The End Result!

This is the front cover of my music magazine 'It's All Country':


This is the Contents page for my music magazine:



This is the left hand side of my Double Page Spread:



This is the right hand side of my Double page spread:

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

The title of my magazine: Looking at other country magazines when doing the research before creating my own, I found that most of them had references to the genre in their titles. For example, 'UP Country' and 'Southern Country' magazines. This helped me when deciding on my magazines name and I came up with several options in my earlier post. 'It's All Country' fits in with the conventions of these magazines.


Mis-en-scene of images: This is the image I used for my front cover. I thought this most represented a country band out of the photos taken. They all have quite calm, sombre expressions which I think fits as country songs are quite like that. My contents page is filled with poloroid images and a large image of a guiter which I think helps increase the country genre. My photos in general portray a close knit feel, not a poppy, obviously put-together band which is how most country bands are.

Costumes and props: The acoustic guiter in the centre of my front cover is a popular instrument in country music and the one most identified with it, so I thought it appropriate to use that as a prop. Two of my models are dressed in red, blue and white which is the england flag colours. This i thought appropriate because country magazines all seem to be very patriotic. The middle model didnt wear these colours because i thought it would be abit too bright in the background. I could have had them wear cowboy hats to make it even more obvious a genre, but I thought that might be a bit too much.


People: I thought the people i used as models in my magazine were appropriate because they were an all girl group (appropriate for the band they were representing; The Dixie Chicks) and also because they all listen to country music already and have the sort of background.



Title font and style: I thought this an ideal font for my magazines look because at first glance it reminds you of cowboys and quite old times, which is perfect for Country music because it is quite an old fashioned genre.


Written content: The written content in my magazine is based on a question and answer system. I could have done it by way of their story instead of strict questions but i liked this way better - I've seen it done in my magazine research. The questions I asked were based on the band's (fake) return to music and their lives surrounding that.

Music genre and how your magazine suggests it:
My music genre was Country and everything in my magazine suggests it. Everything above helped in someway to show the country genre. The main things were the font on the front page (The title as well as the masthead), the instrument shown in the image (acoustic guitar) as well as the bands featured on the cover (The Dixie Chicks and Dolly Parton).

Layout: The layout of my magazine is quite bare for normal covers, but normal on country magazines. My research showed that the covers are't generally completely covered with articles and images, its quite simply featured.

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

Above to the left is an image i took for my magazine (the front cover) and to the right is a cover of the magazine 'Time' featuring The Dixie Chicks, also shown by the anchorage text 'Radical Chicks'. The models in both images are looking directly at the camera in quite a serious manner; which immediately attracts viewers attention as it draws them in. The models are also all connected - touching in some way to show that they are in a group together, that they mean something to one another. This attitude fits my magazines country genre, as it is all about close groups and family. Both magazines have a plain coloured background; one blue and one black. This shows that all the attention is fixed on the people, with nothing to detract from them.
My target audience is women in their early twenties and the models in both images are young nearing that age which immediately attracts the target viewers - people are always interested in those of a similar age range to them. The models have a clothes colour scheme in both images - the real dixie chicks are all in black whilst my models are in the flag colours with hints of black as well. They are all clothes that my target market group would wear - in fashion but still unique to them. All of the girls are wearing similar dark eye-make-up but not a huge amount of anything else; which is the trend among the target viewers.
Both images have a feel of togetherness, of being quite a tight-nit group which is what I the target audience have alot with their friends/family.

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

To find out what media institution could distribute my music magazine 'It's All Country' I had to research what companies are distributing other country magazines. I found that 'Proper Partner scheme' distribute 'Country Music', 'Froots' and 'Maverick' (who also did a front page feature on The Dixie Chicks). Another company I discovered was 'Bauer Media Group' who are a very successful company that distribute magazines such as 'Kerrang', 'Empire' and 'Q'. This company wouldn't be very appropriate to my genre magazine as they focus on Rock bands with males audiences. 'IPC Media' is the third company i looked at and they distribute magazines such as 'NME'.
From these three companies, I think that 'Proper Partner Scheme' is the most appropriate company to distribute my magazine as most of its other magazines are quite country or around that sort of genre.

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

The target audience for my magazine would be quite a broad range of people because of the celebrities that feature it. For example, young teenagers would be attracted to the likes of Miley Cyrus and Taylor Swift; but and older audience would like Dolly Parton and Billy-Ray Cyrus. I said previously in an older post that the audience would be between 13 and 30, but I think that, that is too wide a target, so in this reader profile I will average it out.
'It's All Country's' target person would be in their early twenties/late teens and doesn't tend to keep up with the latest chart hits. They still buy their albums from the stores instead of on modern downloading programs like 'itunes'. They don't tend to go to many gigs and concerts and the ones they do go too are treats and ones they would enjoy immensely. They don't buy into the dinking, partying, exclusive lifestyle; preferring to stay in with a small select group of friends with a classic movie. They like the summer festivals (like the Leamington Peace Festival) and things you can just go to and relax in the sun listening to their favourite country music. They particually like artists like 'Kenny Rogers' and 'Dolly Parton', a favourite song of theirs being a collaberation of the two, 'Islands in the stream'.

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

Here are some annotated diagrams describing how features on my magazine attract my target audience:







Click on them to make them bigger.

6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Apple Mac: I had only vaguely used a mac before being asked to create a magazine on one. I found it quite easy to use and I liked being able to drag things across. The ease of the documents to stole and view files was really good i thought, especially when tranferring images across onto Photoshop for example.



The Program I used to actually construct my magazine was InDesign. I found it really difficult to use when I first started out, opting to use Microsoft Publisher for my first magazine instead. I still find it difficult but as time went on I grew more familiar with the tools offered. I liked how you could layer things and swap them around with ease and how you can change pretty much anything. I like how you can resize the images without them blurring and pull them into basically any shape you like. Some things still confuse me on Indesign but i managed to create my pages to the standard i wanted them to be.

The Program i used to edit my images was Photoshop. I preferred using this to Indesign because i had a bit more experience using it in my other lessons and such. Using this program, I edited my images to the high standard you expect to see on magazine covers. I brightened it up, changed the background colour whilst keeping the same texture and changed some of the flaws on my models - hair for example and skin blemishes.

Other programs I used whilst making my magazine were the website www.flickr.com and its editing program 'Picnic'. I found that a very useful place to store my images so that i could edit them at home as well as at school and because it is a site that is familiar to me. I used www.Photobucket.com to store more images and create the slideshows seen on my blog. using that, i transferred the slideshows to Blogger with ease.

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

On the left is my music magazine 'It's All Country' and on the right is my origanal project, the school magazine 'Chenny D'. I think I learnt quite a lot since making my first magazine. To start with, i learnt how to use Indesign and Photoshop properly; I avoided using them in my school magazine, preferring to use Microsoft Publisher and Picnic. I also spend more time planning everything in my music magazine, from the photoshoots to the layouts.

Photography: In my school magazine, i didn't plan my shoot, I just found some photos that I had recently taken and liked and just used them. I didn't edit the photo very much at all, preferring it as it was, when I could have given it a magazine polished feel. With the music magazine, I planned my shoot, prepared my models and thought about the kind of things i wanted them to do in it. I sorted throught the images and chose the ones I thought would look most effective in a country magazine. I spent a lot of time editing them and generally thought about it in a lot more detail.

Layout: The layout for my school magazine I just guessed at. I fiddled around with it and just placed the text and photo's where I thought fitted best. In my music magazine, I researched how my genre of magazine tended to present theirs and used that as inspiration to my own. I didn't try to crowd my page with as much as possible, preferring to space things out in a seemingly casual way. I like the layout of this magazine better.

Fonts: The fonts i used in my school magazines were just ones I found on Microsoft Publisher. I didn't try and find any interesting ones, I used ones familiar to me and the program. In my music magazine, I searched through a few websites looking specifically at fonts that i thought would fit into my magazines genre. I spent a lot more time finding the right ones and i previewed quite a few before settling on the ones chosen.

Contents Page Images

Here are the images that I considered using in my contents page. Not all of them went on it:

This is the editing process that i went through, when creating my contents page images in poloroid form!

Front Cover Image

ORIGANAL IMAGE:

I chose this image to use on my front cover because I think it looks quite band like and they are close together with no gaps. I think it will be a little difficult to make my font show through with all the different colours but i will work it out.

FLICKR EDITED:
I edited my image first on Flickr because i am more comfortable with this program than Photoshop. I like the effect this has given it:

Originally uploaded by tiakerby

FINAL EDIT:


I changed the background colour of my image as when i had edited it in Photoshop, the red was too full on a colour to use and it didn't look realistic. I chose blue instead as it matches the colour of my models tights and gives it a softer look.

Possible Photo's for Music Magazine

Here is a slideshow of the photo's I have taken for my magazine:

These include possible front cover, contents and Double Page Spread images.

"It's All Country" Double Page Mock-Up

This is a hand-drawn draft of my magazines double page spread:



I want this page to follow the american flag theme of the cover, because the Dixie Chicks brought in that theme to the magazine and the double page spread is about them. I want the Questions in the article to be black, the answers red and the background of the text box to be white. This will continue, hopefully into the image with the colors very obvious. I want the text font to be "Marker Felt" bold again, which i think will connect the pages and help it feel like a proper magazine.
I want the title of the article, 'The Dixie Chicks' to be as if it is on a banner. I could either find an artificial version when editing the layout or i could get the models to hold up some white material and lay the text on top. I want the font of the title to be the same as on the front cover, "Zapfino" as it seems again, stereotypically 'Country' as well as being quite edgy, making the band more eye-catching.

"It's All Country" Contents Page Mock-Up

This is a hand-drawn draft of my magazines contents page:



I wanted to try something new with the Polaroid images and i thought it would look really interesting if i covered the page with them, with a different photo of each one. I also considered that Polaroids are quite old, an old means of taking photos and Country music is all about old traditions I think - a slower progressing type of music. To do this, I will have to either take the Polaroid images and scan them in, or take the photos digitally and edit them on the computer to look like Polaroids. I want the pictures to show a variety of artists, so I will do several short photoshoots with different people to make it look crammed with people.
I thought, even though it isn't in this plan, that I could put an acoustic guitar image on the right hand side of the page for the text to sit in - making it stand out more from the polaroids, as well as bringing it back to a country theme.
I want the text to be in "Marker Felt", thin font, because I think it looks stereotypically 'Country' and helps link the page together.

"It's All Country" Cover Mock-Up

This is a hand-drawn draft of my magazines front cover.



I've only got noted that I want two images on this, but from the last magazines research I would consider adding more. But then again, on country magazines they have very few so It is something I will have to think about. I want the color scheme to be the American Flag colors as much as possible, going on how patriarchal the magazines I looked at are. I want the font of the name of my magazine to be in "American Typewriter" because it is quite old fashioned and I think it really fits in with the genre and I want the main article's text in "Zapfrino" font as it feels very 'Country' like. The font next to it, giving a tiny bit more detail to the article, I want in "Marker Felt" font, so that it stands out more. The articles surrounding the smaller image I think should all be in the same font, so that no emphasis is put on any artist, making them equal. I haven't decided what that font should be yet.

Ideas for my Magazine

Country artists that I know of:
Billy Ray Cyrus
Dolly Parton
The Dixie Chicks
Taylor Swift
Miley Cyrus

Front Page:
Main article = Dixie Chicks interview
Photo = Dixie chicks (CME)

Other Articles advertised:
Award shows?
Upcoming Albums/singles

Double spread:
Interview with the Dixie chicks (CME)
Photo shoot with friends for this
(Look at ‘COUNTRY’ magazine’s ‘Joey & Rory’ spread)

-Looking at research, could simply list artists that feature in the magazine

Country Music Magazines

Country magazines from research don’t seem to have very much advertised on its front cover. It isn’t busy and cluttered, filled with as much information as possible which, main-stream magazines such as ‘Kerrang’ or others do. The magazines seem calm and don’t try to grab viewer attention with packed covers, bold colors and font that stands out aggressively. It’s a style of magazine, of music, which appeals to a much smaller target market group than ‘Kerrang’ so they don’t try to compete with that, keeping it styled in the way that would attract their own TMG. I've also noticed, especially with "Southern Country" magazine, that the front pages or even possibly the entire magazine, aren't as edited and polished looking as others are. For example, "Kerrang" wouldn't just use the cover image of this "Southern Country" magazine. It would seem too wide a picture, too filled with people to go on the cover - they would probably just feature it elsewhere in the magazine or even in the contents page.
The magazines seem to be very patriarchal, using their own country's color's - which is usually American. "Up Country's" Name is designed like the American flag. "Southern Country" is a mixture of British and American and have used their natural colors, It is all very real. It makes other magazines seem artificial, makes them look very styled and fake.
Even 'Up Country' which is the most modern, fashionable country magazine I have seen, is very natural. The image is of a girl standing in woods with a pretty dress and little make-up. They articles are in small font, making them seem less. Nothing is bold enough to stand out and grab viewers attention. I was surprised to see the British flag flying on the page - I stereotyped country music to be practically all American. I would like my magazine to contrast this - be country but in more of an attractive way.

Music Magazine

Our next project is to make a music magazine. We need to do the Front Cover, Contents Page and a Double Page Spread. It can be any genre of music we choose, but it has to be music.

Possible Genres of Music:
- RnB
- Drum and Bass
- Pop
- Rock
- Country
- Metal
- Charts
- Classical
- Indie

i like the idea of doing a country magazine as it is something that not many people would do. I will do more research into other country magazines to see if there is any difference to magazines I've already looked at.

Target Audience:
Since artists like Taylor Swift have become popular, I think there is more of an interest in country music, especially from young people. So I think I will try to make this magazine for people 13 to 30. Ranging from the likes of Taylor Swift to the old favourites like Billy-Ray Cyrus and Dolly Parton.

Possible Names:
- Country!
- It's All Country!
- Country Classics!
- Country and Cool!

I would like the name of my magazine to be, "It's All Country"

Evaluation

I'm going to Evaluate my Front cover and Contents page and clarify what I could have improved on and my opinions.

My Front Page:
I enjoyed making the front page of my magazine. I found it easier than the contents page because of the amount of research I did. I really enjoyed doing the photo shoot with my friend for it and laying out the text around the photo. I didn't actually edit my photo which I should have done using Photo shop, so that is something I need to remember to do for my music magazine because i think it may have made my page a little too dark. And I also didn't directly link my image to any of the text, like they do in other magazines. I advertised the Cornwall trip next to it and didn't connect it. I made my Cover and contents using Windows Publisher because I found using Adobe InDesign CS3 really difficult and Publisher is a really familiar program. I will try to use InDesign for my music magazine and practice on it. I didn't use very many images on my cover, I noticed; the magazines I researched I found to both have seven and I only used 3. I think I could have put some next to the advertisements at the bottom to attract people to the sports more. I used Photoshop to edit the 'Agony Aunt' image and I don't think I did it very well. I used the lasso tool to cut around the image and paste it on the page and didn't do it as smoothly as could be done. I think also that I should have used less black around that area, or bordered the speech bubble in one of the colors in my scheme. The last thing I noticed I could have done, was to put the date, price and bar code on my magazine. I didn't think about it when I was creating my cover, but it is something that HAS to be on it. I pretty much kept to the plan of my magazine and didn't change much at the last minute. I was pleased with the result of it but felt that I could have done better.

Contents Page:
I didn't enjoy making my Contents page as much as I did the front page. I found it harder, not having researched contents pages as much as the the covers. I liked the design idea that I had but I don't think it worked as well as I wanted it too. I found it difficult trying to line up the articles to the same angle as the notepad image. I also used Microsoft Publisher to create this page, for the same reasons as with the cover. I liked the idea of using a handwriting type font on this page, fitting in with the school pad theme. I didn't edit my image using any programs as I should have; I think I could have made it a bit brighter and not so dull. I chose orange font for the titles of my articles fitting in with the color scheme of the cover and also kind of matching the background of the notepad image. Something else I think I could have improved on I think was filling up the page a bit more; adding a few more articles which I think would have increased its professional look. With the 'Cornwall' image I added over the top of the notepad, I wanted the white labels to again help with the school child look. I wanted it to look like it had been stuck down using labels as would be in a real notepad. i think it worked to a certain extent but it didn't look extremely realistic - especially with the image not being at the correct angle. I was pleased to a certain degree with my contents page but I definitely think I could have done better and that it was a learning experience for my music magazine.

Magazine Contents Page

This is the final version of my School Magazine Contents page:

Magazine Font Cover

This is my final version of my school magazine "Chenny D":

Magazine Contents Mock-Up

This is my rough hand drawn plan for my Contents page of my school magazine:



My idea for the image was to have it as a notepad with a pen. I chose to do this because it fits in with the school theme - it's something you associate loosely with schools. I also chose the text to look kind of handwritten for the same reason. The titles of the articles I want to be orange; it fits with the front page's colour scheme.
The type of things advertised I thought about, what kind of things would a school magazine have in it?
I made a list of some of the things:

- After school activities
- Gossip page
- Local news
- Jobs available (Sixth Formers?)
- Canteen meals
- School news
- Brainteasers
- Out of school activities
- Horoscopes
- Agony Aunt page
- "Cringe' page
- Interviews with chosen teachers
- Upcoming Trips
- Reviews of other trips
- A Year photo page - each year group
- Exam and Revision tips

So these things, I would narrow down to the best ideas and put them on my contents page in the style that fit.

Cover Image

Here is a slideshow made in Photobucket of possible images for my front cover.

This is my chosen image:


I chose this image because I think it looks the most professional. From magazines that I looked at, the cover image was usually neutral and calm unless they deliberately made it different. I think this one is the right length and angle; gives the best space for articles around it and I simply like it better than the others.

Magazine Cover Mock-Up

This is a drawn up plan of my magazine front cover:



My chosen colour scheme is yellow, orange, brown and black. I chose these colours because they are neutral, but still eye-catching. I thought it would be the sort of colours a school would choose for its magazine.
The title "Chenny D" is in the "Bernard MT Condensed" font in the Word Art application and is a brown to yellow faded design. The "Photography Residential" subtitle is also in word art in a brown crumpled design also in the "Bernard MT Condensed" font. Looking at other magazine covers I decided to put a banner along the bottom of my piece with advertisements on it.
I want to put an 'Agony Aunt' image in the bottom right corner, which I can edit using Photoshop so that it fits in properly.

Analysis of "Woman" Magazine

This is the second magazine I looked at when researching for my front cover.
It is called "Woman" magazine.



Advertising Description: "Woman" is a must-have weekly fix of hot celebrity news, juicy TV insider gossip, compelling real life stories and body confident fashion and beauty. It's lifestyle section offers brilliant ideas on home and interiors, the latest product news and user-friendly advice. Woman is first for food too with healthy family friendly menu ideas.

Editor: Jackie Hatton
Publisher: IPC Media
Publishing Director: Oswin Grady
Website:
Frequency: Weekly
Circulation: 331,065 (ABC Jan-Jun 09)
Readership: 682,000 (NRS Jan-Jun 09)
Launch Date: 1937
Median Age: 47
Target Market: Busy mums and housewives, aged between 25 and 54

This magazines layout is also very similar week after week, which brings me to the conclusion that the editors keep the basic style for each issue and change only a few things each time. A large main photo is normally situated to the right of the page, but actually covers the entire magazine - articles and such are pasted over the top. The name "woman" is at the top of the photo but underneath her head, which makes it look like it all fits in comfortably. The articles are surrounded my box's placed in seemingly random angles at the left hand side of the page. A strip at the top of the cover is used as another advertisement of an inside article as well as a circle in the top right showing a competition deal of some sort. The colour scheme of the magazine uses more colours than the other magazine I researched; it uses pink, yellow, purple and white with a bit of black text. This looks good as firstly they are quite feminine colours which would attract their target audience as well as that being so colourful would also help in catching viewers eyes. 7 images are used on this issues cover, which is the same as the amount used in "Woman's Own" magazine. If very few images were used I think the magazine wouldn't be quite so attractive, as they help to advertise the articles presented.

Analysis of "Woman's Own" Magazine

This is one of the magazines I researched for my own front cover.
It is called "Woman's Own".



Advertising Description:
Woman's Own is one of the best loved weeklies for women who know how to enjoy life, are fun-loving, confident and whatever their age, feel ten years younger. It delivers a weekly mix of news, views, celebrity gossip and intriguing real life. It's smart, surprising and straight talking.

Editor: Karen Livermore
Publishers: IPC Media
Publishing Director: Sandy Gale
Website:
Second Website:
Frequency: Weekly
Cost: 90p
Circulation: 307,407 (ABC Jan-Jun 09)
Readership: 947,000 (NRS Jan-Jun 09)
Launch Date: 1932
Target Market: Busy mothers and housewives aged between 25 and 54

The layout for this magazine is similar each week. Its main image is placed to the right of the page usually split in half for the purpose of showing two different people or scenes, or even the same person in different states. The main article advertised always relates to the image and is in the largest font so as to immediately attract attention. The name "Woman's Own" is spread across the top of the page, under more adverts but above the image, slightly underneath it so as not to chop part of it off. A strip of adverts is placed at the very top and bottom of the page,advertising the contents of the magazine and some competition deals and the from other issues I have seen, another advert is shown in a rectangle or box on the left hand side of the page, normally body issues related. A colour scheme of pink. yellow, white and a bit of black is used on this issue and it works really well, joining each section together. This issue uses a total of seven images at varying sizes to fit into the layout, all slotting easily into the advertising boxes. This, I think was done well as, even if text is layed over the top, or even the image spills into something else, like the bottom article "Pauls holiday nightmare" it still looks really proffessional.

Introduction

We have been told that we have to make a music magazine for our coursework folder; The Front cover, the contents and a double-page spread. To Practice for this, we made our own school magazine cover first. To start off we looked at different genres of magazines that we could buy in the shops. Looking at these we got a good idea of the general layout of a magazine and how they use color schemes and images to create a polished look. I will scan some of the issues I looked at, into the next blog - I was looking at magazines targeted at middle-aged woman.