The document summarizes the learning process of creating a magazine mock-up. It discusses conventions used, influences from other magazines, target audiences, and technologies used. Key points include using common magazine conventions like mastheads and cover lines to attract audiences. The creator analyzed magazines like NME and Kerrang for influences and aimed their mock-up at a similar teenage audience. Software challenges were discussed, finding Paint.net and Photoshop most useful for editing despite complexity. Overall, the process helped the creator learn magazine design principles and technologies for constructing a media product.

1. Media Evaluation James Smith

2. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge form and conventions of a real media product?

3. Magazines My magazine uses codes and conventions like many magazines on the market, these generic conventions consist of mastheads, barcode, date, cover lines, puffs and pugs. These conventions are on the front cover of the magazine. I used this puff to entice the audience, this would entice the audience because people always like to have Free objects. The mast head was across the top third of the page, this is because people look from top to bottom at a magazine. Therefore , it will attract people and it will make it stand out from other magazines.

4. A barcode is used in all magazines on sale, I used this to show that the magazine is on sale and it shows how I used the conventions to show that I create a magazine. I used cover lines , with superlatives to attract the audience but to show them what is inside my magazine. Within my magazine I also challenged some conventions , an example of this is a photo on my contents. The photo shows the artist not looking towards the camera this gives the artist an attitude that he doesn’t care about being in the main article

5. When creating my magazine I had influences which helped me to target my target audience, my genre of magazine was targeted at rock and indie music therefore my influences was similar magazines. The magazines were NME and Kerrang, they had similar conventions so I chose some of the conventions and layouts as these magazines. By doing this it would allow me to attract the same target audience. Also Q magazine influenced my contents page, the reason for this is because Q magazine uses a formal layout so it is easy to see what pages it is for different articles. Whereas NME is usual informal but I thought that the Q contents page style suited my magazine better. http://www.nme.com/ http://www.kerrang.com/ http://jamessmith93media.blogspot.com/2011/01/research-into-similar-magazines.html On my blog i discussed what influences I used.

6. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

7. The social groups represented in my magazine are similar to the ones in NME magazine. These social groups are “indie” groups of people. This group is usual dominated with males, as they always seem to be rebellious side to the music genre. It also similar with rock music and rock people. Which is also dominated with males. However there are some women which make music in this genre so there are some woman featured in my magazine. NME appeal to teenagers and early 20 year old, they use the conventions and the music genre to attract these people, this is why my target audience is similar because NME influenced the work I created. They also have similar social groups that they target, they target the music genre and style of indie , this style attracts the people who listen to indie music which is what I tried to do.

8. My magazine also fits in the stereotype of men being more dominant and women being passive, even though this is not the case in society. The reason I have done this because other brands of magazines with similar social groups have men being dominant because there is a lot more men who are in bands in this genre. The indie and rock genre usually stereotypes young teenagers as binge drinkers because this is how famous bands act and are known for in this genre of music.

9. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

10. My magazine might be distributed by IPC media, IPC media is a well known business that distribute hundreds of magazines, they have a few similar magazines to mine. They distribute NME which was one of the magazines which influenced the conventions I used on my own magazine. http://www.ipcmedia.com/brands/nme The reason why I choose IPC media is because it distributes music to a mass market. My magazine would be distributed by a mass market because the music genre is followed by a large amount of people. My is not In a niche market because there is a lot of people that follow the indie style. However if my music magazine followed “grime” music I would have to find a niche market distributor because there is only a few people that would listen to that style of music.

11. Who would be the audience for your media product?

13. Both males and females are also my target audience of the magazine. However, males dominate the magazine because there are more males then females, this is because there is more male artists on the front cover of similar magazines.The reason I choose this target audience because my questionnaire gave me the data of what ages and gender would read my magazine. Also, it is similar to NME which has the same target audience to age and gender.

14. NME and Kerrang both appeal to the “rock and roll” life style, this is what I wanted to accomplish with my magazine. They have similar conventions and they was my influence on creating my own magazine therefore I have the same themes. This meant I would have a similar target audience to NME and Kerrang magazines. NME appeal to teenagers and early 20 year old, they use the conventions and the music genre to attract these people, this is why my target audience is similar because NME influenced the work I created. Q magazine attracts to the people in there twenties because there articles and styles in their magazines are more formal, I used this style in my contents page because I thought it would fit better than an informal style like NME or Kerrang.

15. How did you attract/address your audience?

17. From the feedback of the draft I also needed to change the positioning of the masthead , the reason I change this is because it didn’t stand out on the page therefore, I place it in a central position and made it larger

20. The images I used at the beginning was okay some of them I used in the mock up as well as the final product however, I realised there wasn’t much diversity so I took more photos so I could incorporate more bands and articles in my cover lines and contents pages. I also got the models on my front cover and double page spread to act if they didn’t care about being on the front cover on the magazine , I done this because many other magazines do a similar photos, these types of images go with the style of music the magazine is about. This means the target audience would be able to relate and recognise the music in the magazine.

21. What have you learnt about technologies form the process of constructing the product?

22. To create my magazine I used a range of different types of software, they all had advantages and disadvantages.

24. Word was a good software to use for text boxes and writing in general however , it is not to good at editing. I found there is not many was you can edit a photo or text.

27. Looking back to your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

28. Preliminary task Unplugged final Unplugged mock up I have learnt how to layout out a magazine, language used, convention used and learnt how to edit images and text etc.

29. From the first task I feel that I have learnt how to create a magazine successfully. I have learnt the conventions of a magazine and how some magazine challenge these conventions because they are either well known or apart of a niche market. The preliminary task is very simple, it doesn’t have any pugs or puffs , it doesn’t have a barcode or a large mast head. Compared from the draft you can see the change in conventions , for example I used a barcode, larger mast head and cover lines. The final product is similar to the preliminary because it very colourful, I thought the colour should be bright so it would attract my audience. However, I used similar pictures and layout to the draft because the feedback was good.

30. How successful do you feel your end product is in fulfilling the task?

31. I feel that from first product to end product I have learnt a lot about how magazines work . I have learnt about the conventions of a magazine and how some magazines challenge these conventions. It has also help me understand the techniques used to create media products such as magazines. I feel that my strengths was the layout of the contents page , I feel that I used the right conventions that would address my target audience to buy the magazine. Also, I feel that my front cover layout was good ,However I could have improved it by adding more images of bands because there is only one main image on the front cover. To improve I think that I should have done a different article because the Q&A is very simple, I think that a album review would have been more appropriate for the target audience.