Draft 4 Front Cover

This is my 4th draft for my music magazine front cover, when I got feedback on this draft people liked the picture and where the anchorage text was placed, but they thought it needed a few more cover lines on it to look like a more conventional music magazine front cover. They liked the font because they said it looked quite rocky. However, they said that they did not think it looked like a 60s rock music magazine so they suggested maybe I changed my anchorage text to something different so my audience would realise that it is meant to be a 60s rock music magazine. 

Draft 3 Front Cover

This is my third draft for my front cover. When I got feedback on this one people said they liked the font of the masthead because they said it looked more like a masthead that they would expect to see on a rock music magazine. However, they thought the colour scheme was a bit too bright and said it made it look more like a pop magazine rather than a rock magazine. They also thought it looked a bit bare and that maybe at least one more cover line would make it a more conventional music magazine rather than just the one cover line and the sell line at the bottom. 

Draft 2 Front Cover

This is the second draft I did. When I got feedback on this draft people said they preferred it to the last draft because there was not as much text on the cover so they knew what text went with what story and said they found it much easier to read because there was not as much there to try and grab their attention. They also said they thought the font was interesting but did not think it suited for a music magazine because it looks more like a clothing or celebrity gossip magazine because of the connotations it gives of city life. They also thought the 'Review of the Week' cover line looked a bit out of place and the whiteness of the box did not really fit in with the colour scheme on the rest of the front page.

2nd Draft Step by Step

Draft 1 Front Cover

This was my first draft I did for my music magazine front cover. When I got feedback on this front cover, I found people thought it had too much writing on it and that they did not know where they should look first. So for my next draft I decided I needed to put less writing on it to make my main image and anchorage text stand out more. 

Hand Drawn Front Cover

Hand Drawn Double Page Spread

Front Cover Photo Shoot Ideas

Lady Gaga to Elle Magazine (Behind the Scenes)

Taylor Swift Behind the Scenes Magazine Photoshoots

Possible Name Ideas

Because I want to do a rock/60s rock music magazine, I decided to look up 60s slang words so I could call my magazine after one of those. Here are the options:

• Blast
• Crash
• Dig

Uses and Gratification

This refers to the needs that your media product should fulfil for its target audience. The certain audience that you want to target your media product at will have certain interests and hobbies that they enjoy and will buy your magazine because it fulfils this need that they have.

For example, if you have a rock magazine and your audience really enjoy the rock bands that you feature in your magazine, this is a need that your magazine fulfils for them so they enjoy buying and reading your magazine. However, if one week you decided to involve a girly pop band that your audience do not enjoy, then they will not enjoy your magazine and will not buy it because it no longer supplies their needs and they will get their needs from a different magazine.
So to make my magazine appeal to my target audience, I will need to make sure the features of my magazine are suitable for the genre of my magazine. If I make the features relate to the genre then I can ensure that my target audience will stay interested with what is in my magazine and it will satisfy their needs for what they are looking for in a music magazine.

Colour Scheme

Because my magazine is going to be sixties rock music, I would like the colour scheme to be bright to represent the psychodellic nature of that era.

Price

When I looked at 3 existing magazines, they all came out between every fortnight and every month and were all priced between £2.50 and £3.50, so I will publish my magazine every fortnight because after doing audience research I found that this is how often people would like to see a music magazine this is what the majority of people said.  
My price for my magazine will be around £2.50. When we did our focus group (posted on the 22nd November 2012) we found this is the price that most people would be willing to pay for a magazine that comes out every 2 weeks and this is a reasonable price that my target audience can afford.

Box Plan Layout of my Front Cover

ICT Mock Up Front Cover

Photoshoot Planning- Double Page Spread

Whilst I was looking for inspiration for my photo-shoot and how to arrange the photos on my double page spread I found this image, and I really liked the idea of having several different pictures and then the main image centered around these smaller ones. I like the idea of the photo's been one of the main focuses of the double page spread, rather than just a small part of it, I would like to do something like this with my double page spread, except because I will have a band that has 2 people in it I will have to feature both these people in the pictures. I quite liked the idea of having them in similar poses and looking at each other even if they weren't actually stood together when the picture is being taken. I also like the background and lighting used on this double page spread as it is very plain so there is no diversion from the main story, the audience can look at the pictures then read the article without getting distracted by the features of the photo shoot. I like the fact that the lighting is quite bright as it gives connotations of upbeat and happy music and that the artist is happy to be making the music and to be sharing it with this magazine's audience.

Photo Shoot Ideas- Front Cover

Because I am trying to mix together rock and 60s rock together, I thought if I have modern people wearing 60s style clothes then I will successfully be able to mix these two genres together. 
I used this as my basis for the photo-shoot, but when I ended up taking the photos some of my initial ideas that I wanted to do were a bit unrealistic so I had to rethink how I wanted my models to look and the make-up they were going to have, but I managed to think of some new ideas to do and make it work.

Target Audience (My Reader Profile)

My target audience will mainly be both males and females from the age 17-45, however, because I will be using a female on my front cover as my model then I will probably attract mostly female audiences as the colour schemes will probably be reds/pinks that will attract female readers more than male readers. The reason I am doing such a wide age range is because I want to attract readers who were around at the time this music was popular and can really appreciate it and will enjoy both the 60s rock music side of it and the modern rock side of it as well. I want to do it for a younger male audience so that I can get the readers who are interested in modern rock (such as Foo Fighters and U2) and if they buy my magazine it could get them interested in the 60s rock music as well (bands like The Beach Boys and Cream). 
The reason I want to do both these time eras is because many people know of popular bands from the 60s such as The Beatles, but are not aware of all the other bands that were around at that time, and if they enjoy The Beatles then they will enjoy  other music from that time as well, but I realise that if I only did 60s rock then I would not attract a very wide audience as it is quite a niche audience, therefore, by joining 60s and modern rock together it will attract many different audiences.
I will feature both modern rock and 60s rock on my front cover to attract both of these audiences, for example, I will place my model in a sixties style pose (maybe based around the iconic 60s theme such as Twiggy or patterned clothing that really stands out- that will represent the psychedelic theme of that time).

Focus group

Focus Group- Planning

Do you buy music magazines, if so how often?
What makes a music magazine appealing?
How much would you pay for one?
How much would you want it published?
What would encourage you to buy a music magazine?
Do competitions in a magazine make you more likely to buy it?
What freebies do you like?
What music do you like?

Prezi- Rock Music + 60s Rock Music

60s Rock Music on Prezi

Top 40 Download

1. Troublemaker-Olly Murs
2. Little Things- One Direction
3. Beneath Your Beautiful- Labrinth
4. Something New- Girls Aloud
5. Girl On Fire- Alicia Keys
6. Gangnam Style- PSY
7. Candy- Robbie Williams
8. The Power Of Love- Gabrielle Aplin
9. Ho Hey- Lumineers
10. Locked Out Of Heaven- Bruno Mars
11. DNA- Little Mix
12. Diamonds- Rihanna
13. A Thousand Years- Cristina Perri
14. Don't You Worry Child- Swedish House Mafia
15. Not Giving In- Rudimental
16. Can You Hear Me- Wiley
17. Skyfall- Adele
18. Sweet Nothing- Calvin Harris
19. One More Night- Maroon 5
20. Latch- Disclosure
21. Hall Of Fame- Script ft Will.I.Am
22. Shine Ya Light- Rita Ora
23. Give Me Love- Ed Sheeran
24. Beauty And A Beat- Justin Bieber
25. We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together- Taylor Swift
26. Tidal Wave- Sub Focus
27. Back In Black- AC/DC
28. Anything Could Happen- Ellie Goulding
29. Try- Pink
30. I Found You- The Wanted
31. Love Is Easy- McFly
32. I Cry- Flo Rida
33. Va Va Voom- Nicki Minaj
34. Live While We're Young- One Direction
35. Wings- Little Mix
36. Right Now- Rihanna
37. Wonder- Naughty Boy
38. Do You Think Of Me- Misha B
39. Gold Dust- DJ Fresh
40. Highway To Hell- AC/DC

There are not many songs from my genre of music (Rock), there is only 'Back In Black' and 'Highway To Hell' by AC/DC. This shows that in our generation people do not listen to rock music, probably because not as much is made now as it used to be 10 or 15 years ago, so I want to do my rock magazine by using music from different time eras (such as the 60s) so people are more aware of it and this genre of music can get in the Top 40 Download list. 

Practice Shots

Audience Research (Existing Reader Profile)

This is a reader profile from the popular rock music magazine ‘NME’ as the genre of this magazine is slightly similar to the genre of magazine that I would like to do, I thought that this reader profile would be a suitable example to write about. We can see that the target audience for this magazine is men due to the colour scheme being quite dark and all the pictures associated with the readers. Jack Daniels, Topman and Cars are all things that you would associate with a male audience. Also it states how their readers also enjoy watching films and using mobile phones (and obviously love music). The target age range for this magazine will be 15-24 and 24-35, I can tell this because the features of this reader profile include things like beer and cars that only the mature readers will be able to relate to. However, things like X-Box’s and Men’s clothing will obviously to appeal to a younger generation of readers that maybe are not old enough to drive or drink but can still enjoy the magazine because they enjoy the music that is featured in this magazine.

By looking at this magazine's readership level (388,000) I can see that this is a very popular magazine and that the audience enjoy reading it every time it comes out due to all the positive comments about it such as; "I can trust it" and "Honest no-holds barred reviews" which shows that people trust what this magazine has to say and really look in depth into its reviews and its opinions.

In relation to planning my magazine, this has helped me establish some of the things I should include in my magazine if I want to appeal to a male audience. For example, I should chose competitions were the winner could win a camera or a new laptop, however, I will also need to bear in mind that this reader profile is designed to appeal to an audience with a median age of 23 whereas my magazine is trying to appeal to a much older audience but the most popular things like cars and beer are an all-round thing that men as a gender group enjoy.

Demographics Explanation

Demographics is that audiences can be categorised into groups using quantitative data (quantitative date is anything that can be plotted onto a graph) about age, gender and socio-economic group (this is their profession, class, income).

According to demographics, age can be put into 5 groups:

·         <15

·         15-24

·         24-35

·         35-55

·         55>

And then there are also male and female audiences that the media text can be split in to.

Below are the National Readership Survey’s social grades. These are used in advertising and market research and are also used by all institutions that are concerned with audience. These social grades are largely based on profession and estimated related income:

·         A- Higher managerial, administrative or professional (3%), these would be people like bank managers

·         B- Intermediate, managerial, administrative or professional (15%), these would be people who are teachers or doctors

·         C1- Supervisory or clerical, junior managerial, administrative or professional (23%), these would be people who work in offices such as secretaries

·         C2- Semi-Skilled manual workers (28%), this category would be people such as shop workers

·         D- Semi-Skilled and unskilled manual workers (18%), this is those people who are labourers, such as factory workers

·         E- Casual labourers, unemployed, state pensioners (13%), this category would consist of students, who are unemployed with not a lot of money

For music magazines, institutions would target C1’s and B’s groups because these are the groups of people that have money to buy the magazine and concert tickets for the bands that they advertise in their magazine, therefore fuelling their institution and the institutions they’re working with.

Go Animate

My Music Magazine by s0014631 on GoAnimate

Animation Software - Powered by GoAnimate.

Moodboard- Rock Music and 60s Rock Music/Style

Identify and Explain Choice of Genre

I decided to chose rock music as my genre because I enjoy this music. I want to do rock music that people might have forgotten about and I want to make people aware of it. So I want to include Rock Music in general but I want to focus it mainly on rock music from the 60s. By doing both of these eras I can include modern rock bands that people may have heard of and by including both modern rock and rock from different time periods I can make people more aware of this music.
I believe that by doing this genre of music I could get a wide range of people who would want to buy this magazine, because it will attract the people who enjoy rock music and it will also attract the older generations who were around when the 60s rock music was popular. I particularly enjoy The Beach Boys as I enjoy their surf rock theme that they have- one of my favourite songs is 'Surfin USA': The Beach Boys- Surfin USA . I want to make people more aware of these bands that I believe are really good and allow people to listen to them when they may not have listened to them before. I want to do the rock genre because I find that in our generation, music such as pop, R'n'B and heavy metal are taking over the music industry, and the older generation of people still enjoy rock music. But because not as many people are making rock music (more people are going towards the indie rock genre) people are forgetting about all the good rock bands that are out there. So by doing rock genre (and by choosing to do it from different eras such as the 60s) I can get more people interested in this genre like people used to be.

Other bands that I enjoy and will use as inspiration for my music magazine are:

• The Beatles- The Beatles- Can't Buy Me Love
• Johnny Cash- Johnny Cash- I Won't Back Down
• Red Hot Chili Peppers-Red Hot Chili Peppers- Californication 
• Foo Fighters- Foo Fighters- Rope

3 Music Magazine Front Covers

 NME and Q both have their masthead in the left third, this is a convention because this is the third that you see when they are stacked on shelves in stores. 
Also the main image overlaps the masthead on all three magazines, this is another convention as it allows the main image and the masthead to be seen as connected so the audience can relate the two together. Another convention of these three rock music magazines is the colour scheme. The colour from the masthead matches either the anchorage text or the cover lines, which helps create a house style and help link all of the magazine together. The bar code is usually in the bottom left or right corner, and the price is either next to the bar code or under the masthead so when the audience see's the masthead they do no have to look for ages to find the price they can see it straight away. The main cover line on all three magazines is the biggest one and it is directly under the main image so the audience can relate these two together and can establish what story is the                        main story and decide if the main story is something they would be interested in reading.

LIIAR Analysis Of A Front Cover

LANGUAGE: The main image of this front cover, is a well known band (Mumford and Sons) and they are all looking directly into the camera. This means they can interact with the audience and it allows the audience to feel more connected with them. The magazine title ‘NME’ is short and memorable, which is a convention of magazine front covers. As it is the biggest piece of text on the page, it’s dominant and clear that it is the title of the magazine. The red from the masthead goes with the red of the banner going across the main image, this links the two together. In the top right corner there is a thumbnail of a free poster to attract the audience. They also have other main stories that will be featured in the magazine underneath the main story. It also has the price and barcode linked together in the bottom corner, which is another convention. And teasing contents and free gifts on the top cover line to attract the audience.

IDEOLOGY: The name of the magazine NME, stands for New Musical Express. This gives the belief that this magazine gives it’s audience new music updates, and the use of the word ‘express’ means quickly, so the audience knows that they will be updated quickly (so weekly or monthly). With the main image subjects not looking all polished, it shows that they care more about the music then they do their appearance. With the banner headline going through their outfit as well, it gives the audience the belief that (to them) the music is more important than how they look.

INSTITUTION: On this front cover, the institution shown are the bands that the magazine are advertising. So when they advertise bands new albums and festivals coming up, it benefits the institution that runs these as it gets them known to the public.

AUDIENCE: The target audience for this magazine, would probably be teenagers/young adults who enjoy indie/rock music. By using all males on the front cover and using dark colouring, it looks like it is trying to attract males more than females. However, that doesn’t say that females cant read it, as they have used a young, popular boy band on the front, that could be there to attract a female audience.

REPRESENTATION: The way they have represented the subject of the main image is looking directly at the camera so they can engage with the audience (this is a convention of magazine front covers). The band are quite young, so the audience can relate to them and could appeal to the female audience and the male audience because they might look up to them or see them as role models. By representing them looking not very smartly dressed it gives the audience the idea that they care more about letting people know about their music than they do about how they look.

Evaluation

My front cover uses most of the conventions of magazine front covers that already exist. It has the masthead, main image, cover lines, datelines and price and the main stories in the left third. However, I decided to put the main cover line on the actual main image, rather than around it (which is what most magazine front covers do). I did this because I wanted to let the audience know exactly which cover line was the main one, and by placing it inside the main image I connected them to ensure the reader understands that was the main one.

With my product I have tried to represent most students at college, by placing the model with folders in her hand, which is what you would expect to see a student with. And by using a model who is the same age as the students who go to college then I have used that feature of the model to attract the age group that my product is aimed at. To attract a male audience as well, however, perhaps I should have placed a male student on the front cover with her and made the masthead a different colour to pink (I did this thought because it links with the colour of the folder and the folder is the colour that sticks out the most on my front cover).

The audience for my product would be students who attend college (so around 16-18 year olds). When I was thinking of what to do for my product, I wanted to attract boys and girls but when I was taking the photos I chose just a girl on my own with a pink folder and decided to link the colour of the folder with the colour of the masthead to keep a house style (as many other magazine front covers did that I had looked at). So my final product will probably attract female students rather than girl students, although I have included a sports story to attract boys as well. I decided to have the girl stood on college campus so the name really related to the masthead. Many magazines I looked at featured words like ‘EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW INSIDE’ which I liked the idea of using because I thought that would be a good way to attract the audience, by giving them the idea that this magazine is the only place to get this interview, making the audience want to buy it more. So I decided to do this with my magazine (about the women’s football team), to attract girls and also boys that are interested in sports.

Whilst making my final front cover, I learnt a lot in Photoshop. I learnt how to use the ‘Clone Stamp Tool’, which came in handy when one of my planning pictures wasn’t long enough to fit the page and I couldn’t stretch it anymore. I also learnt a lot about the layering (specifically when I was making my mood board, as I wanted certain things to stand out over other things on it). I also learnt about the magic wand tool, which made it a lot easier (and neater) to cut out around my model and place her on the college campus background as it didn’t give me all the rough edges that cutting it out using the polygonal lasso cut tool did. 

Hand Drawn Initial Idea

My Finished College Magazine Front Cover

DTP Initial Idea

Planning

Initial Idea

This was one of my initial ideas to use for my front cover, however, I decided not to use it as the masthead doesn't really stand out or catch the reader's eye. Also by having the cover lines (which would be in the black boxes seen above) all together, it could confuse the reader as to which one is the main cover line of the magazine. And as the main cover line is a convention of front pages, I need to make sure this one stands out from the rest of the cover lines.

My Contents Page (Mock Up)

Photo 2

I also decided not to use this picture, as it didn't have much relation to any of the stories I wanted to include on my front cover. I also decided not to use it because it is quite a boring picture and sticks out on the page but not in the way that would catch the audience's attention.

Photo

I took this picture, however, I decided not to use it on my final project. This is because it doesn't really fit in with what the stories on my front cover were. The fact that it was in a glass box means that you can also see the reflection of the photographer and the line down the middle goes straight through the trophy so you can't see it properly. 

Camera Framings- Long Shot