This document outlines initial ideas for various aspects of an indie music magazine called "DISCOVERED". It discusses: 1) Choosing the title "DISCOVERED" to represent finding new indie artists and highlighting both emerging and established acts. 2) Focusing on the indie genre to showcase its diversity and give attention to a less mainstream musical style. 3) Targeting 17-24 year olds for a defined audience to tailor appropriate content. 4) Including news, interviews, artist features, reviews, and event listings to provide a variety of music-related content.

1. Proposal

2. Title of magazine
The title I have chosen for my indie music magazine is ‘DISCOVERED’ I picked this
name for my magazine as ‘DISCOVERED’ suited my idea for my music magazine. I
thought this because discovered has more of a meaning that links in with my genre,
indie. ‘DISCOVERED’ suggests that someone/something has been found out about,
and that is what I want my magazine to be about: writing about and publicising the
new artists that have finally been discovered and showing the audience what they’re
all about and what their music involves. Also discovered shows already discovered
artists in the industry that everyone knows about to give the magazine some crossover
of the genres. I also picked the title discovered because I asked my target audience
(17-24 year olds) and the majority of the people picked this name out of all of them as
they thought it was the most effective and gave the audience an insight into what the
magazine was actually going to be about before they even read it. Lastly I picked this
name for my magazine as I thought it was completely different to all other existing
magazines and had more of meaning than something that includes indie in the title
like ‘indie central’ which was one of my initial ideas for a title.

3. Choice of genre
I chose to have my music magazine based around the indie genre of
music. I decided on this type of music as the music that it involves is
very broad and is all different. For example in indie, you have sub
genres like indie rock, indie pop and indie alternative all of this music is
very different from one another meaning more of a wide variety of
people as the audience for my magazine. I also picked this genre for
my own music magazine as I think that indie is one of the genres that
is least talked about and people know the least about. I think that
because pop is so mainstream this is the genre of music everyone
knows artists from and all about, meaning other genres get forgotten
about a little. So I thought that if I made my magazine an indie
magazine it would make it more popular amongst the British public
and will make people want to find out more and go to gigs where indie
artists perform.

4. Target audience
I chose for the target audience of ‘DISCOVERED’ to be 17-24, as this
age range isn’t a very wide spread of people making it suited more for
a specific audience so I can make the information inside age
appropriate. If my target audience was from 17-40 for example, then I
would not be able to make the magazine suitable for everyone
because different ages prefer different artists and different aged
artists.

5. Content of whole magazine
I chose to add in lots of information about the latest music news,
interviews: including a big main one from the cover artist, information
about indie artists, equal amounts of information linking to images,
reviews, gigs coming up and a main section on discovered artists. I
chose to add all of this and more into the magazine as this way it will
cover a lot of things about the genre and about music in general. This
is important for a magazine as this will attract people in and the more
information the more people will want to buy it for the price that it is.
The more information there is the more you get for your money. I also
chose to add all of this in, as this way if some people aren’t interested
in reviews for example they can read lots about discovered artists if
they wanted too, or people can read all of it if they like every aspect of
the magazine.

6. Initial ideas for front cover
My initial ideas for the front cover of my magazine involve the masthead being at
the very top of the magazine with the date underneath it on one side. Also I
thought of placing a large image of the main cover artist in the middle of the page
with the artist (Martha Davis) crossing her legs and holding a guitar to show that
indie also involves many instruments. Below this image would be the artists name
and a quote that she has said that is also included inside the magazine on the
double page spread. Other information will also be added to the front cover
drawing the audience in for example ’10 page exclusive’. I have thought about
doing all of this for my front cover as I thought that too much information on the
front cover would be too much for the audience to look at and if there is only a
limited amount then people will have to buy the magazine to find out more,
rather than reading it on the front cover. Also I thought that the artist should take
up most of the cover as that is the main focus of that edition of the magazine and
it will show the audience the type of artists that will be included inside.

7. Initial ideas for contents page
My initial ideas for the contents page of my music magazine involve a list of the
contents at the bottom of the page which includes: gigs coming up, new, up and
coming artists, discovered artists, the indie artists to listen to now, old school
indie, latest music news, the main feature (cover artist) and reviews on old and
new albums. At the top of the contents page I thought about adding the editorial,
so that would be the first thing you see when you open the magazine, introducing
you to it. There will also be images added into this page to draw more attention to
it and this would mean the one of the first things you would see when you
opened the magazine would be these new artists that the magazine was all about.
I made a decision to put all of this on my contents page as I thought that because
this is the first page the audience will see it will also be the first impression of
inside the magazine. So I added all of this as this is what people would expect to
see and more as they will want to know what they are going to read, it could also
help them make a decision whether they are going to buy it or not. I put the
editorial at the top instead of the list of content as I think that a note from the
editor of the magazine will bring you into the magazine a lot more than a list of
what is inside.

8. Initial ideas for double page spread
My initial ideas for my double page spread in my music magazine was to have one of
the double pages full with my cover artist and a quote from the article/what they have
said about indie music and what they think about their own music. I then thought on
the other page, that this would be split up into columns for the article/interview with
the artist to go into. In this section there would also be images, using different shot
types that link to what is being said in the article. I made a decision to put all of this on
my double page spread as this may have been the reason the audience bought the
magazine (for the cover artist and too find out more about them). This double page
spread would introduce the audience to the artist and then on the next few pages
there would be more so the first two pages would draw the audience in and make
them want to read more. The way i have taken up a whole page up with a quote and a
long shot of the artist makes the audience wonder why the artist is saying this and
what her plans are in the music industry. It also introduces you to a new indie artist
who you may or may not have seen before or know anything about.

9. Initial ideas for photographs
My initial ideas for my photographs on my front cover, double
page spread and contents pages were for them all to link
together in some way by adding certain effects but also varying
them by having them all at different angle using different shots. I
also planned to vary my images more on the contents page as
this is the page that shows what is going to be in the whole
magazine and the DPS and front cover both link more as they are
both mainly about the cover artist and the new indie music that
there is. I decided to do this as I thought using different shots
and different people it would make the audience want to read
on and want to see all the different aspects of these new or old
indie artists lives and what they do/ going to do to the music
industry.