Evaluation

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

The magazine industry is generally very conventional and driven by repeated formats as this industry understand what appeals to the public and by sticking with the same format and content they get sales and will remain to.

My magazine develops instead of challenges as it has an attractive model on the front as well as displaying some of the content of the magazine. I decided to keep a more feminine feel to the magazine by using a female model on the cover. I did not base my front cover on another magazine, however did follow the formats of other magazines and how they focus on a main image, and to give it its own originality I took my own photos, these were used on the cover, contents and double page spread. However my magazine can also be seen to challenge some forms of convention from a real media product. My magazine cover does not try and bribe the audience by advertisements of free products or competitions. My front cover has a balance of image and text which does not overload the audience or intimidate them.

The main story is not published clearly on my magazine.

The two headings are very different, my magazines title could have been bolder to stand out.

Both of the pictures are of a good quality however the picture on the right is brighter due to professional equipment used.

The writing on my magazine would have stood out more if it was a bolder and a brighter colour.

I have not included as much information on my cover as i was scared it would put the buyer off.

The title of my magazine is clearly visible weather the actual media products title is slightly hidden by the picture.

The actual media product has a main image and a slightly smaller image on the cover, if i had the chance to produce another product i would do this.

Both of the magazines titles are clearly displayed.

My magazine has a heading ‘contents’ the actual product doesn’t, I think the reader prefers a heading to be shown.

Both products have an image however the picture on my contents page is not the main focus.

The contents page displays an extract from a featuring interview.

I chose to put an extract from my interview underneath the picture.

I based the idea of who is featuring on the front cover from this contents page.

I chose to include more on my contents page to show the reader what else my magazine offers.

Both double page spreads display the names of the artist in the boldest font

I have chosen to write over my image and use the background of the image for the page, the actual product has split the page into an mage and then separate writing space.

On my double page spread i picked out a part from the interview and used it as a sub-heading. On the media product they have done the same and put it in larger font and a different colour.

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

My media product represents men and women from the age of 18-30 with a particular interest in Indie?/Rock music. My media product did not represent any ethnicity however focused on Musicians that produce Indie/Rock music. The way in which I interpreted this was by use of styling and choice of artists featured in my magazine.

The models displayed on media products are usually famous or successful role models used to encourage readers to buy the magazine. They are often attractive and images are edited to give a better look.

To interpret the genre of music I based my magazine on, I had to take into account mise-en-scene, colours, fonts and different types of editing. I went to a derelict house in Croydon to take my photos which created the perfect vibe to imitate the messy/chaotic feel to the genre of music. I did edit the picture on my contents page however chose to use the original as I thought the page looked too dull. I also styled my model with quite a relaxed yet messy look to further suit the genre of music. I kept the same structured font throughout which was sans serif as this opposed the unstructured images, which worked well.

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

Conventional distributionI prefer this type of distribution as it is widely available for a target audience and can be seen by the general public. I would choose this type of distribution for my magazine as my target audience often browse through shops , in my market research our target audience preferred to buy than subscribe to a magazine as they said that they would base their buy on who and what featured in the magazine. Seymour- This is 50% owned by The Frontline Group and 50% owned by Dennis Publishing Limited. Seymour have a 13% share of the total magazine market and are the largest distributor of UK magazines. There aim is to drive magazine sales. I would not chose this type of distribution as I would prefer to have an individually distributed magazine.

Subscription distributionMany magazines offer a chance to subscribe to them however I believe this is more successful in fashion and magazines such as National Geographic, where the content of the magazine is often the same. There are pros and cons in using this method for my magazine. One pro would be more assured and confirmed sales leading to more money. A con for this method would be that the buyer may not be happy with the content of one of the issues of the magazine. When someone subscribes to a magazine they loose the choice of buying or skipping this months edition.

Web 2.0/mobile handset distribution

This enables the reader to access the magazine online. I would also choose this as a method as I believe it attracts new audience and is widely available. However where you save on costs for printing a magazine you loose on the sales of magazines, by making it viewable online, people do not pay.

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

My magazine is targeted at both males and females from the age of 18-30. Although there is a female on the cover of my magazine she is not portraying a stereotypical women's fashion magazine model therefore appeals to both sex’s. The content of the magazine does not favour a sex, as a result of this it further appeals to both men and women. The young attractive model on the cover makes the 18-30 target audience apparent and as a result of the market research carried out would appeal to buyers.

My magazine found its target audience through media as well as social grouping. The media grouping comes from the genre of music. The Indie/Rock genre is preferred by a mixture of ages and sex’s therefore cannot be socially grouped. When it comes to our target audiences age of 18-30, they have been socially grouped.

I think my magazine would be in the ABC1 class. The magazine is priced at £2.80 which is affordable for most. I decided not to price my magazine too high as it needed to be affordable for 18yr olds who may still be in full time education. Although my magazine is not highly priced it does not deliver a chatty gossip read. It is fairly formal with a chaotic yet structured twist of layout. The average income of my target audience would probably be £25,000 per year.

5) How did you attract/address your audience?

I have appealed to my audience through the uses and gratifications theory. I believe my magazine is able to inform and entertain readers through content and imagery. The magazine also provides a crossword for interaction, ( I based this on one of NME’s contents pages). My magazine informs readers on the latest music, festivals and also enables readers to have an insight into artists lives through interviews. My magazine is also pleasing to the eye entertaining readers with loads of images.

When carrying out the questionnaires I asked if the image on the cover was important and the majority responded in saying yes, as it is the first thing that catches their eye. When deciding on my particular genre of music I had to take into account styling, I think and hope I have managed to capture the relaxed slightly ‘dated’ image of Indie/Rock music.

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6) What have you learned about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Before undertaking this project I had never used Photoshop as a form of editing or creating work. The only softwhere i was familiar with using was paint and Microsoft Word. I found Photoshop really hard to use when trying to create my project, however when I understood the term ‘Layering’ I managed to create and edit quickly.

This is the quick selection tool that enabled me to cut out an image. However I decided not to use this image in the end.

LAYERINGThe camera I was working with was a digital camera, however the resolution was not as good as it could have been the pictures turned out with a high quality and were not too pixelated.

Slide share and Blogger was also a different technology I hadn’t used.

When merging the layers you were no longer able to move individual texts and images inserted and created.

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

Looking back at my preliminary I have seen that I have been able to include more content and match images with fonts. The contents page was created on Microsoft word therefore it appears to be plain and un edited. I could only print screen and crop images or insert my own and change the lighting through the picture toolbar.

However looking at my final front and contents page I am now able to edit colours, cut, layer and assemble my finishing product. Looking at my preliminary I learnt that bold font and colouring is important when attracting the eye. In my final product I have made the page numbers bold and put them on a different coloured background to the complete page making them stand out. I have also chosen a different colour to write the features in than the page numbers which looks pleasant as well as helping them stand out. Although I have not overloaded the front page with writing I managed to include more features on the final product, however if I had a chance to do it again i would add more features and maybe choose a colour that stood out more.