Photos that I have edited...

This magazine caught my eye...

I was out shopping yesturday and I was looking at the magazine rack and this magazine jumped out a caught my eye:

The main reason this magazine caught my eye was because of the masthead because is looks very sparkly and is made out of sequines the reason this caught my eye is because it is so different to any other magazine I have seen; I like how the producer has put in light reflections on the title to make it look like the sun is reflecting on the masthead also they have done this on one of the callouts as well I plan to encorporate this into my magazine to make it really stand out and to look as intresting as this magazine.

I also like how some of the title is behind her head and how some of it isn't I also haven't seen this in a magazine before and I plan to see how it would look on mine. Look also have a very interesting colour scheme, it uses a lot of colours and they are very contrasting, also by the use of orange, yellow and pink a lot of attention is drawen to the magazine because the colours clash.

Photography Ideas so far:

These are ideas that I have so far for photos:

• Photos in the local woods.
• Several people sat on rocks, all on different levels (use different angles).
• Somebody led in some leaves.
• Silhouette of someone againisnt the sunset.
• Photos by the old garage.
• Photos by the old castle.
• Photos in the studio.
• Photos of people listening to music.
• Photo of feet, you can still see the person but they are out of focus.
• Photo of hand, you can still see person but they are out of focus.
• A hat twirling up someones arm (using slow shutter speed so you can see movement).
• Somebody playing the guitar.
• Two people back to back.
• Close up of face.
• Looking over shoulder.
• Person winking at camera.
• Person sat on chair looking at the camera (low angle & high angle)
• Person with arms crossed look at the camera (low angle & high angle)
• Person led on a tree.

Q Magazines...

I plan to emulate the Q magazine, so I have decided to get lots of front covers of the internet as inspiration, here they are:

From the Arctic Monkeys edition I have taken the idea of using a callout to make the writing stand out, also I have emulated the same message of this magazine through my model, using a neutral expression with direct address making the audiences' attention to be grabbed by the magazine but they have to read on to find out whats happening and keeping them interested.

From this magazine I took the idea of how the writing was laid out on the right, it looks like a poster it also looks fresh and smart which is what would appeal to my audience.

This maagzine caught my eye because of how the main story and sub heading was laid out, I plan to emulate this in my magazine.

This front cover inspired my to use a border around my front cover, this made it look more appealing and professional.

What interested me in this front cover was how the main cover line it's written, the way it's written in a handwriting style is unique it also makes it personal and makes the audience feel involved this is how I wanted my audience to feel so I emulated it.

The final front cover gave me the idea to have my image in black and white, this has made it more sophisticated also this doesn't really happen very much in magazines so therefore by having my magazine front cover like this would attract attention which is one of the aims when trying to sell a magazine.

My Masthead Font:

This is the font I have chosen for my masthead:

This is the font I have chosen to have as my masthead, reasons for this is because it looks modern and young. It is also quite graffiti looking and my target audience would b able to relate to this and maybe have memories of it. The font also looks quite mature, confident and fancy this is how I imagine my audience to be and act.

Front Cover which I have made:

Here are several music front covers I have already made, I am now in the process of picking the one which will be the best.

I have decided that my title will be iD and will be on a blue background this is because this is what I have seen on most of the music magazine so this means it is quite successful also the magazine I have chosen to emulate is the Q magazine because I would make it for the same type of audience with the same intrests and the same social/ecnomic group.

In this magazine I have put the title to the right to see what it would look like, I haven't seen a magazine do this before and I wanted to see if it was effective or if it wouldn't work at all; I decided that I liked having the title to the side but it looked better when it was on the left. I have put in a photograph which lets you know straight away that it is a music magazine because it is showing a boy looking at some guitars which drum sticks in his hand this gives off a very band feel which I like but I have also editted it o make the guitars stand out even more, this is because they are my main focus because my model is not looking at the audience, he is not making a direct focus and drawing in the attention. If I were to use this as my front image the model would probably be and upcoming artist because there isn't much attention paid to him.

This is another attempt of my magazine, I have cut out the background and burred the edges a little so they aren't as sharp, I have also put him on a white background giving the feel of a studio shot this suggets that the artist on the front is a big star and quite famous. Personally I prefer the studio shot looks because they look more high quality/profile and more sophisticated than one with a background. I also like that the model is looking on this magazine, it gives a more personal feel and as it is a direct address it attracts your attention very quickly and makes you feel like the magazine was made and is personal to you making you buy it.

I placed the title of this magazine to the left this is what made me decide that I prefered the title to the left. also I have been changing the font to see which one look the best on a magazine front cover.

 

 In this magazine I played with the camera shots and angles. By having my model in a close up shot it makes the magazine really stand out also it make it quite intimate. I have also put a filter on the magazine called film grain this makes the photography grainy and old looking, it also gives quite a retro effect. It makes the magazine look quite different and unique (something my audience aspires to be like).

In this magazine I have also been playing around with the typography and the typically layout, I have started to add in coverlines and taglines, by having different fonts for each line makes it stand out and doesn't make it look bland this is something I learnt from creating my school magazine, that you need the font and typography to be different to make it look proffesional. I have also added in a barcode, date, price, website a issue number this is to make it look like a typical magazine.

This is my final idea for my title this is the font I have chosen to use.

This image is quite effective as it is how I imagine my audience would dress sometimes also by my model wearing a suit it makes the magazine have a proffesional, sophisticated, smart feel this is good because this is how my audience would act.

Again I have use a block colour background, but this time I have changed the colour, I would do this with every issue depening on which type of band it was and what type of denotations they had for example is Kasabian was on the front cover of my magazine then it would probably a dark, greyish background (because of their music genre).

Music Magazine Project Planning

1) Define: 

Audience - in media the audience are the consumers of the products that the institutions make for example the people who watch Eastenders are the audience of Eastenders.

Institution - an institution is a company or brand which makes the product that the audience reads/views.

Representation - the ways in which groups are presented in the media, this is often through stereotypes and it can affect our views on race, gender, sexuality, age and ability.

Media Language - are media conventions, formats, symbols and narrative structures which cue the audience to meaning and helps you figure out the connotations.

2) I have chosen to do the print task as I have previously made many films, also I made a music video for Queen's 'Don't Stop Me Now' for my GCSE coursework so I decided to do the print task to try something new, also I plan to take A2 Media next year and I plan to do film next year.

3) To complete this coursework successfully you need to have technical skills such as advanced use of photoshop, good photography/camera skills and you also need to be organised, creative, hard working and manage your time wisely.

4) Magazines intrest me because they entertain you and you can escape from reality (Blumler and Katz 1974 Uses and Gratifications Theory) also researching magazines you have to be very creative to be remotely successful in making a magazine. You need to do a lot of research into professional magazines to see what to do and what not to do so that your magazine sells.

5) My favourite music genre is alternative/indie, I like bands like the Arctic Monkeys and The Killers, but I also quite like older music (60's, 70's and 80's) I thing this is because I have been subjected to it a lot as I have been growing up.

6) The two main magazines I am researching are Q and NME this is because they have a similar music genre as me; a similar target audience and they are both very successful magazines.

7) I am planning to have quite a wide genre magazine like Q and NME for example I would use quite a famous, well established artist for my front cover (star appeal); if the magazine was to go into production people like Rihanna would appear on the front cover to attract a wider audience but my magazine would also report on new bands and also bands which weren't in the charts.

8) My intended audience are mainly males between the age of 19-27; average reader would be 23. They would be really interested in music and would have a high disposable income, as my magazine is high quality and a typical glossy magazine.

9) The main purpose of my magazine is to inform my reader on what is happenning in the music world and to keep them up to date with what the lastest music trend are, who topped the charts this month and what they're idols are doing, but it would also be a way to pass the time, to entertain my target audience.

10) All the music titles I have came up with are:

• YM/UM - Your Music
• Identify/iD
• MFY/M4U/MFU - Music For You
• IRM - Indie Rock Music
• Bang
• Loud
• Noise
• Music
• Wired

Photo Shoot Number One 12/11/2011

This is my first photo shoot on the 12/11/201112/11/2011 Photo Shoot 1

View more presentations from Jessica Milverton.

Deciding My Masthead

Today I went onto www.dafont.com and picked out the most suitable fonts for my magazines. I have now used photoshop to slightly edit a photo (rubbing out the background, blurring the edges to make it look natural and used the spot corrector tool to get rid of any imperfections). This image is nowhere near the standard which I will even put on by drafts, let alone my final piece, but it is a good example to show how all the separate mastheads look agains a background and an image. Here are all the mastheads I have selected:

The inspiration for the top 4 rows of mastheads came from magazine I had looked at in my school magazine research but also a lot of the ideas of having a masthead all the way across came from the KERRANG! magazine, this is because it is already a magazine and it is quite successful.

The ID mastheads ideas came from emulation Q and NME, although NME doesn't have a background beneath the masthead it is located to the left of the magazine which is the same as my mock ups, I will mostly likely use the ID masthead as this style is used by both NME and Q which are both very famous, well established, successful magazines and they have a similar target audience to me. In addition the ID mastheads would appeal more to my target audience because they look more youthful, modern and sophisticated than the first 4 rows.

Possible Mastheads

I still haven't decided whether I want to call my magaizne IDENTIFY or ID but I have came up with different style fonts for both; here they are:

Starting My Front Cover

These are my first attempts of making my music magazine, I obtained a font off of www.dafont.com for my masthead. The reason I chose this font is because it looks very individual and unique, this is how I would imagine the way my target audience would want to feel like and be like so this title would appeal to them. In addition the titles looks very modern and electronic-like. The reason I like it looking modern and electronic-like is because it looks up-to-date, also I imagine that my audience would have all the new and top of the range phones, mp3s, TVs, radios, music, cameras and games consoles.

The draw backs of this cover is that the photograph is so far away, the model isn't looking at the camera/audience and  I feel that this disconnects the intimacy between the magazine main image model and the viewer of the audience, I feel that this is a reason that Q is so successful because it uses well established artists (star appeal),  the artists are looking at the audience this makes it quite personal and it has a direct address which grabs the audiences attention instantly, and draws them in.

In my second attempt of the front cover I cropped the image and made it fit the screen so that the image was bigger and you could see the expression on his face also it made it look more magazine like because you don't often see a magazine with a long shot. I also edited the photo more, I put a filter on the image called paint dubs but what I found interesting and good about this effect is that it made the model stand out from its background, because the filter had less of an effect on the model as it did the background. The model still isn't looking at the audience, and this is the main reason I have chosen not to use this picture because you rarely don't have the model looking at the camera/audience in Q or NME which are both highly successful magazines.

As you can see I have put in a music related graphic, it is of two separate people holding a guitar it represents a stereotypical rock guitarist, this is part of the reason I have put it in, because my magazine audience would listen to mainly indie rock, so they would be able to identify this and the people types that the graphic represnts. Another reason I put it in is because it could be something that appeared in every issue, and when you saw a person doing it or a graphic like it, it would remind you of IDENTIFY the magazine, also it gives the magazine an original and quirky touch which my target audience it likely to enjoy.

I have chosen not to use this a my magazine front cover because of three things the photograph, the graphic and the colour scheme. I have not use the photograph of two things, the colour (grey it looks boring) and that the fact that the model is not looking at the camera. This photo is more likely to be used on a contents page of a double page spread.

Although I like the idea of the guitarist graphics it reminds me of something that should be in a children's magazine and this could effect who would read the magazine, if the audience felt that the magazine was in anyway childish they wouldn't read it which is not what I want and if the magazine were to go into production would not be something I wouldn't want to risk.

Finally the colour scheme is the biggest problem I have with the magazine, it is all grey, black and white, not only is this boring, and it doesn't grab your attention but personally I find it a bit depressing, if you were going to buy a magazine then you would buy one that had colour in it, because the one without colour suggests that it will be the same bland, boring and outdated information and pictures insides.

Magazine Basic Flat Plan for Cover

This is my basic flat plan for my magazine. This is how I imagine my final magazine to look but I will probably alter it to make it better, and more appealing to my audience.

Names for my Magazine

I've started thinking about what I would like to call my magazine. These are some of my ideas:

• YM/UM - Your Music
• ID/IDENTIFY
• MFY/M4U/MFU - Music For You
• IRM - Indie Rock Music
• BANG
• LOUD
• NOISE
• MUSIC
• WIRED
• CRASH

All of these titles sound like something my target audience and target genre would buy and read this is why I think that they are effective.

The possible mastheads like BANG and CRASH are onomatopoeias and if they are word which sound like they are spelt it could give the connotation that the magazine is going to do what it says on the cover an nothing less.

My inspiration for the possible mastheads like YM, ID and IRM came from the NME and Q magazines, I did this because I realised that they are very successful magazines and if I was to emulate either of them then my magazine would be quite successful too.

My favorite possible masthead is ID / IDENTIFY I liked this not only because it sounds good but because it is often what an audience will buy a product for, to belong to a type of group, to be identified by their music taste and thus the music magazine they by. This is tied in with the theories of: blumler and katz 1974 uses and gratifications theory and maslow hierarchy of needs pyramid.

On another blog I will be showing my test fonts of what my masthead is going to look like, and chose one that could be successful.

Music Magazine Analysis

NME Lily Allen Front Cover

The target audience of this magazine is typically young people between the ages of late teens to early 20s.

The main image of this magazine suggests that the magazine is very direct because Lily Allen is looking straight at the camera (audience) and also Lily Allen is looking very rebellious which suggests that the audience may be like that and that they would admire people who were being rebellious. It is a high angle shot which is typically used to make people look small and less important. So by having her looking up and the audience looking down on her it makes the audience feel very important and feel as if people look up and admire the audience making them feel good.

Some of the fonts for example LILY ALLEN TAKES ON THE WORLD is in a font which looks very newspaper like which suggests that the magazine holds a lot of information on the music subject and that it is worth the money you are spending. NME follows the same colour and font scheme ever time it is made the main colour used is red the connotations of red is dangerous (which would connect to the rebellious audience) but also another  connotation is passion which is how you would feel about the music if you were buying the magazine.

The font of NME is very bold with outlines around them, this is to grab your attention when you are looking on the magazine so it stands out, also it gives the statement of the audience being bold and confident so it hints at the audiences and the artist who feature in the magazines’’ personality.

Magazine Code and Conventions:

Many features are common to find in all magazines. Most magazines have:

• an advice column.
• a contents page.
• a letter page.
• some form of make-over article.
• competitions.
• an 'In the next issue page.

They also have general merchandising and/or review sections. Advertising is a very important source of finance for all magazines. Review sections are a subtle way of advertising, this is where a company give the magazine its product free in exchange for them to review it in the magazine.

Magazine front covers almost always have strong generic elements.

• Price, barcode and issue number/date.
• A photograph directly related to the feature article.
• A recognisable masthead.
• Various plugs and puffs on the front cover to entice the audience to buy the magazine.
• A link between the colours used and the month that the magazine is published as well as colour links between images and texts.

Magazines front covers are carefully designed to attract the target audience and to be easily identifiable on the newsagents shelves.

Audience of Different Genre Music Magazine

K MAG:

Genre:

• The genre of K mag seems to be a rock.

Key signifiers:

• Its audience is aim at men and women but mostly males read the magazine.

• The dress code seems to be quite punk rock; they also dress quite a lot in black and red colours. 
• The attitude of the audience seems to be quite hard core, rebellious young adults.
• The audience age demographic is 16-25.
• It seems to be mostly white people who are in the ‘K mag’ magazine suggest that there audience is the same.
• The music is very loud, there is quite a lot of screaming and shouting also there are many loud strums from the electric guitar and loud bangs on the drum. 

Downbeat:

Genre:

• The genre of ‘Downbeat’ is Jazz.

Key Signifiers:

• Men and women who possibly play jazz instruments.
• The dress code is quite smart casual for example e.g. smart shirt, jeans and shiny shoes.
• I would say quite down to earth, quite sensible and very calm.
• The ethnicity would be very different types of people all the Downbeat magazine covers I have looked at have a different ethnicity people on every time but the people who read Down beat would be people who are likely to play Jazz instruments.
• The music Downbeat is jazz, this is very instrumental for example Saxaphones are used a lot, also Jazz music is quite similar to blues.