Evaluation of Portfolio

In this evaluation I will be examining my three final pieces on their use of conventions, representations of social groups and the overall quality.

I think my front cover has done a good job of following typical codes and conventions that are found in already existing magazines. For example, I found that all music magazines have a big, bold, easy to read masthead at the top of their magazine. This makes it one of the first things readers see and the masthead can even reference the type of music magazine it could be. You can see this on magazine covers like ‘VIBE’ and ‘Q’. I have followed this convention and made my masthead big and easy to read, giving it a kind of scratched up or broken look to help it show the genera of music my magazine is presenting. In this case, it is rock. I got the idea after being inspired by the masthead of ‘Kerrang’ and chose to use something similar.

Another convention which is always found on music magazine covers, are sell-lines.  All magazines have these, because sell-lines showcase the magazine’s content and tries to tempt readers to buy the magazine by giving bits of juicy information that readers would want to find out more about. The typical sell-lines you can get on a music magazine are of interviews with artists, countdowns of best songs or artists and some kind of competition announcement. This is why I decided that sell-lines are a must for a magazine from cover. I included a range of information on the sell-lines, so that readers that buy the magazine for different reasons can all spot something that will convince them to purchase the magazine. For example, one of the sell-lines refers to free posters. So readers that like getting cover mount will want to purchase the magazine. Or, I made a sell-line that tells readers of interviews with bands, so people that like the band or just enjoy reading interviews will be tempted to purchase the magazine. I also included a main sell-line. This sell line is the biggest on page which means it could be a feature article and will grab attention faster then the other sell-lines. The contents of the sell-lines are written in such a way that the reader thinks they are getting something limited and special, so that’s why words like ‘EXCLUSIVE’ and ‘FREE’ are maid to stand out. This is done by other magazines to achieve the same effect.

The main image of a magazine’s cover is one of the most important conventions that help to draw in reader attention, and all magazine covers have one. The main image is usually of an artist that is being featured in the magazine. After researching costumes and layout of the main images, I decided to follow this convention and that my band would be featured on the cover, all directly facing the front and dressed in casual clothes with a style that comes form rock and punk. My image is something you would stereotypically see on a rock music magazine with the band members in the centre and against a plain background, however, I decided to brake the convention of males dominating the image, and placed the female member of the band in the middle so she would get the most attention. I think this made the image look even better because she looks like she is bringing brightness to the band. One thing that I would change is the effect of the image’s contrast or vibrancy because even though I like the image, the lightness looks like it could be improved. I would have also made it bigger but I was too scared to cover the masthead, even though most magazines do this.

 Another convention I chose to follow, are smaller related images. I got the idea from ‘Kerrang’ that do it on every cover. These images are presented on the cover in smaller form to give readers a preview into what images they can expect in the magazine. Sometimes the images are previews of posters or other possible freebies. These smaller images can entice a reader to buy the magazine if they liked the possible posters or if the artist they see is someone they like. I also added shadow drop effect to make it seem like the images are jumping off of the page. The images were also placed on a white background which made them seem like instant photos.

The smaller related images can be seen spread out all over the cover.

A convention that I noticed in many music magazine covers like ‘NME’ were banners being placed at the top and bottom of the magazine. These banners usually either consisted of lists of other artists or information about competitions, festivals or special offers. I wanted to apply this concept to my magazine, particularly the lists of artists, because that way, readers can know the magazine’s range of artists and the lists let them know there is much more content.

I also had to include a barcode since this is not a free magazine. A convention of these magazines is that all of them have barcodes on the cover. That is why I chose to follow this convention as well inserting a puff. Puffs are usually found on the cover, but do not necessarily have to be inserted. A puff’s main purpose is to advertise some kind of special offer like a contest, or to function as another sell-line. The puff is usually positioned at the top half of the cover, but it can be placed on the bottom half. Nearly all magazines use them at one point or another.

Here you can see a bottom and top banner and even 2 puffs.

There have been conventions however that I chose to ignore or alter. I chose not to include a strap line because it looked like it did not fit in with the rest of the cover and I thought it made the cover look less professional. Not all magazines have strap lines so mine will just have to be one of them. I also chose not to place the date line on the cover but in the contents page. I saw that ‘Kerrang’ puts their date line on their contents page so I wanted to do the same. The date line looked better on the contents page so I did not change position again.

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My contents page was created so that it would help readers navigate the magazine and at the same time provide visuals of what’s to come in the magazine. Just like the cover, the contents page includes the masthead and an indication that it is the contents page somewhere at the top. All magazines like ‘Rock Sound’ and ‘NME’ do this.

 

Like all magazine contents pages, mine had to have sub-titles of the different type of information my magazine would be showcasing. Under each sub-title there is each individual article written next to a page number. This way, readers can use the numbers to go to the wanted article. For the sub-titles, I wanted to given them a design that kind of reminds you of police tape as if something went wrong at a gig. This adds a dangerous and rebellious style to the contents page. For the list of articles, I gave a simple easy to read font and colour that stands out well against the background. Other magazines don’t do fancy fonts for the lists because the audience need to be able to read the information clearly, so I followed their example. But I chose to inverts the colour scheme from dark letters on a light background, as seen on most music magazine contents pages, to light letter on a dark background e.g. ‘Rock Sound’. I think this way I achieve a better symbiotic link and the page’s style reflects the genera of music.

Light letters on a dark background worked for my contents page more.

At the bottom left corner, I included a section where readers are able to subscribe to the magazine. Not all music magazines include this, but I found a similar design on the contents page of ‘Kerrang’ and got inspired to go my own. Using that as my reference, I created the information needed for a magazine subscription section. Including, the price per month, the telephone number readers can call to subscribe and the magazine’s website where readers can subscribe online. I also noticed that in the subscription section there are small pictures of previous magazines. I created my own makeshift versions and displayed them next to the subscription information.

After looking at other magazine contents pages, I noticed that all are image heavy at a ratio of about 1:1.  This convention helps to make the contents page seem less boring and give its target audience a preview of images included in the magazine. I chose to have a main image and other smaller images spread around the right side of the page and I made them have the same instant photo effect. This effect makes them seem like they were taken recently and that readers would feel like they were at the events as they were taking place.

 Smaller images and the choice to subscribe at the bottom. Both pages are half text and half image.

I also found out that another convention of contents pages is that the images usually have numbers next to them. This is done so that if readers spot an interesting image and what to know what page it was on, they can look at the number next to it. This is done in all magazines like ‘NME’ and ‘Rock Sound’. I followed this convention and placed a number next to each image. I believe that my contents page has followed many conventions of a music magazine contents page and has done so to a good standard.

   Both pages have numbers next to each image present.

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For my final double page spread, there were a lot of conventions present in already existing music magazines and not all of them were always used. I got a lot of inspiration from the ‘NME’ double page spread featuring ‘The Teenagers’.

The first convention I saw, was that most of the time, the double page spreads had headers at the top left hand corner. This lets people know which section of the magazine they are currently at and it seemed like it would fit in well with my idea for my double page spread. It would also give me a chance to apply the colour scheme I’ve been using to achieve a symbiotic link.

The convention of the headline in most magazines tends to span across both of the pages of the double page spread. This is one of the ways people know this is a double page spread. The headline has the biggest text and can be in the form of a quote. This makes readers want to know more because if the headline is a quote, it makes them feel like they a getting a sneak peek into the mind of the artist. An example of a magazine doing this would be ‘Kerrang’ as they feature the band ‘My Chemical Romance’. I chose to follow this important convention and made my headline be in the form of a quote, span both pages and made the text big and bold. I also added an effect that makes the text look like it’s cracking to make it seem like the band is trying to break into the world of music.

You can see the headline is on both pages and is in a quote.

Another convention I chose to follow is the standfirst. The standfirst is like a short synopsis of what the article is about and is another tool used to get readers interested in reading the article. It is always placed above the body copy and is in slightly bigger and bolder letters than the body copy so readers’ attention is brought to it first. I also included it because it made my double page spread look more professional.

The body copy is an essential part of any double page spread and is usually displayed without taking up too much space. All magazine double page spreads will have a body copy but the amount of text can differ from a whole page or less. It is important not to have too much writing because if there is, the readers will find it boring and dull. For my double page spread, I included enough writing to make it seem interesting, but not so much that readers lose interest by just looking at the amount of text.

Pull quotes are another convention of double page spreads that I chose to follow. A pull quote is placed somewhere in the body copy and is usually a quote by one of the band members. Pull quotes are a tool use to get readers interested in the article. The quote is usually something shocking or interesting and attention grabbing. This way, if the readers want to know what the reason for the quote, they would have to read the article. Pull can come in many shapes and forms, but I liked the way ‘NME’ did theirs for ‘The Teenagers’ in boxes, so I chose to do something similar.

Another convention of double page spreads is boxed text. Boxed text usually has either facts about the band, any special news or offers on their up-coming gigs or more quotes from the band members that try to apply some comedy. I chose to have my boxed text have interesting quotes so that readers would become intrigued with how this band thinks and works and have no choice but to read the article to find out more. That is why I think this convention was followed well.

A must convention for any double page spread is that it has images. My main image, like in most music magazines, takes up almost half of the double page spread and spans both pages. This is another indication this is a double page spread. Double page spread have to be image heavy because that makes them look more interesting  and might persuade readers to read the article. The image is always of the artist and the background can range from gigs to bedrooms. That is why I chose to do it at a park instead of a plane background. Along with the main image, there are smaller related images that can be scattered around the page. This help to make the double page spread more image heavy and look more interesting. In the ‘NME’ featuring ‘The Teenagers’ double page spread they have smaller. I chose to follow this convention and place a couple of smaller images bellow my main image but with a slight change in scenery. I added a drop shadow effect to give the smaller images a keyline effect. This makes the images look like their bursting off the page.

Next to some of the images I added a caption to either add comedy or five some kind of information about the image. This makes the double page spread more enjoyable to read and not just be an article. I did this using the ‘NME’ double page spread as a reference. This convention was easy to follow.

There is a convention I chose not to follow. A starburst functions similarly like a puff and is a similar shape, but I chose not to use it because I couldn’t find any place where it could have improved the double page spread and if I had put it in, it may have lowered the quality of the overall piece.

After analysing these three pieces, I think it is safe to say that they all followed their codes and conventions of typical music magazines, except those that are not mandatory for better overall quality.

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My magazine presents genders in an inverted way, instead of following the norm of how they are usually presented in music magazines. Most music magazines represent men as being strong, brave, successful, bold frontmen. Whilst women are seen are gentle, nurturing and weak; they are represented as either just fans, sexual objects, girly stereotypes, or being defeminised and made to look more masculine.  My magazine does not do this and lets women choose what they want to represented as.  On covers, women are either pushed away to the side, or if it’s a female artist, she won’t look as feminine.

This artist has been de-feminised then placed on the cover.

You can see that the female on this cover was pushed to the very side.

On my cover, I placed the female band member in the middle so that attention can be focused more on her. She is also wearing light makeup, which gives her a gentle glow and still let’s her appear quite feminine. I did so similarly for the main image on the double page spread by placing the female in the middle of shots, or bringing her to the front. This way, my magazine will not focus on one gender. There has been a rise in female artists however, and these stereotypes seem to be lowering. E.g. Florence on the cover of ‘NME’ doesn’t look like she would fall into any of the stereotypes and doesn’t look de-feminised. Instead, she still retains her feminine charms and her clothes make her look quite sophisticated or professional, while the light make-up and white blouse give her a more delicate appearance.

Since the majority of my target audience are bellow 30 years old, they are still young youths and have a big interest in enjoying themselves and having fun. My magazine doesn’t represent them as they are represented on the news as trouble making hooligans.  On the cover, the band members are all young people, but they do not appear threatening. I have represented them, so that even though they may be dressed in dark clothes, they have a friendly appearance and are aspiring musicians just like many of the current musicians use to be. On the contents page, the images show that even though their youths, they try and work hard and hope to make it one day. It also shows that they want to have a good time and not cause trouble. The double page spread is also showing their friendly side. They are shown to be like typical youths that love to hang out and be with friends. I think that my magazine shows the lighter side of youths and not the bad reputation the other medias have built up.

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The institution that I have chosen that will distribute my magazine would be Bauer Media. I have chosen this institution for several different reasons. The first is that Bauer Media is also the institution of music magazines like ‘Q’ and ‘Kerrang’. After looking at theses magazines, the genera of music and the artists they celebrate are similar to mine. My target audience are similar to ‘Kerrang’ but not as dark and ‘in your face’, and ‘Q’ has a kind or sophistication and professionalism that I wish for my magazine.

The second reason why I chose Bauer Media, is because this institution doesn’t only concern itself with magazines. There also do radio, TV, online and mobiles, so if I was ever planning to expand into other medias, I would not have to go searching for another institution.

There have been other magazine institutions that I was planning on using e.g. Denis or the National Magazine Company. But I found that these institutions focused more on either gossip/news or lifestyle and health. So I decided that it is better to use an institution that has had experience with music magazines, because that way, I know they will help me deliver my magazine to the right audience.
Other big music magazines like 'NME' have created a cross media synergy, expanding across different medias, so an institution like Bauer Media would definitely have experience in this.

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The target audience of my magazine are males and females in the age range of about 16 – 28. They are a sociable and confidante group of people that have a great passion for music and believe that being unique is more important than trying to fit into the crowd. They also enjoy the diversity that music brings. The age range spits the target audience into people that are still in education, so funds may still be limited for them which means I should not make my magazine too expensive. The target audience that is employed are well paid hard workers but like to find ways to brake from their routine and my magazine would help them do this. Their good income makes them feel independent and secure. Readers of my magazine love trying out new things and making on-the-spot decisions to add some excitement to their daily lives because if they hate anything, it’s being bored. They like leading a healthy lifestyle, but don’t mind treating themselves with lazy days and fast food. My magazine would be the perfect thing to blend into one of these lazy days.  Music channels like ‘MTV’ are viewed by my target audience as another source of music news, so my magazine would be the information source when the target audience do not have accesses to technology. 

Some of my target audience could be aspiring musicians, so they would be interested in finding out what is happening in the music industry through things like magazines. My magazine would suitably help them do this. To my target audience, music accompanies them throughout their day and takes an active role in their lives. They like listening to live music, so my magazine could give them a wider range of choices with the gig guides. They like classic rock bands like The Beatles and Elvis, but they also embrace today’s modern rock bands like Simple Plan and Coldplay. The magazine my target audience are looking for is like ‘Kerrang’, but more laid back, with a kind of sophistication like ‘Q’ magazine but being centred completely on music. My magazine is exactly what they are looking for.

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As Abraham Maslow identified, humans all have needs. They range from basic needs like food and shelter, to more psychological needs. My magazine is able to fulfil some of those needs. As Maslow stated, my target audience have the need to have friends and feel acceptable. My magazine will help them fulfil this need because they will join the community of many others that read this magazine and share the same vision and passion from music, they will feel that they have something in common with all of these people. Another need Maslow mentions is the need to believe in yourself and to feel confident. Since my target audience will consist of aspiring singers and musicians, content like inspiring articles of artists achieving success against all odds will definitely help my target audience believe that they will also be able to make it and gives them confidence to continue chasing their dreams.

I think that my magazine is appealing well to my target audience and is fitting in well with their daily lives. My magazine offers the unique outlook on today’s rock music and doesn’t try to feature only those that everyone is listening to at the moment, but also appertaining the genius of less know, but respected music artists; with the same uniqueness my target audience appreciates. My magazine is the brake my target audience is looking forward too, whether it be from school or work. Aspiring musicians would also find my magazine enjoyable since they like to know what is currently happening in the world of music and live rock fans would be able to use the magazine to find the nearest gigs to quench their thirst for live music. The magazine is also the alternative to watching shows or listening to radio to get music news. You can go at your own pace and read as many times as you like. My magazine covers not only new but older artists, so my target audience can always find something that their conformal with and not go too much out of their comfort zone.

I was able to talk to one of my target audience members and ask for her opinion on all of my three finished pieces after showing them to her. I asked what she thought was good, bad and anything I could improve on.

I was also able to get feedback of my finished pieces from my target audience via e-mail. I sent them images of the finished pieces and got a reply of what they thought. I also asked friends that would be into rock and people I believed would enjoy my magazine for quick feedback whist working to give me more ideas or point out things I haven't spotted.

From gaining all this feedback, I have learned a lot on what I could improve if I were to do this king of task again. I have learned to be extra careful with spelling since Photoshop doesn't check it so it would depend on me not to make mistakes. I have also learned that in some cases, If images go over each other it could actually make the whole piece look better. It doesn't have to be all tidy and neat since that would not have appealed to the target audience as much.

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Since I had started this project, I have gained a big amount of technological skills I didn’t know I was missing. I have already had experience working with Adobe Photoshop, but this project has helped me learn more about the manipulating ability of this programme. I also gained more knowledge on how selecting specific areas and manipulating layer can improve the overall look of a piece. I also learned how to download font designs I thought would suit the magazine and use them in Photoshop and I’ve also started learning how to use the vector shape pen to get certain shapes that weren't available on quick select. That is how I got the guitar pick shape for my puff. Another big skill I have learned is how to set up and use a blog to showcase my work. I learned how to customise the look of my blog, from the background to the colour of texts. In addition, I learned how to upload work weather it be text or images. I also learned how to include links, videos and sound recordings. When creating the sound recordings, I also got to know and improve my skills with the newest version of Windows Movie Maker and the features that come with it. This project has also given me the chase to improve my use of my digital camera and experimenting with shot types. 

Since the preliminary task, the skill that has mostly improved was my use of Photoshop. I have learned not to use as many features as possible like I did with the preliminary task but use the amount that will help my magazine look as professional as possible. For example, I have gained a much better understanding on how layers work and how you can add masks instead of layers which can save time. I have also learned better control over the gradient tool and how to create shapes using the pen tool. I have also been able to improve my skill of gathering information from my target audience in more diverse ways e.g. questionnaires and online forums. This has helped me to get a much more varied opinion and more feedback for me to analyse. Lastly, I have become much more relaxed about how I use a camera; trying out shots from different angles and experimenting with poses for my models.

The areas of my final products that have improved were the choice and placement of font and text. I feel that I was able to control this area quite well and make sure to not go overboard like I felt I did with the preliminary task. I also feel that I got a better understanding of codes and conventions since the preliminary task, so I could use these conventions confidently to create a professional look. If I were to do this again, I would follow the advice I received from my feedback and be less fixed with my layout designs, not being afraid to just experiment and see where it could take my ideas.

From this project, I have gained a better understanding of what role magazines play in people’s lives and what needs magazines are able to fulfil. I have also learned how much research needs to go into making a magazine in order to deliver it to the right people and estimating what they would want to see in a magazine. Lastly, along with learning codes and conventions of all three pieces, I have learned how different social groups are represented, sometimes being based on stereotypes.