Preliminary Task - Planning & Research

OCR Media Studies – AS Level

Unit G321: Foundation Portfolio in Media

Planning & Research

Name: Zakary WinsallCandidate Number: 2144Center Name: St. Andrew’s Catholic SchoolCenter Number: 64135

Set Brief - Print

Music Magazine – Production

Preliminary Task Progression and Planning & Research

Section 1) –Preliminary Task

Preliminary Task Progression– EvidenceFront CoverStep-by-step

I started with a completely transparent A4 sized canvas.

I then created a grey to white gradient to give the background some colour instead of it being plain white.

To give my magazine a brand identity, I used the colours of St Andrews in a semi-circle shape at the top of the page.

My next step after adding the shapes at the top was to add the Masthead in the font: mfBeYourSelf. This was again in the St Andrews’ blue colour with a white 1px stroke around the outside.

My next step was to add in the strapline and the details of the magazine.

The strapline is located in the yellow and states “Published by the Pupils, for the Pupils”.

Underneath to the left and right in the blue is the magazine details. On the left is the issue number, date and the price. On the right is the web address for the magazine. I also added on the St Andrews logo for a better brand identity.

The first major change to the front cover would be the addition of the Main Image. I took a picture of my sister and edited out the background and added her to the front cover. Her hair is slightly overlapping the masthead as a common feature on magazines.

The next step was to add the main headline in yellow with a faint yellow glow. ‘Exclusive’ was also added in blue with a 1px black stroke to draw attention.

After adding the main headline I went ahead and added by cover stories with the St Andrews logo on each line. These are done in a white font with a 1px blue stroke on it.

I also added the metropolitan police logo to anchor one of the cover stories.

In this step I added in the barcode. I also copied the masthead and made it smaller to fit on the top of the barcode.

In a triangular shape above the barcode I added social media information with the anchoring logos along with the St Andrews logo on top of the triangle.

In the final step I added the puff promotion on the left of the main image. This is the St Andrews blue circle with a yellow stroke. Inside the circle there is the St Andrews logo with the Apple Logo which anchors the prize of a £10 Apple Voucher. Finally there is the word ‘WIN!’ in yellow in order to draw attention to the promotion.

Final Front Cover

Preliminary Task Progression– EvidenceContents PageStep-by-step

I started with a completely transparent A4 sized canvas.

I then created a grey to white gradient to give the background some colour and so it matched the front cover background.

Next I added in the brand identity, the yellow and blue semi-circles at the top with the St Andrews logo in the centre.

My first main step was to set the layout of where my main features would go. I marked out the boxes for the page title, the general information, interviews, the editorial and a bar at the bottom for the magazine information.

Once I was happy with the locations of the boxes, I added the titles to each box. This also included adding the St Andrews logo inside the ‘Contents’ box.

Next I spent a long time setting out my stories that would be featured inside the magazine. I made it so the title of the page was in the St Andrews blue and the description of it was in a small text and in black.

My next step was to write up my editorial. I added in the drop capital and then added by picture inside a circle. I wrapped the editorial text around both of these using the ‘Pen Tool’. I finally added my signature along with my details.

As I had a large blank spot in the top right, it is common to also seen the front cover repeated on the contents page. So that is exactly what I did. I copied it onto the contents page and added a 1px black stroke around the outside to separate it from the contents page.

My penultimate step was to fill in the yellow bar at the bottom of the page with the information about the magazine. This included the social media information, the copy of the masthead, web address and finally the page number.

The final step to my magazine contents page was to add some anchoring images around the page to fill up dead space and to make it look more appealing. With the dead space in the centre, I added another image of my sister, who was on the front cover, along with the metropolitan police logo and a picture of our sixth form café with relating page numbers.I also added in smaller images such as the sport equipment, Appleident and Mr Brooks to anchor the other stories.

Final Contents Page

Section 2) – Log Book

Music Magazine – Genre research

Vibe has a circulation of 300,943, of which 202,439 was paid, and 98,504 was non paid.

Production ProcessDate of Publication – The first thing that is done it to set the date the magazine will be published to the general public. This will help with setting a schedule for the development.Managing the Schedule – You must have enough space in the schedule to fix any mistakes before the deadline.Editorial and Budgetary Decision – It is the editorial decisions which involved the content that is covered in the next issue of the magazine. Once they have made the decisions they look at how much money is available for them and how much should be spent in the production of the magazine.Content Acquisition – Probably the most important step because without content there would be no magazine. There is in-house staff writers for the magazine and external writers that write about a specialist nature. There is also artwork and illustrations and pictures in the magazine.Sub-Editing – This focuses on the quality control, it involves checking the accuracy of the facts, making sure words are spelt correctly, property grammar and punctuation are used, make sure that the articles follow the house style and work on the page layout.Page Layout – This person will correctly lay the articles out to put it together as a magazine using powerful programs such as Desktop Publishing (DTP) or InDesign or Pagemaker to do this. The advertisers are also placed into the content.Proof Reading – The editorial department will print a hardcopy of the magazine in order to read through it and to find any mistakes. Any mistake that is spotted is quickly corrected, the editorial keeps proof reading until all the team is satisfied there is no mistakes.Printing – The entire magazine is send to the printer, Pre-Press’ are printed to check all the colours and layout is fine before printing hundreds or thousands of copies.Distribution – It is the final stage where the company packs the magazines and go to a warehouse to go to the general public.

Q magazine has a circulation of 52,781 from (ABC Jul – Dec 2013)

Source: http://hosbeg.com/the-magazine-production-process/

“#1 of 25” ‘informs’ (Katz) the reader that there will be more of the collector’s magazines to come out at a later date, again encouraging people to buy them when they do.

Established Magazine for my Research

Tinie Tempah is the main image in the centre of the front cover and also infront of everything else. This illustrates that his is more important than the rest on the page.

Masthead, it is bright red which stands out on the front cover and contrasts completely from the background.

This “collector’s edition” is a magazine that is specialist. This may encourage more people to buy it because it’s one of a kind.

The main headline is about how music has changes some artists’ lives. With this amount of artists gives a wide range of people the reader can look at.

Tinie Tempah has also signed a copy of the magazine which allows for the other copies of the magazine to be published like this. Again a one of a kind feature will encourage people to buy it.

The placement of the barcode is in the bottom left corner of the cover. This way it is completely out of the way so it does not disrupt the main image on the cover.

Target Audience –The target audience for Q magazine can be denoted as having a mass appeal to all classes and genders. Q publishes their magazine each month and it costs around £3.50 per issue. According to socio-economic needs, students are placed in the Class E section. £3.50 per month is very affordable for a student who may earn very little. It is also very affordable for anyone else in regular work. I believe that Q Magazine is not specifically targeted at any specific class or ethnicity as every issue is different that would appeal to different people. Q Magazine may also target ‘Survivors’ (Maslow) who wish to have security and a routine in their magazine. The audience most likely reader Q magazine for ‘diversion’ or to ‘inform and educate’ (Katz)

What is the USP of this magazine?

From the research completed into this media product, I think the USP is the fact that this issue of Q magazine is an exclusive, collectors addition magazine. The people who are avid readers of Q magazine would be more tempted to buy the magazine as it’s one of a kind for the 25th

anniversary. The signature from Tinie Tempah may also be a huge selling point as again it is exclusive and one of a kind, which is brilliant for the collectors.

Publisher research

http://www.bauermedia.co.uk/brands/qhttp://magazines.bauermediaadvertising.com/magazines/detail/Q

Q is a magazine that is published by Bauer Media. This a company that manages a variety of other magazines besides just Q. They also focus on radio and TV stations in different areas of the world.

Q’s content focuses mainly on new and old rock and roll artists and their target readership is mainly those of the ages of 15- 25.

Because of Bauer Media, Q has a total of 48,353 copies of their magazine (Jan –Jun ’14) and a total readership of 339,000 (Jan – Dec ‘13).

The reader profile to the right illustrates thatthe average reader of Q magazine is male.

Conventions of a Music MagazineThe masthead is bright yellow in colour which stands out from the plain background. This would also mean that it stands out on the magazine racks in a store.

The main headline, again in a bright yellow makes it especially clear to the reader what the main story is going to be about.

The main image is both of Eminem and Dre and is slightly different to your usual Hip-Hop/Rap magazine cover. Both artists are standing in white lab coats instead of the typical tank top and tattoos.

This cover of Vibe also has cover lines with separate artists that the edition also includes. If Eminem and Dre do not appeal to some readers, they also have the other artists listed here in the cover lines.

The web address for Vibe (Convergence) is placed at the bottom left of the cover which is completely out of the way of the main image.

Dre is looking straight out towards the customer which could ‘intimidate’ them into purchasing the magazine.

Target Audience –The target audience for Vibe magazine can be denoted as having an appeal to a mainly male audience, rather than a female audience, (Hartley). This mainly male audience would be followers of the hip-hop or rap culture; most likely within their teen years. The cost of the magazine is around £5.00 quarterly which is very affordable for the Class E, most likely students, (Socio-economic needs). I do not believe that Vibe has been specifically designed to appeal to a certain race or age, but people may argue that according to stereotypes it would appeal to black people more than white people, (Hartley). The readers of Vibe magazine are most likely ‘survivors’ or ‘explorers’ (Maslow) and probably read it because they want ‘diversion’ (Katz).

What is the USP of this magazine?

From the research completed into this media product, I think the USP is the bright letter for the masthead and also the main headline. I believe this because it would stand out on the magazine racks and someone would stop and look at the issue. Another selling point of this issue of Vibe magazine would most likely be the lettering ’15th annual juice issue’ which suggests that this specific issue has some interesting content which some readers would be very interested in; thus convincing them to purchase a copy of the magazine.

Publisher researchVibe Magazine was founded by producer Quincy Jones and is published by Spin Media, located in New York. Their main content includes mainly R&B, Hip-Hop and Rap.

Vibe’s target readership would usually listen to R&B, Hip-Hop and Rap music and would be between the ages of 18-34. (Hartley).

According to recent statistics Vibe has a currently circulation of around 300,943 copies, 202,439 were paid for and 98,504 were non paid. The magazine is published quarterly into big stores and online.

Vibe used to publish both printed copies and online copies, there were small differences in the content provided in each version. The online version has the potential to have more information than the printed copy. The printed copy also focuses on individual artists instead of a whole group of artists, which they do on the online copy. However as of 2014, Vibe magazine only publishes the online copy and no longer prints hard copies that go into big supermarkets.

http://abcas3.auditedmedia.com/ecirc/magform.asp