The document discusses the design choices made for a music magazine prototype aimed at 16-25 year old indie/rock music fans. These include placing the magazine title in the top third of the cover page, featuring a prominent central artist image on the cover and contents page for consistency, and using jagged boxes and color coding on the contents page to distinguish sections and draw the reader's eye. The magazine is intended to appeal to a niche market by including interviews on less mainstream genres like Christian rock.

2. I included a summary of all the artists featuring in the magazine so readers knew if the artists they liked where in this issue I included a box with a competition inside due to the majority of magazines, being music related or not, hosting competitions for prizes related to their magazines genre I called my magazine “unplugged” because it is focusing more on live acts and suggest it has all the news from behind the scenes. The title is also big and in the top third of the magazine sticking to the conventions of many music magazines When placing the title for my artist I did not put it across the Image like many magazines do but instead placed it next to it, Highlighting the name in red to draw the readers attention to it. Front Cover

3. Contents Page I avoided adding the word “page” next to the page number in an attempt to allow more space for information on the content featured in this weeks magazine. I noticed this in a copy of NME allowing more room for spacing between contents . I noticed that the majority of borders for music magazines are usually rather plain so I used the Jagged boxes to draw attention, and so the reader could easily identify what articles are in each section as the header stands out I noticed that most music magazines have one main image on their contents page which is of the artist of the front cover creating consistency across the magazine as they are the focus of this weeks issue.

4. Double Page Spread The mast head is used to draw the readers attention so they can recognise what they will be reading. So the reader can follow the conversation easier I have colour coded the Interviewer and the artist so they can be easily distinguished from one another The image on in the centre of 2nd page of the double page spread contained a caption as to show what the artist was doing at the time When I began the interview I gave a brief few words to make the artist more appealing and catch the reader’s interest . The triangles sectioning off parts of the magazine show what’s in this weeks magazine as well as next weeks interview

5. My magazine is aimed at people between the ages of 16-25 and who are fans of indie/rock music. I looked at magazines like NME and Q which are quite popular among people of the target audience. To help make my magazine appeal to them I designed the layout of the front cover in a similar way. I placed the Name of the magazine in the top third of the magazine. I placed my main artist in the centre to be similar to conventions of other magazines yet in an attempt to make mine different I covered Part of the writing behind the main image allowing the image to be the first thing that catches the readers attention. I also kept the Front cover from being too cluttered by writing so it would be easy to recognise what was inside. A good example of this is the artists featuring section which summarises who features in the magazine without going into details taking the focus away from the main image and cluttering the page.

7. However one thing that I recognise is that IPC would only accept a magazine which has proven it would make money therefore I would make my magazine free to download originally and if there was consistently strong downloads I would begin to charge people for downloading my magazine and if it continued to make money I could then ask for support off IPC.

8. My front cover image was taken on a street to try and appeal to the people living in the cities rather than out in the countryside. My main artist is male. I choose to do this as a lot of men look up to musicians as role models and aspire to be like them. Also I believed that by choosing a male artist it would be easier for me to write when it came to points in the coursework like writing the interview. My magazine is set out to appeal to people who are more serious about music and would like more detailed interviews with relevant questions being asked to corresponded with their opinions. However if you read through my interview you’ll find my artist appeals to a niche market as well, due to the fact he plays some Christian rock, a genre which I feel has not been exploited by modern day music magazines, such as NME.

9. Throughout using Photoshop elements for my media magazine I have learnt that I can alter colours by using selected filters to produce effects like negative or greyscale or I could use the brush tool alter specific sections of photos, making them darker or altering colours. One of the more effective methods I learnt in photo shop was by altering the contrast and brightness of an image so once it had been cut from the irrelevant background it blended in, looking professional and like it had been a professionally taken photograph rather than one which was taken in the living room of someone’s home

10. I also learned how to use filters which to edit the colours and style of the images to make it appear as if its been drawn or painted rather than a plain image. Also it can increase the sharpness of the people in the image making them more defined from objects in the background.

11. I found that the layout of my school magazine was far to formal to transfer over to my music magazine. I wanted my music magazine to represent a more relaxed group delivering news from the music industry. However in my opinion the layout of my school magazine makes it look more like a formal newspaper similar to styles like news of the world or the daily mirror.

12. When designing my contents page for the music magazine I aimed to change several things. For example I wanted each section (features ect) to stand out from one another. This led to me boxing them off so they can be distinguished from one another. My aim was to try and make it easier to follow. One thing I kept form my school magazine was the use of a colour code, allowing consistency throughout the magazine making it easily recognisable to readers