Saturday 22 March 2014

Self Evaluation Questions

1. In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
During the research stage we looked at a wide range of music magazines including NME, Q and Kerrang.  We also looked at other students magazines from previous years and found out that those who followed the conventions of real magazines were the ones that got the highest marks.  The reason for this is that the people who created professional magazines know exactly what looks good and know all the 'rules' of creating a professional magazine design.  We looked at different magazine plans such as the 'F plan' 'E plan' and the 'Z plan' all of these are designed to get the reader to look at the most aesthetically pleasing part of the page, in our culture we read from left to right therefore the part of the page which you want the reader to see first should go in the top left of the page.  The magazine title I chose was 'Parklife' as it is a very well known song by Blur therefore when people see the name Parklife they will associate my magazine with other bands of Blur's genre which is what my magazine is about.  One of these rules is the rule of 3, these 3 things are considered to be the basic things you should consider when creating a magazine, they are; whether the page is portrait/landscape, the colour scheme and the different fonts used.  The front cover should be about 80% image and 20% words, this is because the photo is what makes someone stop and look at the page not the writing.  The mast head should be in the top left or centre of the page because normally you would want it to be the first thing the reader sees when reading the page.  I found out that less colours is better, the magazine must have a theme of colours which runs throughout it for example mine is yellow, black and white/cream these colours work well on each other, if I used too many colours in my magazine it could look like there is too much going on in the page and nothing would stand out which means it wouldn't be as eye catching.  I decided these colour by using what the professionals use - a colour wheel - by doing this it's easy to tell what colours work well against one another.
       When designing the magazine I took into account these conventions because if the professionals use it to make their magazine look good then it must work and therefore get me more marks.  My magazine has high influences from NME and Kerrang! magazine because NME has exactly the same music genre as me and I really like the way that Kerrang! have set out their pages therefore I combined them to make a magazine that had effective layouts on its pages and also had music artists that attract my target audience of 'Indie Scenesters'.
       I think that my mast head is very effective as it stands out due to the colour combination, also it is placed in the top left corner so that it should be the first thing that people see when they look at the page.  I thought the best font to use for this was a font called 'Harabara' as it is sans serif so it is eye catching and bold, also it curved at the edges of some letters which makes it quite quirky as is the band Blur which the title is named after.  I feel that with this font and mast head name people get an idea of what the magazine is like and the sort of information it contains.  I feel the graphology of my contents page uses, develops and challenges the classic NME style contents page, I took the idea of a band index however placed it on the right instead of on the left of the page.  I did this because I think that the main story stands out a lot more along with the mast head, in the NME contents pages the main story stands out less because the eyes are drawn to the large band index on the left of the page.  Also the images on my contents page follows the conventions of NME contents pages because I have a picture of my main model actually on stage performing which makes it look very believable and very professional.
I used, developed and challenged an NME double page spread featuring the 90's band Blur, as I tried to make my magazine in the style of 90's NME magazines i thought it would be beneficial to get inspiration from articles featuring 90's bands.  The image of the NME double page spread is a close up of one of the band members, this takes up a whole A4 page, on the page next to it, it has a quote with the article at the bottom.  My image is also a close up of one of my band members however in mine you can see part of his clothing which emphasises his style and fashion sense, on the page next to mine there is also a quote which shows of my model's (Tommy Cobley) attitude towards the life of being a rockstar 'I didn't meet Liam Gallagher, he met me', doing this makes him look like a role model to many men and his confidence would make him more attractive to most women therefor they will want to read the page and find out more about him, the quote i similar to the Blur quote 'My book would be about Blur, orgies, vomiting and vicodin...'


















2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?
After researching different types of social group on a website called UK Tribes, I found out that my magazine suits Indie Scenesters the best because they enjoy the same Indie Rock style music that my magazine consists of.  I have designed my magazine to fit the needs of this social group by having images of people wearing the same clothes as Indie Scenesters e.g. Fred Perry and Adidas.  My magazine is designed and written mainly for young adults because they are the age group who are mostly interested in new bands and artists of the Indie Rock genre.  The gender I have chosen is mainly boys however girls aren't excluded because I made the models look attractive so they would like their music even more.  The models on my magazine are all boys as you wouldn't usually find a female in a band of this genre, I feel that I gave the main model both positive and negative reputations.  The fact that Tommy has a good fashion sense and looks the part of a rock star makes him seem like a role model which other men would aspire to be like.  However the negative side of him is how he is rather arrogant which granted, may appeal to some people but others it may not have such a positive effect.  I tried to create a stereotypical rockstar who lives a 'don't care' lifestyle with influences from stars such as Liam Gallagher and Paul Weller. 
      My contents page represents my Indie Scenesters social group due to its layout and colour scheme.  The layout was influenced by an NME magazine and Kerrang! magazine both of which I would expect my target audience to buy or be interested in.  The colour scheme is black, white, yellow and red, I think these represent my target social group because it's the same colour scheme as an NME magazine that I researched which was designed by professionals.  The camera angles for the image next to the cover lines is a high angle shot looking down on the band
My double page spread looks professional and smart which is how my target audience of Indie Scenesters like to dress therefore it should appeal to them largely.
     I think my front cover appeals mainly to fans of 90's music as the colour scheme is similar to many NME magazines from the 90's which Indie Scenesters would be interested in reading due to the bands from the that decade that would've been included in the magazines.  Also the bands on it are mostly from that era E.g. Oasis and The Stone Roses, however I also have bands from this decade which would appeal with fans of 90's music for example Kasabian and Arctic Monkeys.  There are new, less known bands on my cover page that I thought my target audience would enjoy listening to, I wanted my magazine to be known for getting new artists popularity.  My model appeals largely to fans of this genre of music as he is wearing clothing that 'mods' would wear, also it is Pretty Green which is Liam Gallaghers clothing brand, many of my target audience know and respect Liam Gallagher therefore it is very suitable for my magazine as it means the readers who are male can see Tommy Cobley as a role model and an influence to them.
      My double page spread appeals largely to Indie Scenesters mainly because of my model and the things he says in the interview.  There is a close up of him on one whole page which connotes how he is quite full of himself, the fact he has a whole page of just his face, also he is wearing a jacket with a large collar which stands out for example if you saw him wearing that in the street he would stand out over other people wearing ordinary clothing which adds to his presence that i'm trying to make throughout the magazine.  The things he says in the interview such as 'I didn't meet Liam Gallagher, he met me' and 'I do get sad sometimes but I just look in the mirror and go what a good looking f**k you are' make him come across as a person who doesn't care what people think about him, he even gets cocky to Liam Gallagher, a rockstar who is known for getting into fights with people and trashing hotel rooms.  This attitude makes him stand out over lots of other celebrities which gets him more popularity and also it makes him more of an influence on some men who would read the magazine and some girls would find this more attractive.
      The mise en scene of my whole magazine appeals to my target audience because of the way my models are dressed, they wear Adidas and Fred Perry which after doing some research, is the same brands as Indie Scenesters like to wear.  I use a wide variety of camera angles including high angle, mid shot, close up and side views.  Using this variety is beneficial as otherwise the reader could get bored of the same types of photos of the same people.

3.What kind of media institution might distribute your product and why?
I think that IPC Media would be the most likely institution to distribute my product as they publish magazines such as NME which my magazine is highly influenced by.  NME magazine also has a similar social group to mine, Indie Scenesters are its target audience.  Even though my magazine is targeted at mainly men, women are in no way excluded from buying it however my magazine would be best suited in the 'Young Men and Music' section of IPC as this section is targeted at men who enjoy the same style of music which my magazine consists of, in this section there are magazine such as NME and Nuts.  It is a British corporation and distributes a lot of trusted magazines which will definitely benefit my magazine.  There are many ways you can access magazines that are distributed from IPC Media including; Tablets e.g. Ipad and Kindle Fire, smart phones, laptops and obviously across print.  The fact that my magazine would be very easily accessible means that more people will buy/subscribe to it.

4.Who would be the audience for your media product?
My target audience will be mostly young alternative groups such as Indie Scenesters as my magazine consists of alternative rock bands such as The Enemy, Blur and Oasis.  Indie Scenesters wear brands such as Fred Perry, Adidas and Pretty Green therefore I decided to use as many of these brands as possible in my magazine to make the readers think that if they wear the same brands as the models then they will like their music and style.  Most of this group shop in places such as HMV which sell all kinds of genres of CD's including the artists in my magazine (Oasis, Blur, Stereophonics) they are always looking for new artists and bands to listen to which is why my magazine suits them very well as it has been written to tell people about new bands who aren't very well known.  My audience of young adults are likely to shop at supermarkets such as Sainsbury's and Tesco therefore my product will be available to buy in the magazine section of these stores along with similar magazines such as NME, Q and Kerrang!  Also if someone from my target audience goes into Tesco or Sainsbury's etc to buy an NME magazine and they see one of their favourite bands on the cover of my magazines then it is likely that they will buy mine as well, this scenario is very likely because NME readers have the same taste in music as what my magazine contains.  My audience will read other magazines such as NME, Q and Kerrang! due to the music artists that they mention, I fell that my magazine is a mixture of NME and Kerrang! as the music suits NME fans whereas the layout suits Kerrang! magazine.  I must mention bands who are featured in these magazines to get the target audience that I have researched, these bands stretch from the 90's e.g. Stone Roses, Happy Mondays and throughout to current bands e.g. Kasabian and new up and coming artists such as Splashh and The Strypes.  My audience go to gigs on a regular basis therefore I should tell them about upcoming gigs that they would be interested in, this is why I put on a competition to win tickets for a big Kasabian concert in Victoria Park, Leicester this June.  By doing things like this it will increase my audience because they will buy my magazine so that they can find out more information about the competition.

5.How did you attract/address your audience?
My audience ranges from young adults to people in their late 20's.  I would expect the people who buy my magazine to be mostly men as their are no women models in the magazine however there are lots of women who would enjoy the music that my magazine consists of and would also find the models attractive and therefore be more interested in buying it.  I chose to make my models look as smart and good as possible because it would make them look more like role models to the men who buy it, readers would aspire to be like them as they have style and attitude.  Another reason why I think men would enjoy my magazine more than women because they would find the colour scheme more aesthetically pleasing, the main models coat and the brand colours are more 'manly' so mens eyes will be drawn to it.  The fact that my target audience like to go to gigs and festivals in their spare time is useful information for me because I know what their main interests are, therefore I put on a competition to go to a Kasabian gig so anyone who sees that and like Kasabian will most likely want to buy my magazine.  I chose the title of my magazine to be called 'Parklife' as this is a famous Blur song, I would expect a lot of my target audience to know and enjoy Blur therefore when they see that the magazine is called this it should draw their attention to the page and make them want to read on.  The language that I use in my magazine would appeal to my target audience as I use mostly proper English however with some slang as this is how Indie Scenesters talk, they don't like the use of 'text talk' and will use proper words when possible, this gives my magazine a certain level of maturity which shows that it is meant for teenagers and young adults and no necessarily for children , also there are some swear words blanked out with the * symbol however it would still not be suitable for young kids.

6. What have you learned about the technologies from the process of constructing this product?
My school magazine was my first attempt at making one, it was also my first attempt at experimenting with Adobe Photoshop CS6.  I used this software a lot during the coursework and my skills have developed a lot since the first magazine attempt and I think it shows in my final product.  At first I found it very confusing and hard to get used to but I made a number of preliminary magazine covers as shown below and I think I learned quickly which helped me when it came to making the final magazine.  I took lots of pictures in the AVS room for my magazine.  I started by taking practice pictures for my preliminary tasks and once I got to understand the different types of lighting e.g. key light and back light, I decided to take the real pictures for my final magazine.
The camera I used was a Nikon D320, I used this camera to capture all
of my images throughout the project as the clarity of the images was clear which would get me a lot more marks for my coursework.  I took over 100 photos of all my models for the project to make sure I got the right ones, when choosing the photos to use I took into account the quality for example making sure they weren't blurred and there was no red-eye, also I took into account how their facial expressions and other prosodic features looked because if they didn't look the part of a rockstar then I didn't want to use them in my magazine.  Another piece of technology I used that I hadn't experienced before this project was an Apple Mac, the Mac made it a lot easier to edit the images to make the models look better e.g. getting rid of spots and blemishes, I did this using Iphoto which is an application that isn't accessible from an ordinary computer, I found it very beneficial and feel that it got me more marks.  In order to display my work in a presentable way which anyone can access easily, I decided to create a blog using Blogger where my work could be seen by anyone at anytime also if I lost any work I could just go on my blog where it is saved and can be edited at any time.  I used Microsoft Word to create documents displaying tasks such as the double page spread and analysing my preliminary tasks, i chose this software to use as it has a range of available fonts and you can insert images from Photoshop.  I had to put these documents on to my blog so I used the website Scribd which allows you to post documents on to the internet, after uploading them to Scribd I embedded a code which allowed me to insert them on to my blog.  I used the website http://www.dafont.com/ various times throughout this project to help find a suitable font for my mast heads, pull quotes, cover lines etc.  Dafont had a very wide range of fonts that I could use including many different categories so it was easy to find one which fitted my genre and stood out as much as I wanted it to.
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?
What I think stands out the most on my final magazine when compared to my preliminary tasks is how there is so much more going on, on the page of my final design.  Whereas on my first draft it looked very boring and didn't give enough information about was was inside the magazine itself.  Secondly I think the final design is more eye catching than the first draft as there is a good variety of colours, on the first draft there wasn't enough however on the final design the amount was just right, not so much that the page looks like there's too much going on but also not so little that it doesn't stand out.  I have learnt how to layout a magazine cover, contents and double page spread effectively, firstly my front cover has largely improved as I took

largely into account the different types of layouts for example the E plan, Z plan and F plan.  I decided to use a Z plan for my first draft because I felt that this was the most effective for my genre also a lot of NME magazine covers use this plan which is the magazine that I have been mostly influenced by.  On my final draft I decided that there was not enough information on the front cover and it didn't stand out therefore I added a pull quote, band lists and a competition to win Kasabian tickets (a band that my target audience would listen to), another thing I have learned is that all the bands must be related to the same genre as your target audience because no one would like to buy a magazine that has one article on a band they like e.g. Stone Roses however the rest of it is about Jay Z, Jessie J and pop music which is completely different to Stone Roses.


1 comment:

  1. Ollie.

    Your responses are very vague. For task one you offer no direct examples from your magazine at all, you MUST identify clear examples from your magazine where you USE, CHALLENGE or DEVELOP. At no stage do you demonstrate any awareness at all of whether you do this! Look at your class mates blogs to see how they have tackled this question.

    For question two you MUST analyse the mise en scene of your images. How has your use of camera angle, lighting, props and costume reflected Indie Scensters? Similarly how has the colour palette of your magazine as well as your language choice represented Indie Scenesters?

    For Q3 pick a specific publication from IPC and investigate how that magazine is distributed (make sure it is a music publication)

    Q4 and 5 are better and attempts to deal with the task. You could improve this by connecting to Q2 and 3 by mentioning where your audience would buy it and how the social group on the cover would appeal to them. Some analysis of the language used would also help.

    Q6 for this question you MUST include all the technologies you have use, blogger, internet, twitter, photoshop, office, scribd, animoto, SLR camera etc and explore how they link and connect. There is lots to do on this question

    Q7 This question need much more terminology so you can evaluate and demonstrate what you have learnt.

    You have a lot of work to do to get this up to the required standard. The deadline is the final friday of term, you will need to spend a considerable time outside of class getting this improved.

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