Evaluation as slideshare questions

Question 1- In what ways does your media

product use develop or challenge forms

and conventions of real media products. • The music magazine which I have created for my media product uses many of the main

conventions of real media products including mastheads, main images, secondary images, tag lines, puffs and many more. Each of these conventions serve a purpose in encouraging and persuading my target audience to purchase and read my magazine as they have been designed to suit my target audience in particular from the audience research that I carried out. My music magazine challenges other RnB music magazines as there are not many of this genre available and those that are tend to be of an online format whereas mine will be a physical published copy available to purchase in stores. However, when acknowledging the importance of the media I have included web links for my magazine page as there would be an online version that viewers could also use. This is advertised throughout my magazine to maximise publicity and awareness. My magazine develops other forms and conventions of existing magazines such as the colour schemes of reds, blacks and whites which I have found is a typical colour scheme for a lot of magazines of this genre. Due to this, I decided to use this as my own colour scheme as it clearly works well with the target audience and is professional. However, I decided to incorporate gold into my front cover and DPS as they featured the same model and I liked the connotations of royalty and luxury that it reflected. I also found that gold was a very popular colour for RnB CD’S and music videos when doing research and so thought this would work well.

For my front cover I decided to copy the layout of the RnB magazine on the left. This included

the placement and sizing of the cover lines and positioning of the masthead and main image. I felt

like this layout created a good balance between text and image and so did not appear empty or

overcrowded. I have also developed the strapline convention in that I felt it linked well with my

magazine and was a good feature to include as it makes the magazine appear more authentic. I

also developed the use of the banners at the top and bottom of the page as it was a common

feature of RnB magazines and allowed me to add artists names and more information for the

reader.

Features that I changed in regards to the existing product was the plain background which I changed to a faded

blend of grey and gold. I used this as somewhat of a colour tie in with the gold from the models cap. I chose this

colour in particular as it connoted success and wealth which I feel my target audience would be interested in.

Here is a comparison of my original work alongside my inspirational piece. As you can

see, I copied a lot of conventions from these piece as I felt that it was a great layout for a

contents page. However, I did make a few changes. I decided to use a red, black and white

colour scheme as opposed to the greys and blacks of the inspirational piece. I felt like this was

too dark to get across the right feel to my magazine. I decided on red as it connoted a sense of

danger which is stereotypically associated with the street lifestyle and was also more visually

pleasing to look at, in my opinion.

I also changed the angle of the image as I felt a shot from behind created a good tone from the

magazine and gave the model a sense of street status.

Conventions that I kept were the layout of the title, which I felt was creative and something I

hadn’t seen before. I used this as I think it would attract my target audience. I also liked the

use of the large letter behind the image as somewhat of a background as it made the magazine

appear established and professional. The fonts were another feature that I

kept similar as I liked the variety and

consistency of how they changed

depending on what they indicated, i.e

all page numbers were in the same font

and all page titles. I feel like the fonts

were relevant to my genre while being

legible and professional. This layout

was a good choice I believe as it does

not appear over crowded or empty.

Conventions that I have developed in my

production also include the large masthead that

stands out on the page. I developed this

convention as it instantly allows the reader to

understand what the article as about and draws

attention to it. I also developed the convention of

a large main image as I feel that it creates a good

balance between image and text which is likely to

be more appealing to my target audience. I also

liked the idea of a faded background when

researching existing products and so I decided to

develop this but chose to use gold rather than grey

like the existing product. I further developed the

use of conventional columns although I

experimented with fragmented columns but

changed this due to peer feedback.

Question 2- How do your media products

represent particular social groups? • Given that the majority of my target audience are males around 18-

25, it is likely that the social grade of this reader ship will range from C2-E as a lot of them are still of a young age and so will not be in top occupation positions in their careers yet. Or could still be in education such as college or university in which case they would fall into social grade E. The advertisements and images that I have used throughout my magazine tend to portray this social group as laid back with a sporting nature. the costume of my model and the props that he is using and the graffiti background of some of the images help to connote this idea of my target audience. For example, the basket ball prop that is visible in some of my secondary images portrays the athletic nature of the social group and the graffiti walls in the background, along with the costume of my model indicate the stereotypical raw nature of my target audience.

My media product also represents the beliefs and values of my model. These include the

typical masculine traits of strength and somewhat violence. This is a stereotypical feature of

males, in particular those that live a “street lifestyle”. In many films it is common to see

strength as something that males compete for to gain status, i.e in Fight Club. My readers

may be interested in my artist as his physical appearance clearly demonstrates bodily strength

and is something that the readers may aspire to have as it is a valued trait. My products also

highlight the value of music which is something that my readers would be interested in, given

it is a music genre magazine. This is important in this rap genre in particular as it is how a lot

of people make their money and so is highly important in their life.

Question 3 - What type of media institution my

distribute your media product and why? • Bauer, a magazine institution which distributes other products such as Mojo and Kerrang. Bauer is

currently Europe’s largest and most successful privately owned publishing group. The company publishes over 300 magazines in 15 countries. The existing magazine which I have researched, VIBE, is currently distributed by intermediate partners which is private equity. They distribute their magazine through their online page which allows their target audience to browse through some of the articles contained in the magazine. It is also distributed in other areas ranging from local shops to supermarkets and has been done this way since it was first produced by Quincy Jones in 1993. Although vibe Is distributed by intermediate partners, I feel like Bauer would be a better choice for my own magazine because it would be more likely to help my magazine reach mass media scales rather than a small scale audience like a lot of existing RnB magazines.

• I believe that there is a gap in the market for my magazine of my chosen RnB genre because there are not many existing products of its kind that are actual magazines rather than online articles.

• So because BAUER is a very successful distributing company they would have a bigger budget to use on expenses to make my magazine the best it could possibly be to attract more readers, e.g. more freebies and better features.

• To distribute my magazine I would have them sold in local shops and supermarkets so that they would be easily available to my target audience. I would also advertise through social media to maximise publicity and awareness given that a lot of my target audience have access to the internet.

• Other institutions that would be available would be companies such as Future. A company that has been ranked the sixth largest media corporation in the UK and published over 180 magazines in a variety of fields. The reason for this institution not being as suitable is for the fact that it does not specialise in music magazines but focuses more on gaming and software.

Question 4-Who would be the audience for

your media product? • When starting to put together ideas for my magazine I created a survey which I

would ask a sample of people in my proposed audience of males and females aged

18-25 relevant questions to get an idea of their interests in RnB/rap. First of all I had

to distinguish whether the people in my sample liked this genre and so this was my

question otherwise following answers would have been irrelevant. I continued to ask

questions about their hobbies, interests, likes and dislikes which was really helpful

in allowing me to understand the personalities of my target audience. From my

results I was able to create a reader profile of all of the things that related to my

target audience which I would incorporate where possible into my magazine. I found

that the best target group for my magazine would be males aged 18-25.

I also then created an audience profile which consisted

of a structured interview with a target audience

member which was posted on my blog. The interview

allowed me to ask more questions to get a good

understanding of my audience and also confirmed that

they would buy and be interested in my magazine.

Question 5- How did you attract and

address your audience. • To attract and address my audience I used my results from my

survey and reader profile to incorporate their likes and

interests into my magazine so that the magazine would feel

more relatable to them. For example, my target audience

survey indicated that the majority of my audience attended

gigs several times a year and so a puff on my front cover is

about lucky readers being able to win tickets for an Eminem

gig. To make my magazine stand out to my target audience

more than other existing RnB magazines I made sure that my

product had its own brand identity.

• This included the contrast between the dark and light colours

throughout the magazine, particularly on my front cover. This

is because this is the page that the audience see first and will

associate with the magazine. The unique selling point of my

magazine also helped to attract my audience, this was the

exclusives that were mentioned on my contents page as my

target audience survey indicated that my readers like to see

exclusive images and interviews.

The image that I have used as my main background image

was also an aim to attract and address my audiences as

when researching male target audience magazines such as

Men’s Health, a lot of the front covers demonstrated a

masculine and confident stance. Other images throughout

my magazine also reflected this kind of masculinity in an

aim to attract my target audience. None of my images had

any background settings as all images were cut around to

highlight the model. This limited the amount of mis-en-

scene that could be created as there were limited props and

lighting able to be seen. However the colours and costume

that I used for my model, e.g caps and baggy clothes,

helped to create this feel of street life within the mis-en-

scene as they were typical clothing of the RnB and rap

genre which would appeal to my audience. This was

further used as a page in regards to fashion that was

mentioned on my contents page as my reader profile

survey indicated that they were interested in clothing.

The fonts that I used on my front cover were all bold and used

solid colours. This was an attempt to attract my target audience as

research shows males are more likely to relate to “harder” texts

and colours, i.e the bold red and black that I have used. I included

these within the front cover as it was the first page that my

viewers would see and so would need to be appealing to my

audience from the off set.

However, the font of my contents page differed so that it was also

appealing to my secondary female target audience. The fonts of

my contents page showed “softer” fonts in cursive that are

considered more feminine and so would help appeal to female

readers.

In regards to the language that I used throughout my magazine, I

first researched existing magazines to get an idea of the writing

style that appeals to my audience. For example, page headings

such as ‘Rags to Riches’ are relevant in this genre as it refers to

how living on the streets has became living in luxury for the

artists. It would also appeal to my audience as they may aspire to

do the same one day. The language is informal in an attempt to

create a strong reader-writer bond so that the readers feel

comfortable and like they can relate to the magazine. This was a

common feature that I found of existing products.

The colour main colour scheme that I used for my magazine was red, black and

white. However, the colour gold was also used in both my front cover and DPS as I

felt like it connoted success and luxury that would appeal to my target audience who

may aspire to have this lifestyle. The reds and blacks were chosen as they connoted

mystery and danger that was typical of RnB and rap magazine genres. This allowed

my to know that these colours were successful in attracting an audience as they were

common colour schemes of existing products.

Question 6-What have you learnt about

technologies through the process of

constructing this product?• While constructing my magazine I have learnt new skills on Photoshop that I was unfamiliar with in

the past such as blending options and different textures you could apply to text and layers. This included the gradient tool that I used on my front cover to create the gold-grey fade and reflected a scale of success. I also experimented with the opacity tool when creating my water colourbackground ‘B’. I made this feature less opaque so that it was not too bold and did not over power the page.

• I also learned about different lighting options that you could add to images to create different effects which I experimented with in my own images, e.g. the back lighting I used which helped to create the mysterious tone to my secondary images.

• Another new topic which I learned about were the different shot angles that an image could be taken from to portray levels of power and dominance in an image. This was used in my sub images on my double page spread in which the camera was positioned at a low angle to portray authority and status of the model.

• Other devices and softwares which I used to create my blod were Dafont- a website that allowed be to browse a selection of creative fonts relevant to my Rap/RnB genre and download to the computer to use in my magazine. Blogger- a program that allowed me to post all of my updates onto the internet and keep up to date on time management. Imac- the hardware that allowed me to use all of the programs such as Photoshop. A Canon camera- the equipment that I took my images with for good quality. Prezi- an online program allowing me to make more media rich presentations in a fun and interactive. Slideshare- a presentation software site that helped me embed powerpoint slides onto my blog instead of block texts. Soundcloud- a audio software that allowed me to create voice recordings to make my post more media rich.

Question 7- Looking back at your preliminary

task, what do you feel you have learned in the

progression from it to the full product.

• Looking back at my preliminary task I feel like my product has improved in many ways such as improving the professionalism of my work from researching existing conventions of magazines and how real products use them successfully. This has helped my work look more like an established product as it has demonstrated the use of popular conventions.

• Another progression that I have made is the quality and content of my images making sure they are relevant and interesting to my audience.

• Overall, my skills on programs such as Photoshop have been allowed to develop through experimenting more and gaining a better understanding of the tools which has allowed my work to progress. For exampe, how to create effects on text unlike the word art that I had used within my preliminary task. How to remove backgrounds from images and cut around white space to make images and text over lap. These are all features that I struggled with in my preliminary task but was able to improve in my finished product.

• I have also learned about how theories such as colour theory and the study of semiotics can help in. These studies allow me to know what colours are likely to appeal most to my audiences and what effect I can create from certain images or text.

• Extended research has also allowed me to further understand my target audience and so I can now successfully add in cover lines and advertisements that I know that they would be interested in which would help boost sales.