. To begin with, I was unsure what information and
layout I should apply to the contents page, so I carried out some
research into various magazines contents pages. VIBE was used a lot
during the production of my magazine, so I decided to use them as
inspiration on the contents age too. This meant there was an image of
the artist on the contents page, with very little text, mentioning a few
pages within the magazine. The symbol of the ‘V’ in the vibe contents
Page represents their brand name, I inherited
this into my magazine but used the symbol ‘T’ to
represent the brand name ‘TUNEZ’. Also the
main page in the magazine was bolder and
written over the image of the artist similar to the
Vibe magazine. Lastly the subheading of
‘features’ is present in the top left corner, this is a
simple and clear heading to allow the reader to
know what the page is on.

product use, develop or challenge forms and
conventions of real media products?
The house style of the contents page is the
same colour scheme for the front cover;
purple, white, gold and black. Black is
associated with power, elegance and
formality. It can make it easier to convey a
sense of sophistication and mystery in a
design, and since the artist is a newly
signed artist, she will be a mystery until they
read the exclusive interview to find out who
she is. Whilst the colour purple is a subdued
colour, it’s a calming and relaxed colour,
which gives a simplicity sense to the reader.
It connotes wealth and creativitiy. The white
symbolises her purity and virtue and lastly
the gold connotes achievement.

Double page spread
Similar to my contents and front cover, I looked for
influences for my double page spread, especially
Vibe magazine as this was the same genre as mine. I
found a Niki Minaj interview double page spread
which inspired me. This was because the layout had
a large heading of the artists name, followed my a
subheading of what the article was about, which
then had columns of text with an image of the artist.
After seeing this, I then applied it to my magazines
double page, but with using the colour scheme I
used originially and the same font. My artist wore
props such as Jewlerry to connote her wealth and
sunglasses, the props were similar to Niki Minaj,
however different in some ways as Niki wears aztec
and crazy outfits whilst my artist is simple in her
choice of style of clothing.

Question 2
How does your media product represent particular social
groups?

Question 2-How does your media
product represent particular social
groups?
My magazines target audience was mainly aimed at teenagers, but
mainly ages ranging from 16 to 21. This was due to pop and R&B
music being really popular in todays society with young teenagers.
Cover star
My cover star is called ‘Serena Gold’. This is her in the original
photography, who is a confident and dominant woman. This is the sort of
image I wanted to portray for my artist. This specific image to put across
was done because she is a new signed artist, who has become
something bigger, she began with youtube videos and now she has a
record deal, this dominance is shown through her success, to how she has
got to where she is now, her new career of getting signed is spoken about
in the interview. She can be seen as a massive role model to many
teenagers, as this may be a dream similar to theirs. Mostly females would
be the wider audience of this particular artists as her songs are pop which
young girls typically listen to, however males are also targeted.

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

Question 3 – What kind of media
institution might distribute your media
product and why?
My music magazine ‘TUNEZ’ has a similar audience to the magazine I was
influenced by, which are major distribution companies. I researched into
different major music distributor companies, one I decided to use
InterMedia Partners which is a private equity. They own other companies
such as WAPA-TV (Radio Station). This company is a distributor of Vibe
magazine however vibe gained their success through other media
institutions, they distribute their magazines through their online websites
which provides some articles from the magazine, an there magazines get
distributed to a variety of shops ranging from corner shops to
supermarkerts and lastly they make catchy offers so that the public will be
tempted to buy their magazine.

Question 4
Who would be the audience for your media product?

Question 4 – who would be the
audience for your media product.
My magazine has a target audience of young adults aged 16-21
I created a questionaire to help me decide on who I should aim my magazine at;
http://katiehurley447.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/target-audience-survey.html
This helped me see the different age ranges who patricipated in the survey whom
liked pop and R&B music, after a couple of weeks I looked at the results of the
surveys and presented this on my blog ;
http://katiehurley447.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/target-audience.html
The results showed me the genre of music I was featuring in my magazine, was
mostly liked by ages 16-21. this made my decision of having this age range. This
audience is very similar to Vibe magazine who have a target audience of ages
18-34. Their age range is slightly higher than mine, however I wanted more
younger people.

Question 5
How did you attract/address your audience?

Question 5 – how did you
attract/address your audience?
Masthead
The name of my masthead is ‘TUNEZ’, this relates to music, and what the
younger generation call a ‘good song’ in todays world. I think this is a
good brand name for my magazine as it is aimed at the younger
generation and therefore should have reference to what they relate to in
the music industry. However the brand is spelt different to the usual
spelling, this is to emphasise the brand name and for everyone to be able
to recognise the brand easier. The use of capitals in the name and the
goldy-brown font makes it clear and stands out on the front cover.

Colours
Before I created my magazine, I carried out a lot of research on what
connotations different colours have. For example Gold has a connotation of
achievement and White connotes purity. The researched I did is visible on my
blog;http://katiehurley447.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/screen-shot-of-research-
and-planning.html
Vibe magazine who my magazine was inspired by tend to use a variety of
different colours, each time they usually use black and white as bold titles on
the contents page etc. However they change the colour of their masthead
based on the house style and the clothing of the artist being featured on their
front cover. For example on the Niki Minaj cover, she was wearing orange
clothing, which they then linked the masthead with the colour scheme of the
magazine; orange.

Cover lines
The cover lines are an important part of a magazine as these have an impact
on whether the customer will purchase the magazine or not. If the cover lines
are uninteresting and don’t catch the readers attention, it is likely that there
wont be many buyers. Whereas if the cover lines grab the reader attention,
and sound interesting, there are likely to be people buying it. For my
magazine I used interesting cover lines mainly based on the music industry.
The main cover line is simple and unrevealing; ‘reveals all’. This is short and
straight to the point but makes the reader question what this is all about,
which can make them want to buy it to read into what is being ‘revealed’.
Most of my coverlines are based on new music, events. However one of my
cover lines is ‘how is America winning?’ This is a more factual cover line, I did
this so the whole magazine didn’t consist of one main topic.

Images
All of my images within the three parts of my magazine, are of the same artist.
The images make my artist look dominant and confident, which is the image I
wanted to portray. This was done through the body language she posed
through the images and her facial expressions. I made sure the cover star was
looking directly at the camera to give direct address to the audience in every
photo, however the front cover she has sunglasses on, this was done
deliberatly and she is a mystery, because no one knows who she is as she is a
new signed artist, this will then be revealed in the contents page where she is
still looking directly at the audience with no glasses on. Having the cover star
look directly at the audience helps build a relationship with the audience.

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

Question 6- what have you learnt
about technologies from the process of
Throughout producing my magazine and researching into what I need in a
magazine, I had to use various softwares such as paint.net, Microsoft word and
publisher. STRENGTHS:
Microsoft Word
I found that using Microsoft word for putting my research into, so it was easy to
look back, was easy and logical to use. Its simple to use by changing fonts and
sizes and colours I intend to use, and add images and crop and move them
around. Also if I need a word which I am unsure on how to spell, I have spell
check which stops my grammar errors as well and spelling.
Page Plus
Page Plus is also a very easy software to use, it enables me to add images, text
and shapes. Drag them into any position I would like, add effects and filters to
images instead of having to use a different software to edit the image and
then upload it onto page plus. It also offers me to have a layout where I can
put all three of my designs into one document rather than having three
separate documents. I can change the font, size and colour. It also gives me
tools such as erasing unwanted parts of images and gives me the option of
choosing a background. And lastly it allows to me to save it as a JPEG or a PSD
file.

Publisher
Publisher is an easy software and easy to understand, we are able to choose
a range of different templates; leaflets, posters. We can also choose what
angle we want to present our work, whether it is horizontal or landscape. We
are able to insert images as well as text. We can change the colour, size and
font. Also save the document as JPEG. If I made a mistake, it was an easy
process to go back and change mistakes or delete them.
Paint.net
Paint.net is easy to use and understand, once being taught all of the different
tools. You can add effects to images and crop and cut round backgrounds.
You can add text and shapes similar to page plus. It gives you the option to
change the canvas size, in this case, it made my magazine look more realistic
as it was the magazine size.

Question 6- what have you learnt about
technologies from the process of constructing
the product?However some softwares have their weaknesses.
Microsoft Word
You are unable to save documents as JPEGS and it can be difficult to move
images, as you have to go through a procedure of making the image tight.
Page Plus
The effects don’t compliment the image, the effects can sometimes have a
negative impact on the quality of the image. And you have only a small
choice of brush effects and shapes.
Publisher
There are only basic tools to choose from and didn’t always give my
magazine the look I wanted to put across. Also there was no cropping tools
to cut round the image.
Paint.net
The cut out tool doesn’t always take away all the area you want it to
dissolve. This was very frustrating, and you cant have more than one thing in
the same layer, which was confusing by having several layers.

Drafting and planning
At the beginning of the course, I done several drafts as to how I will present my
magazine, looking back at the very first drafts, I have made massive
improvements, the presentation, colours, images and generic conventions has
improved over time. This is shown on my blog from the first draft of my contents
page to the my final content page.
http://katiehurley447.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/drafting-and-planning-contents-
page.html
Throughout the time of my first draft to my final draft, i had to research several
music magazines similar to mine to help me develop my understanding of how
to present the magazine. There was one thing i struggled with, which was when
i wanted to cut out the entire background out, so i was left with just the cover
star. However i kept practicing at this and i got better at it.

Photographic Choices
Before taking photographs of my cover star I researched other female artists
who inspire me, and who I listen to. This was people like Iggy Azalea and Niki
Minaj etc.
http://katiehurley447.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/inspired-similar-artists-r-
hopsoulpop.html
This enabled me to do different photoshoots of my coverstar striking different
poses to make her look dominant. This research helped me to get the right
look for my artists and portray the type of person I wanted my artist to be.

Blogger
This was how I uploaded my progress of creating and researching my
magazine. It was very effective when I wanted to upload analysis of other
magazines and drafts of my own magazine. It allows me to access any of my
work I have uploaded on here at any time and keeps it organised by
categorising it into folders on years and months. I can also title each blog I
post, which makes it more clear on what each post is about. It makes
uploading work much easier and enjoyable.

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

Question 7 – Looking back to your
preliminary task, what do you feel that
you have learnt in the progression from
it to the full product.
Preliminary Task Final Task
In my preliminary task, there is not enough cover lines, and the colours don’t blend
nicely together. Whilst my final task has the correct number of cover lines but not to
much and the colour scheme is consistent. I feel I have learnt how to give a
magazine a specific look, I also learnt the house style has to match the ethos of the
magazine in order for it to look realistic and professional.

Question 8
How successful do you feel your end product is in fulfilling the
task?

Question8- How successful do you
feel your end product is in fulfilling
the task? How well does it fit in the
brief?
Overall I am happy with the outcome of my front cover, contents page and
double page spread. I feel I have made it look like a music magazine. The
researched has helped me massively for when making decision on my music
distributor, target audiences, generic conventions, images etc. By using the
various software’s I have to come to make my pop/R&B music magazine
with typical magazine features as well as making it unique. I think my
strongest page is the front cover as this I felt was well structured and thought
about. Personally I feel that my magazine has turned out successful.

Improved media evaluation

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