Final Products

Final Products

Front Cover

Contents Page

Double Page Spread

Evaluation Question 1

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

When creating my front cover, contents page and double page spread I looked at a variety of existing magazines to help me get an idea as to what I should put on and inside my magazine and also what I should make my magazine look like. Here is a presentation explaining the process I have been through to create my three pages and it will also answer the above question:

Evaluation Question 2

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

          I decided to create a Punk Rock magazine because I know all about this genre of music as I am a fan of it myself. This meant that I knew what my target audience would want to see when they look at and read my magazine. The first thing I had to plan out was what type of things were going to be seen on my magazine. In certain genres of magazines they always use the same props, colours and often fonts. When creating my front cover I knew I would have to make it obvious that my magazine was Punk Rock and the first thing I did was take images, so I had to make sure that the clothes my model was wearing was correct. In the image above you can see that on the original magazine the woman in the foreground is wearing a denim jacket and in the other magazine both women are wearing black. I made my model wear a black t-shirt and denim jacket which conformed to the stereotypes of Rock music. Furthermore, I also used some props when taking my images. As you can see in the original image the woman is holding a guitar, so I made my model hold drum sticks to show that they were part of a band. It is stereotypical to see men related to Punk Rock music, but in these original magazines they have women on the front, so I decided to stick to the stereotypes and put a male on the cover of my magazine which I felt would be more appealing towards some of the people in my target audience.   

          Here is a video to show what type of clothes and props are often used when a Punk Rock band is at a photo shoot:

Untitled Haiku Deck - Created with Haiku Deck, presentation software that inspires           
          
        
This video allows you to see what type of clothes, actions and props Punk Rock artists use when they are at a photo shoot. Here is a list of things that you will often see at a Punk Rock artists photo shoot;

•         Direct mode of address
•         Straight faces with no emotion
•         Props (often guitars, drumsticks and more)
•         Stood in a line and sometimes having arms on each others shoulders
•         Touching of the face/hair
•         Dark clothes

         These are just a few points as to what you would usually see in a photo shoot for a Punk Rock artist. In this video I have also shown some of the images that I was planning to use as my front cover, but some of them weren't good enough to be used on the front cover for a few reasons, but the images have a good use of props and costumes. 

          
When it came to deciding what the median age of my target audience was, I was able to see what kind of people would buy Punk Rock magazines by doing some research and seeing how what the the highest percentage of people would buy a Punk Rock magazine. I also knew myself what type of people would by this magazine because I listen to this genre of music, so I know other people that listen to it and when I have been to concerts I have seen what type of people attend the concerts. 

          
Kerrang is one of the UK's best selling Rock magazine and because of this I looked at 
some of the statistics from the magazine company and the main target audience for a Punk Rock/Rock magazine are teenagers and young adults. As I am a teenager myself and I listen to this genre of music it made it easier 
for me to create my magazine because I 
would know what I would like to see myself. 
The first thing I would have to do is make 
sure that the magazine is affordable for 
teenagers to buy because they are still young 
and do not always have jobs so it can be hard 
for them to spend money on things like 
magazines. I have also included free things 
inside the magazine, which will make the reader 
want to buy the magazine more as they will be 
able to get things for free. On top of that, the gender ratio is almost equal, so I have had to make my magazine appealing to both men and women. By looking at my reader profile you can see that my main target audience is men, but women do also buy the magazine and because it is a weekly magazine I have made it affordable for both teenagers and young adults.     

        

         Here is a small presentation to answer a few more questions about how my product represents a particular social group:

Evaluation Question 3

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

One of the existing Punk Rock/Rock magazines I looked at to help me create my magazine was a magazine called 'Kerrang!' which is the same genre as my magazine and includes the same type of features that my magazine has. As my magazine is similar to 'Kerrang!' in some ways, it means I may be able to get publishers and distributors that work with the 'Kerrang!' magazine. The publisher for this magazine is a company based in Germany called Bauer Media Group. This group is quite commonly known and releases a variety of different magazines from different genres and it is not all just about Rock music. On top of that, this company also creates cooking, TV and lifestyle magazines which means they are popular and well known. Using this company for my publishers and distributors would be beneficial because, as they are well known it means they are successful and they will get a lot of sales - meaning my magazine would produce a large amount of sales and would become successful. It could also be a disadvantage too, this is because my magazine is very similar to 'Kerrang!' magazine, which means there could be competition between the two magazines and because 'Kerrang!' has been in the industry for a lot longer than my magazine, people will want to keep reading the same magazine they have been reading for years and may not want to pick up a new magazine and see what is inside of it.  

When it came to deciding what company I wanted to publish and distribute my magazine, I knew that I did not want Bauer, but I would want something similar to this company. For example, NME's publisher and distributor is called IPC. I eventually came to a decision after a while and I was deciding between the independent publishers called 'Blaze Publishing' and the independent publishers called 'Freeway Press Inc' which produce the original magazine 'Rock Sound' which I used to help me create my magazine. The publisher and distributor I decided to go with was 'Freeway Press Inc'.

I decided to go with the publisher and distributor 'Freeway Press Inc' because I am familiar with one of the magazines that this company sells and it is the same genre as my magazine, so this would be helpful. I would like this publisher to distribute my magazine because I know they have some experience as they have sold the magazine 'Rock Sound' which is quite well known, meaning this publisher may help my magazine become popular and well known. Furthermore, there are many different advantages of having this publisher for my magazine. One of the benefits is that this publisher mainly sells music magazines, which means there will be a variety of music fans that will already be buying their magazines and they also sell a lot of Rock magazines which is also advantageous because there will already be readers who are fans of Punk Rock and Rock music.

The reason I decided not to use the 'Bauer Media Group' was because they sell more than just music magazines which means they will have a wide variety of readers, but because they sell so many different magazines some people may avoid that there is a Rock magazine that is trying to be sold. Using 'Freeway Press Inc' was beneficial because the company is aimed at one age group and appeals to only certain types of people which means the company will fully concentrate on trying to promote a certain genre rather than having to concentrate on lots of other things as well. 'Blaze Publishing' was another one of the publishers I was thinking of working with, but I decided not to use them because they are not very popular which meant I was unsure if they would be able to do the things that I would want them to be able to do. Although 'Freeway Press Inc' is not that popular, they have still published some popular magazines which have done well, so I know that this company would be able to do the things I would want them to do.


'Rock Sound' is a successful Punk Rock/Rock music magazine that is published by 'Freeway Press Inc'. Here is some information about this magazine:

Here are some statistics for this magazine that my magazine may hopefully be able to achieve when I work with 'Freeway Press Inc':

 

Some magazine companies have allowed their magazines to be digitalised, meaning the reader would be able to read their magazine anywhere on their tablets. Nowadays, consumers are more likely to buy digital copies of CD's rather than physical copies, but when it comes to magazines people are more likely to buy the physical copy as there are often prizes and free items inside the magazine, but if you bought a digital version of the magazine then you would not be able to get those prizes. From this I have concluded that my company will make digitalised versions of my magazine, but most of the money will be spend on creating physical copies as more of these are frequently sold. I have decided this because in the future people may begin to want to read magazines digitally and our companies will be one of the companies that already have digital copies of our magazine - so we may earn more money at this time. On top of that, my company will also get a larger income as we will have different ways of selling my product (synergy) meaning there will be a larger mass audience.     

Evaluation Question 4

Question 4: Who would be the audience for your media product?

When creating my magazine I had to make sure that I was including the right features to entice the correct audience. This meant I had to plan who my target audience was before I began creating my magazine because I would need to know what features to include in my magazine which will make my target audience want to pick up my magazine. Here is a presentation I have created which demonstrates who my target audience is and also why they are my target audience: 

Evaluation Question 5

Question 5: How did you attract/address your audience?

One of the most important factors I had to think about when creating my magazine were the ways I would try to attract and address my target audience. This is very important because if there were no aspects on my magazine to attract my target audience then no one would buy my magazine and the sales for the magazine will not do well. I decided to create a presentation to show the different ways in which I have attracted and address my target audience. Here is my presentation; 

Evaluation Question 6

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

There are a variety of different programs and types of technologies I have used throughout this process to try and create my final magazine, but the program I have used the most is Photoshop. Before creating my magazine I had never really used Photoshop and was not that familiar with it and all the tools I had to use to create my magazine. The first time I properly used Photoshop was when I created my preliminary task. However, since then I have improved massively with using Photoshop, which can clearly be seen when you look at my final preliminary magazine and my final music magazine. While using Photoshop I have learnt a variety of different things such as; how to get rid of a background, how to add effects to images and text and also how to use certain tools. It did not take me a long time to understand Photoshop, but it did take me some time to become good at using it. Here is a small presentation demonstrating some of the effects and styles I did in Photoshop which I did not know how to do before I started using Photoshop;

From this slideshow you are able see that I have used some effects which I did not know how to do myself so I had to do some research to find out how to do them. I have not shown how to do the easier effects because most people are able to do them easily anyway and they are quite simple. The effects which I have shown in this slideshow allowed me to make my magazine look different to others as I have created effects which are my own - so no one else's will look like it. On top of that, I have provided before and after pictures of the texts that I used the effects on and I have done this as it allows you to see that there is a difference when the effect has been added, it has been made more appealing to my target audience and it also shows that I have done this process myself and not just found a way to copy it from somewhere or someone else.

There are a mixture of different tools that can be used in Photoshop and I could have used them all, but that would have meant I would have had to spend a lot of time doing research. So instead I just decided to use only the tools I needed and if there was a special effect or something different that I wanted to create and I didn't know what type of tool to use, then I just did some research and looked up the tools that I would only need to use. Here is a small slideshow to present some of the important tools I have used during this process;



By watching this slideshow you will be able to see that there are an array of different tools that can be used in Photoshop, so it would take a long time to learn how to use all of the tools professionally. The tools I have shown in this slideshow are the ones which I did not use a lot but I thought were beneficial and very useful for my magazine because they allowed me to do effects which were my own and which other people would not be able to do unless they did the exact same thing that I did. I think I have used the tools in a unique way because I have used certain tools in the way that they are not meant to be used, which shows that I have used my imagination to create my own things that other people may not be able to do. Again, I have provided before and after pictures to show what the effects I have created have done to my magazine. 

When creating my product I used many different media platforms to present my work. Some examples of the platforms I have used are; Prezi, GoAnimate, Haiku Deck and many more. I was only familiar with a few of the media platforms I had used which was useful because it meant I able to begin my work quickly and I did not need to practice trying to use a certain media platform. I found using different media platforms interesting as I got to learn about a variety of different things and how different things work. I am now extremely confident with all of the media platforms I have used throughout this process and I think I will most likely use them again in the future. A lot of my time was spent on 'Blogger' which is where I have posted all of my work that I have produced and I have also learnt an array of different things on there. I have learnt how to produce a blog and how to lay different things out. One of the features I didn't know was available on blogger was the use of HTML code, I am very familiar with coding which meant I knew how I would be able to add any videos to my blog by embedding the code of the video and coping a pasting it into the HTML section on blogger. 

As I am familiar with technology, I knew that work can sometimes be lost or could accidentally not be saved, so I backed up my work and saved it onto a USB stick which I kept in a safe place so I knew that I wouldn't lose the work I had on it. Every time I continued with my work I saved it on both my computer  'F drive' and also my USB stick so I would always have the latest version of my work in case I ever lost it. On top of that, I always keep my work in organised files so I will easily be able to find the certain piece of work I am looking for and it also means I will spend less time looking for the piece of work that I need. 

Evaluation Question 7

Question 7: Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

When I began creating my preliminary task I barley knew anything about Photoshop, but between the creation of my college magazine and the creation of my music magazine I have had a lot of practice and have been able to research information to help me create my magazine. Here is the cover of my preliminary task and the cover of my music magazine; 

During the process between my preliminary task and my final task I have learnt a lot about everything to do with magazines. I have learnt about all the research I have had to do beforehand, all the different conventions that are commonly seen on a magazine, how to use certain media platforms and many more things. Doing the preliminary task was extremely helpful as it allowed me to get used to certain programs and also helped me to understand magazines in more detail before I started to create my final magazine. I have created a presentation which will explain in more detail how I think I have improved and also what I think I could do to improve more. Here is my presentation: 

I decided to create a slideshow which would show the differences between my college magazine and music magazine so I would be able to see how much I have improved and what type of things I have learnt throughout this process. Here is the slideshow I created: 

Final Double Page Spread Process

Final Double Page Spread Process

I have to create a double page spread for a music magazine - where I will use original images that I have taken myself and I will also have to create my own article and think of a story to write about. When creating the double page spread I had to make sure that it was like a 'Punk Rock' magazine, this is because this is the genre that I chose to create a magazine around. The double Page Spread will have to look like a Punk Rock genre as I will want it to entice people that are fans of Punk Rock music. I have created a few drafts for my double page spread, but the process I am going to show is the process I went through to create my final draft. In this post I will explain how I created my final product and I will also show what it looks like. 

Here is how I created my final double page spread;

Here is my final product;