Evaluation

See prompt question on tracking sheet.

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

Before and during the time that I was making my magazine, I looked at a lot of other, professional, magazines for inspiration. I looked carefully at the layouts and fonts that the professionals use, and tried to replicate those in my own, but with my own personal touch as well.

For inspiration, I looked at well known professional magazines, such as ‘Kerrang’, ‘Vibe’, ‘Classic Rock’, ‘NME’, and ‘Q’, and the styles of the professional magazines, that I looked at for inspiration, is reflected in my own layout.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

My music magazine represents the “rocker” social group. The genre of my magazine is “’rock’ and ‘heavy metal’”, and the overall mood of my magazine is quite dark, and gloomy as the colour palette predominantly consists of blacks and greys. On top of this, I have created a semantic field for “rock” with the use of guitars in my images.

After asking a large number of people, I have reached a conclusion that my music magazine represents this social group due to its themes of “destruction”, “anger”, “pain”, “sorrow”, and the graveyard-type feel. The central image resembles a tombstone due to the emotionless expression on the face of the model in the central image, the smoke effects that I added around the page, and the gothic styled font of the text which is positioned centrally underneath the central image. The model in the central image has also been considered to look ‘sinister’.

What’s more is that the colour palette, being predominantly dark, appeals to this social group as the colouring of the page generally matches the colours that they wear.

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

There are a couple of media institutions that might be interested in distributing my music magazine, such as Bauer Media, and Future Media.

On the one hand, Bauer Media might be interested as the media that they currently distribute is similar to that of my media product. Bauer Media distribute music magazines of similar genres to mine, for example one of the most popular “rock” magazines in current distribution, ‘Kerrang’. ‘Kerrang’ is a very popular “rock” magazine, first published on June 6 1981, and has been dedicated to the music genres of “rock”, “metal”, and all of their variants.

Similarly, Future Media might be interested in distributing my magazine due to its genre, as the genres of magazines currently in distribution by Future Media are similar to the genre of my magazine. The main examples of Future Media’s similar magazines are ‘Metal Hammer’ and ‘Classic Rock’ – these two magazines appeal to the same social group(s) that my magazine does. More than half of the people I showed my magazine to read ‘Metal Hammer’.

In conclusion, I there is a stronger possibility of Future Media being interested in distributing my music magazine as the similar magazines that they currently publish pertain to the same genres. Whereas, Bauer Media’s ‘Kerrang’ magazine tends to feature the most popular variant of “rock” and/or “metal” at the time of each issue’s release, and the magazine has actually been criticised for this.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The audience for my music magazine would be young adults (18-31-year-olds). This is because the genre, “’rock’ and ‘heavy metal’”, of my magazine is generally favoured by young adults. This is primarily due to the “emo” culture which is popular amongst the youths of today.

How did you attract/address your audience?

I attracted my audience with my use of bold fonts, and a bright masthead which stands out easily. Furthermore, I attracted my audience with the central image. The central image of the Chaos Rising lead singer and guitarist, Justin Hart, is an extreme close-up of him staring at the camera. I colour corrected his left eye (the only eye visible) to be a vibrant, glowing green. This entices readers as they notice the eye following them as they walk past the magazine.

In my featured article, I address my audience with an informative tone which resembles that of a news reporter’s tone when giving news. In terms of the graphic design on my double page spread, I used a powerful and commanding image, with the model standing tall, which is further emphasized by the low angle shot, pointing to the off-camera crowd.

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

From the process of constructing my music magazine, I have developed a better understanding of the Adobe suite and its tools and plug-ins.

Throughout the construction process of my magazine, I was constantly learning new techniques for different tools within the Adobe suite, primarily Photoshop. I leant how to improve the quality of my images with the use of the ‘curves’, ‘un-sharp mask’, and ‘hue/saturation’ features. I was able to make good use of this knowledge by using the technique on my images, which made them “stand out” more, and look more professional.

Also, I have learnt how to remove a certain colour from my images via the ‘remove colour’ featured – this helped with removing the backgrounds from photographs taken in front of a green screen.

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

I have learnt how to design interesting, professional, and appropriate magazine layouts since doing the preliminary task, as is evident when one compares the design of the school magazine designs, which I did for the preliminary task, with the design of my music magazine. Not only this, but I have learnt how to maintain the same colour scheme better than I knew before.

I have also learnt how to enhance the quality of images, i.e. photographs. This proved useful when I was editing the photographs that I had taken for my music magazine as I was able to make them “stand out” more and look more professional.

Furthermore, I have learnt how to create more specialised masthead designs for magazines to make them “stand out” better when on shelves or unorganised piles of magazines. By making the masthead for my magazine big and bold with a bright, hazy orange outer glow (custom outer glow, not ‘FX’ tool), I created a stylish masthead which “stands out” quite well.

I have also developed a very good knowledge of the Adobe suite and its tools. I now feel very, very confident about making magazines; I actually had to make a gaming magazine for my I.T. course, and I found the task an awful lot easier than I would have had I not learnt about magazine design in Media Studies.

Overall, I have learnt a lot of useful things since the preliminary task, and I feel very confident about designing original magazine layouts.