Magazine initial feedback

These are the sheets my teacher wrote out for me telling me what is good about my magazine, and what I can add/improve. They have been very helpful so far.

Contents Page Update

This is my contents page now. I know I said the previous post would be the last but you never know with these things. Since last time the pictures have been made way bigger and the text has changed colour from red to black. I think this makes the magazine look slightly more serious and grown up, as it was starting to look more like a kids magazine.

Frustrations of the Contents Page

The contents page took around 6-7 hours to make, including taking the pictures, and I had a few problems along the way. There were a some 'OH MY GOD WHY IS THIS NOT WORKING!' moments, but more often than not these would be resolved within ten minutes, or I had gotten to annoyed and decided to do something else. One thing that was very annoying was making the page numbers for the two main articles at the the top of the page. The shapes kept deforming and the font would keep changing colour. Even the font wouldn't do what I wanted it to. It took me about 45 minutes to sort it out, and I really don't want to change it again. Apart from that I had no big problems to hinder my progress.

ALMOST THERE!! Contents page

From the last update I have added a lot of things to the page! Firstly I Made another section at the top, so the two main articles stand out and are not lost in the crowd. I have also added the larger box at the middle-bottom of the page, which will contain all of the sub articles, all with page numbers, and laid out in a 'column' style. I have also added a 'Subscribe' bar at the bottom of the page, and an issue number in the top right hand corner of the page, however I might end up moving that around to see where it looks the best. Apart from these things, there are just a few finishing touches I am debating upon adding.

CONTENTS PAGE SO FAR...

At the moment this is what my contents page looks like. I have my background up, a picture of a wall from a previous photo-shoot. I have also created a design effect using the shape tool to outline my pictures and text. I also have a page title, and an image for an article, however i'm not too sure what that article will be yet.

Double Page Spread Flatplan

Colour Usage: For my Contents page I am going to use quite dark colours, because this will reflect the mood of the article, which is about the streets and how they are effecting young people and their lives. To reflect this I am going to have a dark background with perhaps a picture, but more likely a picture on one side and a dark background on the other. I will need to choose the exact colour at the time, so I can make it match the picture. I will either use red or white text depending on whether I can get away with red text against the background.

Text Usage: I would like the text to be either red or white against the dark background .his will not only look striking and stand out, but it will reflect the moods of the article, dark and striking. Again, I am unsure how the red will look against the dark background, and white may both look more professional and stand out more. The text will centre around the streets and how street life is changing the way young people live, and consequentially the music the streets make. The masthead of the article is going to be quite large, and I have a number of fonts in mind for this (see fonts post).

Image usage: I have am image in mind that I have taken previously during and 'artsy' moment of a dark street corner being lit up by a lone street lamp near my Gran's house, I was on the way there one day and I just thought it would make a good picture. However, I took this with my phone, and I have some concerns about the quality of the picture and whether it will be good enough to put in my magazine when stretched. If this is the case, I shall have to go out and take another picture with my good camera. This will not be to much of a problem, as i already have a similar place at the end of my street, and I think it would be perfect, and convenient for the magazine.

Contents Page Flatplan

Color Usage: For my contents page, I would like to use the same colours as on the cover, to carry a scheme through the magazine, and to make it look more professional. I would like to use mostly dark colours, with a few bright colours that will stand out and attract attention. I would like my title to be red, with a yellow/gold outline, to make it really stand out. I'm thinking about using a brick wall as the background for my contents page, as this will make the magazine feel more joined together and will be smoother in transition. I would like there to be a red outline around the outside of the images and the text boxes, because this will make the images and especially the text to stand out against the brick background.

Text Usage: I would like the text to be black, and on a red background. This will make it look really striking, however I am slightly worried about how readable this will be. I will need to test what it looks like printed before the final edit. I will have text about my double page spread on 'The Streets', and how they are effecting young people. I would like this to be the main article in the contents but i would like there to be other non essential articles on the contents page, visually to fill the page and make it look good, but practically, who ever heard of a contents page with only one article on it?

Image Usage: I plan to use three images on my contents page (not including the background). One/Two for my double page spread article and one for each of my space saving made up articles. I will take all of the photographs myself, and I will use Either my camera or the camera on my phone to take the pictures.

The Simpsons Poster

This is another practice piece I did on photoshop, this time surrounding The Simpsons Movie. This was  a big help for me, as almost every picture had to be cut out and placed into the project. We had to put the date that the movie came out, and also required at least one Simpsons member to be on the cover.

Pictures for my magazine

The above photographs are the ones I have chosen to use in my magazine (there is one more to add to this list, but the picture was too big to add to blogger). I used these pictures because they fitted into what I planned for my magazine. For example, the mid-shot is the one I will use for the cover, and the Picture of the dark street is perfect for my contents page. All of my pictures are of high quality as I used my SLR camera to take them. Even the Blank picture of the wall is going to be used, as I will be able to use it as a background for my contents page.

Possible colour scheme

Possible fonts....

I think these fonts are very nice and all match the genre i'm going for in their own way.

Potential Problems with my coursework

Potential Problems with My Coursework

Potential area where there might be a problem	How I will deal with this problem
Front cover images	Getting together with the model, sorting out times. Finding a good place to take the picture, which suited both the model’s needs and mine. Getting images exactly in exactly the right frame, to get the model in from the waist up (mid shot)
Article Inside Magazine	Writing the article and trying to write it through the artist’s eyes. Deciding on a title that would fit the rest of the article. Using a header that fits the article.
Images to accompany article	The article inside the magazine is basically a lot of work for what you get out, I took a lot more photographs than I actually needed. Choosing the pictures used for the actual magazine, as I wanted to make sure it was the right picture.

PROPOSAL TABLE

AS Coursework Proposal Table

Type of Magazine (fashion, music, etc)	Music, Mostly Rap magazine with elements of other genres
Name of Magazine	R.E.P
Audience (male/female)	The Audience is mostly male. The Age range I have for my magazine is from 16 to around 23.
Audience (attitudes and interests)	Rap music, people who like to make their own music, people who generally like music.
Outlet (where it can be bought from?)	Most magazine shops and supermarkets, and you can subscribe to the magazine.
Necessary Information	Date: 25th November 2013 Random issue number (Unimportant) Barcode Price £2.00
Selling Point	The cover artist, the striking article, and the competition to win concert tickets.
Theme (article)	The streets, what life is like on the streets, if life for young people is changing, and how this is affecting music.
Images Front Cover	Mid shot of artist, maybe a picture to represent the competition inside
Images Inside	There will be images of streets, at night and during the day, along with a smaller picture of the cover to use for a subscription advertisement. There will also be a few made up articles and pictures to go with them on the contents page.

Preliminary Task Review

This is my completed preliminary task,and to be honest I don't like it very much!  However I did what I did for a reason, so lets's go through it. For the cover, I chose the dark blue background because It make the red and white text stand out really well. That, along with the red sections of text, are the favourite things about my magazine. I think the Barcode is a little to big, and I used the white writing to stand out, which I think looks about average. The reason for the poor quality cutting around the outside of the picture is purely because when making the task I was new to photoshop, however I have learned from this and feel I can carry what I have learned into the main task.

Institutional Research

I have been doing some institutional research on the magazine industry, to try and work out how they operate. Here is a list of some of the top companies and the magazines they produce. 

From this i've learned that companies don't like to put all their eggs in one basket. What I mean by this is that all of the big companies have lots of different genres of magazine going at the same time, this will make sure that the company will always have a magazine that is relevant and popular in culture. Having looked at each of the companies, the one that would be most likely to produce my magazine would be Bauer Media Group. I've chosen them because they have experience in music magazines with front runners such as Kerrang! and Q, however they don't have any hip/hop magazines on their books which is where I think my magazine could fit in.

Weather Problems!

I was going to do a photoshoot outside, but the weather is trying it's best to stop me!

The weather isn't actually to much of a problem because rainy days look very authentic as to what the British weather does. It also fits the gritty and dark theme i'm going for. If is was to be raining hard enough to stop shooting, then it's not much of a problem. This is because i'm not shooting in a studio, meaning I can take new pictures whenever I like, proving that my model is available at the same time.

Artists for my magazine...

Here are some of the artists I may use in my magazine....


J.Cole - Power Trip 


Kendrick Lamar - Swimming Pools


Apollo Brown & OC - Prove Me Wrong



The Genre is rap/ R'n'B, because A, it is a genre I like and B, it is a genre that I know a lot of other people like too.

Front cover plan

The Front Cover:

Colour Usage: For my front cover, I would like to use mostly dark colours, with a few bright colours that will stand out and attract attention. I would like my title to be red, with a yellow/gold outline, to make it really stand out. I may use this on all the text on the front page, but i am not sure yet. I would like to use a brick wall for  background to make the magazine look more natural. It also goes with my urban theme.

Text Usage: With my text I want to tell the reader what the magazine is about, at a glance, so it needs to be big, bold and eye-catching. Perhaps an interview with a current top artist. This will give the magazine credibility straight away. I would like the sell line to be linked with the main image so i can have an explanation for the main image in plain sight. The main heading will point to the main article inside, (preferably the double page spread)  

Image Usage: I only plan to use one image on my front cover, the main image. I hate magazines that have to many images on the cover. It looks tacky, overworked and most of all it just doesn't look right. That is why I would like one massive image, that represents what the magazine is about. I have a few ideas for what the image might look like, but i would like to take a few different shots, and choose from there.

Jarvis Cocker

This is a practice magazine cover I Made, with Jarvis Cocker being the model. We had to find our own picture of  Jarvis, and I think I did quite a good job on that front, in being able to find a good mid-shot where he is doing a interesting thing with his hands, which would draw attention to the magazine. The main reason I am doing this is to get practice on photoshop with cutting out pictures and using the text. Now, I think I have nailed the cutting here, but I have to admit the text could be better! It all helps towards the final thing though!

NME contents

I like the way that the massive tagline dominates the page because it really shows you that the magazine means business is very professional and good at what it does. It also shows great confidence from the publishers to have the name of the magazine all over the place because it shows the company know they have a good product. This isn't something i'd do however because my magazine isn't an established brand, it would be risky and perhaps silly to replicate this. I'm also not keen on the layout. I really don't like the way that there is a bar on the left in tiny little writing that makes the page look messy and crowded. I'd like my magazine to look quite open in layout, meaning that i'd like to have at lest some space left on the page, so that it looks like we've thought about where each thing should go instead of throwing it on the page.

Jay Z cover

This shows the genre of music people like.

Honestly this worried me a little, because I was planning on doing a hip/hop and R'n'B magazine, and this chart points to most people listening to Rock and Pop, with only a couple of people saying they like R'n'B and none saying they like rap. However, this has just given me more determination to make a magazine that is something unique and is something that appeals to the few that enjoy genre, such as myself.

This is a pie chart showing how much people are willing to spent on a magazine. Most people would be willing to spend between £2.00 and £2.99 for a magazine, which I think is quite reasonable if not a little cheap. I'm not sure what price to sell my magazine at exactly but around £2.50 is probably a good price for now. This would means that it's quite cheap for a magazine these days, meaning that my teen target audience should have enough money to be able to afford it.

Target Audiance Feedback

Here are some questions i asked to some of my target audiance, as a way of getting feedback and a way of helping me design my magazine.

Mood Board

This is the mood board I created when I first entered AS Media.
It contains pictures of some of the artists and styles I could use in my own magazine.
It contains most of the artists I would consider using to write an article about if I were a real writer and also lists artists I could use when adding things to the contents page. It has also given me a few ideas as to how I could structure my magazine, in terms of picture placement and font styles.

'Q' Contents Analysis

This is a contents page from 'Q' magazine, that I found online. I was drawn immediately to the big red bar at the top. This makes the page stand out, and also makes the page look important. There is no real main picture on the, page, however there is  more of a cluster of smaller images, making it look like there is a lot of content in the magazine, while still looking quite tidy, with the images being on the right, and text on the left. There is a very tidy colour scheme, that runs through the whole magazine, making it look very tidy. It shows all of the biggest interviews, and features in the magazine, showing that the magazine caters to it's target audience. The red is something i'm certainly looking to use in my work because depending on how you use it, it has so many different connotations. In things like blood as we saw on a previous cover it signifies violence and anger however in something like a fashion magazine or even in a film red can show class and wealth. If you wanted it too it could even mean love however this wouldn't fit into the theme of my magazine. I'd also like to have man smaller images on my contents page as opposed to one large one. The bigger articles could have a slightly bigger picture, however I feel that if the reader is not interested in the main article they may turn of on the magazine altogether if I make the picture too big. I hope to find a happy medium.

Analysed :)

There are some things in this that I would like to use in my magazine. One particular thing is the swagger that Usher has. He looks like it took him two minutes to get ready but his outfit is great. It's that kind of 'I look good wherever and whenever' mentality that I really want to capture. Honestly I don't like that mentality myself but that is one of the conventions of the hip hop genre and it will appeal to the my target audience. However there are a couple of things I don't want to use also. I don't want to have any props such as the bag in this picture. The bag implies that he's just robbed a bank. If Usher is as rich as he seems he shouldn't need to go about robbing banks. I get that it makes him look tough and like he doesn't care but to be honest his clothes are enough to show this. I would like to rely on these things for my magazine. I'm not sure i'd use many things from this contents page because it's just not the style i'm going for. However if i can do one thing i'd like to replicate the presence that Usher has. If I can get my model to dominate the page like he does I'll be very happy.

Covers and Annotations!!

This cover is both conventional and unconventional at the same time, mixing things that are both common and irregular in the hip/hop genre. Firstly it looks very clean and cynical, quite professional as well. I like this because it shows that there is a different side to the artist that you may not see in his music videos. This gives connotations of money and power, it looks lil he's "The Boss"and that he has money to waste.However it's not something i'd use in my work because i'm looking for a much more gritty and grimy aesthetic, meaning that i'd have to use much more muddy and dark tones to make it feel like something that's been made for the people.

This cover is totally different and is more conceptual than the first. Using very clever camerawork and possibly editing a blood-like effect has been created. It looks like blood has been splashed across the artist's chest and across the wall behind him. This gives connotations of violence and possibly even madness, however because the blood is in straight (ish) lines across the screen you get the feeling that this madness or violence is controlled and is more of a statement of intent and warning than any actually harm done. The shot is also low angle, which gives him a towering presence, however his expressions is one of disapproval more than anger. This man feels like he is better than you and he has the power to put you in your place. In my own work I plan on using a low angle shot at some point as this will make my model seem more believable and powerful, however I don't want to use any effects such as blood because I don't want to make it seem like the magazine is for thugs and people who like violence. It's for people who like music so that is what I want to portray.

The Beginning...

In the beginning... there was media.

For our AS Media coursework, we have been set the task of creating out own music magazine.
We will need to create: A front cover, a con-tens page, and a double page spread. I will have to use all original pictures, words, and headers to make sure that it is not only all my work, but to keep within copy write laws. I am still thinking about which genre i would like to do...