2. My aims I set out to achieve a brand new magazine for 15-18year old girls. I wanted to create a sophisticated magazine on the genre of Pop music. I found out that there was a gap in the market for this type of magazine for the age I was targeting.

3. In what way does my media product use, develop or challenge the conventions of real media products? I used the idea of a popular real product as a USP for my magazine. The possibility of being able to win something makes the magazine more attractive. I used a bubble pop out on my double page spread to emphasise an interesting/shocking point that’s been made by the celebrity which is commonly used in magazines. It makes the reader want to read the whole article.

4. Social Groups My media product represents certain social groups, such as all those included in ‘popular cultures’. As it is aimed at older girls, it using sophisticated colouring that they would be familiar with in other industries such as fashion. Also by having an ‘attractive’ young new male artist on the front cover this will attract the target audience immediately. It represents them as men will play a large part in there lives and social activities during this age.

5. Media Institution I would use a large media institution due to the fact my magazine is mainstream and would be advertised suitably alongside many of there other products. I would use one such as ICP Media for my media product, Distraction. These are just 3 of the magazines IPC could use to advertise Distraction in that my target audience may read.

6. Audience Who are they? The audience for my Media Product is girls ages 15-18. Girls such as these in the photos who love to go to see live music & ‘chill’ with their friends. Young women who love music & have an interest in pop.

7. Attracting my Audience I will attract my audience by using my rule of 3, black purple & grey/silver. These colours were the 3 most mentioned in my original research for my product. By having Joseph Mendez on the front, this catches my audience’s eye as he is an attractive young pop artist. As I got Joseph to wear a fashionable shirt during the photo shoot this will also attract the 15-18yr old girls.

8. Having ‘exclusive 1st interview’ underneath the feature article on the front cover makes people want to read more as they feel they will be the 1st to know. This suits my target audience as they love to know the latest ‘gossip’. By using a photo in which the young people are smiling and having a good time, this attracts my readers as they want to know how they can be a part of this.

9. Preliminary Task When I started my preliminary task of designing a school magazine I had never before used fireworks software so had no idea how it worked. I realised how much effect having a banner across the front to advertise a certain feature/USP of the magazine has.

10. I learnt much more about what people want in magazines by using questionnaires and other research methods such as looking at real media products constructed for schools. I also found that having regulars in magazines was an idea that everyone was familiar with & liked. From feedback on my school magazine I found that pictures on the contents page had a greater impact than just advertising the feature with words.

11. Learning the technologies I learnt a bit during that task, but learnt much more whilst making Distraction. I learnt how to do effects such as glow and 3D on fireworks MX. I also learnt how to crop, cut and edit pictures. I also now find it much easier to create and edit posts on my blog. Uploading pictures and other files I now find easy as well. I also found that research methods help a great deal when it comes to actually creating your own media product.

12. Overall I think producing my magazine went very well. As well as making my media product I learnt about new technologies as I previously stated. If I had more time I would have learnt more about fireworks so I would be able to make it even more professional. I think my double page spread worked very well and the layout made it look as if it was a real double page spread, I believe this is the most successful part. Looking back, if I had more time I would have found out how to work fireworks much better so I could give my front cover a better layout.

13. Audience feedback “It’s vibrant, got a futuristic look about it” “Love the primary image on the front cover” “good layout of double page spread” “front cover needs more features on it” “contents is simple and easy so makes it much more readable”