Evaluation Task 7:

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

I think it's quite clear that since my first preliminary task, my school magazine, that i've come a long way. To begin with, i've developed my photoshop skills a lot since I first used it. From looking at my preliminary, it's clear that my skills were very basic, with the only real editing skills being cutting on the model from the background which I haven't done well if you look at the hair of the model. The fonts I used were pretty awful, and plain with no real classy finishing touch. With my new front cover, I believe my photoshop skills significantly improved, this came as the more I used the software. I learnt how to add effects on to fonts, pictures and shapes which really helped me create a professional look. I believe that my photo looks a lot more professional and a lot less 'cheesy' compared to my preliminary cover. The fonts I used were inspired by clothing brands such as Supreme and alkr. I felt that they gave a simplistic look, that was clear, bold and stood out very well. I did however use another font for my featured artists, I did this to keep it slightly mixed up, but still keeping the professional look. I was a lot more aware of what I needed to include on my front cover, as I have become a lot more familiar with current music magazines, and I also looked into what my target audience would be interested in hearing about in a music magazine. The content on the preliminary front cover is of a poor standard as I didn't have any good thoughts of what too put on as I wasn't over familiar with music magazine conventions, I also hadn't done any research at the time in to what my target audience wanted out of a music magazine.

In my preliminary, I did however keep the conventions of having a large image of an artist and also, to have a barcode on the front cover. My colour scheme was blue white and black, as at the time I felt this would be the best look for my magazine, however if you look at my final front cover, it's clear I used a four colour palette this consisting of White, Blue, Red & Black. I feel that the colours on my front cover now look a lot more professional, and I was pleased with the outcome I got from them. My final front cover also follows all the current conventions of a music magazine, the the masthead, issue number, date, and price. Also it has the barcode and a large image of the main featured artist.

I believe that my contents page also vastly improved, once again my colour scheme changed a lot, once again, my new found photoshop skills were shown, in huge contrast to my very poor photoshopping of my preliminary contents page. The fonts on my preliminary contents were awful, looking very unprofessional with all one font, however with my final contents page, I used three different fonts, all giving a professional look compared to my preliminary. I decided to have one main picture and then just one little one. I feel this made the page look much more professional compared to having several little pictures just at the side. Having just one main large image, it draws attention to it, and what the picture is relating too, in terms of what article it's linked with, which is obviously my featured artist. For this contents page, I had a lot better content, I had the features of the magazine that week, I also had a 'Reviews' section and a 'What's On?' section. This demonstrates that I have now done a lot of research into why my target audience wants to read about.

Evaluation Task 6

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

As you can see from the above picture, I used several pieces of technology for my Media coursework.

Evaluation Task 5

How did you attract/address your audience?

I attracted my target audience in lots of different ways, some subtle, and some not so. 

My target audience, as i've already spoken about, are into mainly Indie music, however enjoy other genres of alternative, electro, folk, and even some rock. This was really thought about for deciding who to use for my front cover.

It was a must for me that I used models that gave the look that I wanted to give to my readers. I chose my models, and what they were to wear, in an attempt to relate to the readers. The clothes they are wearing are fashionable items of clothing, and are sought after among my target audience. Obviously, my front cover has just three lads on, so the female audience may not want these clothes, however, there are other things such as the inclusion of artists names such as Caitlin Rose, in an attempt to give the females an inspirational role model. 

My target audience want to be reading about the newest and freshest bands on the scene, therefore under the band name featuring on my front cover, I put a little line 'we speak to the most talked about band of 2011'. This would if got their attention instantly, as if they don't know who this band, they will want to find out who they are and what music they make. If they do know about the band, which my target audience will more than likely do, they will want to read what exactly other people think of them, and to read my article on them in Cassette.

The bands that I had 'featuring' on my front cover was also key. I chose bands and artists varying in genres, this was key as then, if my audience didn't like my main featured band, there would be lots of other big names, such as Friendly Fires, that they do like, and therefore, the magazine will still appeal to them, as they are featured. I had varying genres because then, you might just get one reader who's only interested in Alternative music, so they might see Jack Penate's name, and instantly think, right I need to buy this magazine to see what they are saying about him. I also included things such as competitions on my front cover, as my target audience are predominantly students, therefore they have very little income, and if they can get anything for free, then that's just a bonus. Finally, I dropped the name 'Glastonbury' in there. This will instantly get thousands of people pondering over the magazine, as they want to find out whatever it is that Cassette have to say about this year's festival.

Here, I captured my audience's attention with many other things. I had my features, with little one or two sentences saying what exactly the articles about, this would of drawn certain people's attention, as they might want to know what goes on in the article. I also added a Reviews section to my contents, and underneath listed all of the bands that Cassette had done reviews on this week. This would of attracted my TA, as they want to know what's actually good, and want to read reviews on upcoming music that's yet to be released. Furthermore, I put in a 'What's On?' section. This was a vital part of my contents in order to attract my TA. This is because, my target audience are regular gig goers, and they want to know exactly what's going on this week and where it's happening, and having it all in my magazine, makes it very useful too them, as they don't have to spend hours trolling through websites to see who's on, on what day, at what venue, and at what time. 

My DPS also grabs the attention of my TA. The title of 'who exactly are the antidoes' this would make my audience want to read the article, as obviously it's going to be explaining who they are, what they've done etc. The picture is a picture of the band, in front a brick wall, this would appeal to my audience, as it's showing that the band aren't massively big in the industry, and they still are on the streets as a bunch of lads. This would appeal more to the male audience, as they could look up to the band as role models.

Evaluation Task 4:

Who would be the audience for your media product?

After having a good think about who I want my magazine to be aimed at I came up with the following;

My magazine would generally be aimed at people ranging from around 15 right through to the age of about 26, they will be both male and female. I think that this is a good catchment area and they will, at this age, all generally be looking for the same kind of thing from a music magazine. My 'general' reader would be, either male or female, fall within the age range of 15-26 and be 'well' into their music. They want to know who's in, who's out, what the latest bands are, reviews on upcoming albums, lists of gigs happening around them, they want interviews with their favourite bands and also, one of the big points, they want it weekly, and they want it at around £1.49 - £2.49 per edition. Generally, the male side of the audience would be watching films that are Comedy, e.g. Shaun Of The Dead however they would obviously like action films for example James Bond, and also films such as The Godfather. The female audience would be watching films such as Love Actually, Anchorman and also Step Brothers.  I would say that generally the male audience would be shopping at places such as urbanindustry, wellgosh and karmaloop, however on the other hand I would still include shops such as Zara and H&M. For the female audience I would say that they would shop at places such as Topshop, River Island, Zara & Urban Outfitters. I believe that they would be looking pretty similar to the people that I have shown above, these are members of bands that I would want to be associated with my music magazine, Two Door Cinema Club, Bombay Bicycle and, below, Orlando Weeks, the lead singer from The Maccabees.

Another Example Of How I Would

Expect The Male Audience To Dress

Therefore, this is what I will aim to give them. My audience will be both boys and girls, ensuring I get everyone's interests accomodated for. The magazine will be for the people at school who are into their music, want to know find out more about things they don't know anything about, and also people who attend gigs often, and want to find out info' that they can't find anywhere else - fan's questions answered by their favourite bands.

An example of my audience would be;

Evaluation Task 3:

After having a look around at the different magazine publishers, I would hope that IPC Media would be the publisher of my music magazine. I came to this conclusion, by looking around at which company publishes which magazine. Seen as my magazine will have a heavy similarity to the music magazine, NME, I believe it would be a good idea to team up with the same publisher as NME's. The hope with this is that it will be very similar to NME and have that feel and look about it, however I would aim to slightly 'pip' NME on the sales and hopefully my audience will go for my magazine when they see the two on the shelves. 

According to IPC Media themselves, they produce over 60 iconic media brands, with print alone reaching almost two thirds of UK women and 42% of UK men – almost 26 million UK adults – with their websites collectively reaching over 14 million users every month. 'The company is very successful and manages to sell over 350 million copies of their magazines each year.' 
When thinking about what advertisements I would want to include in my magazine I would believe I would keep things simple, and follow many current conventions. By this I mean that I would have advertisements at the back of the magazine, for upcoming tours and one off gigs for bands, official band merchandise.
I believe that within the magazine, I would have things more classy, with just one company having a certain page totally for themselves. I would have a clothing company, or even a shop name such as Urban Industry, a shop that offers boys and girls cloths and accessories, so that things would appeal to all of my audience. I would also hope to have maybe a brand offering both male and female aftershave/perfume however I would be aware that I wouldn't exactly have brands such as Lacoste instantly wanting to advertise in my new and upcoming magazine, as they want to know that their money would be well spent and getting a lot of instant views by the readers. Furthermore, there would be a limitation with the fact that my magazine is targeting a younger audience who maybe wouldn't have so much money to be just going around and buying expensive bottles of aftershave/perfume. To overcome this issue I could have brands such as V05 advertising a hair grooming product, for both males and females. This is a product that is a lot more likely to be bought and used by my particular target audience as it is cheap and easily accessible to all, and most of all, a product that is used a lot by the younger side of the population.

I'm hoping that with my magazine being published by a leading, well know & respected company that it will only further aid it's sale and it will immediately give the magazine a bit of publicity.

Evaluation Task 2:

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

From first glance of my magazine, it's quite apparent to see that it's aimed at a fairly young audience, roughly of 15-26 years of age, it looks fairly 'boyish', however you can see that it could also appeal to certain girls with that kind of music taste. 

The stance of my cover artist, is one of high profile, yet still with a slight naivety about them. This once again relates to all of my target audience, as a girl would like to see lads, of a similar age on the front cover, and a lad wouldn't particularly want to see a 'girly' girl wearing pink with white ribbons in her hair on the front cover, they'd want an inspirational icon to be looking up to as a role model, in terms of appearance, personality, musical taste etc. 

My colour scheme, which was changed at the last minute, [explained in another post] was Red, White & Blue. This in the end showed Britishness to the cover band. The red was the main colour for my magazine, red relates to elements of danger, which could be due to being rebellious, and the audience may see that, and think that's what I want to be like as a young adult/teenager. Red also relates to rock, however the white and blue, tone the red down, and maybe hint at a more subtle version of rock, indie. I believe that the colours worked well, as it showed not only the masculine side to the magazine, but the red could also have connotations of love and this would generally entice also the female audience. 

The content of my media product also was used to represent particular social groups. My content included Reviews of new releases, keeping the youth of today well informed of what's the newest thing out there and also if it's actually anygood. Further content included Festival news, which is something that my target audience, 15-26 would be very interested in, as it's more than likely that festivals are something that they would want to be getting into as young adults. My magazine also provided information on 'what's on' in terms of gigs, this is also something that the younger audience would be extremely interested in, due to them often going to gigs around the country.

There's obviously some similarities and differences between current artist, Bombay Bicycle Club [left], and my band, The Antidotes [right]. The age straight away is similar, and both bands would have the same audience in that way. I would say that my band are dressed slightly more in a mature way, looking clean and tidy, this gives the feel that they know exactly what they're doing, what their aims are etc as everything is bold and clear. I would say that both bands show naivety within their poses, I chose Dan, the lad furthest on the left of my band, to be the young, naive looking member, and I think once again with Bombay Bicycle Club, the lad furthest on the left with his hood up looks as if he's just taken back by all of this big attention, and is slightly naive to everything. I also paid a lot of attention to detail, even in terms of hair cuts with my band. I wanted one of them to have a striking 'out there' look, with Pat, the furthest on the right of my band having this look for my pictures. I had someone in a hat, Dan, to once again show that they weren't entirely confident or sure about themselves, and perhaps liked to stay away from the media hype, and just cover up. Finally, I wanted one of my members to have the rough, ready look. Miles pulled this off well I believe, as he was portrayed as being the lead singer in my band, The Antidotes, and he gave the impression that he was all about the music, and wasn't bothered about how is hair looked etc.

Evaluation Task 1

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

Above, my final front cover of my music magazine, and also, a current version of 'Indie' magazine; NME. When I compare the two, there's obviously some similarities, however in places I have also challenged the conventions that NME use. My main masthead is challenging NME's current conventions, as mine goes nearly all the way across the top of the page, where as NME's is just in the top left hand corner of the page, and they have just a three letter name: NME, standing for New Musical Express. My name however, Cassette, is one that has a meaning itself, I chose this name, as Cassette's are something that were used for years and are now seen as being 'retro'. I thought about the 80's and what they had and brought musically. I then came up with the name 'Cassette' as Cassette's were used a lot from the 70's right through until the late 80's. I believe that this name is catchy, and as it's only a short word that hopefully people will remember. 

My page layout is similar to NME's, I have the The Antidotes, at the bottom of the page, like The Vaccines on NME's. I also have a little line underneath, talking about the band featuring on the front page. I challenge the regular conventions in the way that I have a bar across the bottom of the page, listing band names featuring in the magazine. You do sometimes see the bars at the bottom, however, I haven't put mine right at the bottom, I have it slightly further up, which I believe works very well and makes the bar more eye catching. I have also challenged the regular conventions of having the barcode in the bottom third, in either the left or right hand corner, I have however put it into the top right hand corner, this was keeping it out of the way and not drawing any attention to it. I have stuck to the convention of having my issue number, date and price underneath the masthead of the magazine, as I believe this looks better than having it anywhere else. My main image is also going along with current music magazine conventions, as it takes up the whole front cover, with them being the focus point. I have however challenged the conventions of having other pictures on the front cover. I felt that without other pictures, it would only draw more attention to the starring band. A convention that I felt that I had to stick with, was to have names of other things included in the magazine at either side of my magazine. This helps to get other people interested, if maybe they don't like the main starring band. 

I believe that straight away from looking at my magazine, you can tell what genre of music my band are; Indie. You wouldn't really get any, for example, Rap artists dressing in these sorts of clothes, and wearing them in this way. I believe that the expressions that my band are pulling really shows an Indie band, naive yet still arrogant. 

The camera angle I used for my front cover was to have my band looking slightly down at the camera. This shows the fact that they do feel that they are above everyone else, and they know they are good. However, I didn't want it to be a too obvious convention, as I wouldn't want people to not pick the magazine up and not want to buy it, just because they felt the front cover stars look to arrogant etc.

The colour scheme of my magazine was Red, Blue, White & Black. Usually music magazines have a 3 colour palette, however I feel that the 4 colour palette works well, therefore chose to use it. All of my fonts are bold, and are in appropriate colours to what colour background they are on, they therefore stand out very well, and are all very readable. Nothing clashes on my front page, everything fits nicely. My music magazine does have a similar colour palette to NME magazine, however I've challenged the 3 colour palette, and also i've gone for richer blues and reds.

Double Page Spread Final

Contents Final

Front Cover - Final

final shots...

These were the pick of the bunch of my final shots.

As you will notice, I have swapped one of my models. This is because after a lot of feedback and discussions I discovered that a lot of people believed that my models looked to young. Therefore I swapped one of them, and had them dress in more mature clothing, I now believe they look the age that they are supposed to be.

I used this picture on my front cover. I feel that it's a really good picture, with the facial expressions I wanted. On the left I have Dan, who is looking away into the distance, I did this to try and give the idea the band were looking to be going further in the future. Miles & Pat are looking directly into the camera. Miles has an expression on his face as if to say he doesn't really care, and isn't scared what people think of him, this arrogance was a key emotion for me, and I really wanted to include it in my pictures. Pat, finally, has a serious more stern face. It shows that also the band are wanting to be taken seriously, despite being young, they want to go places and have every intention of being the big starts they're tipped to be by the media.

I used this shot on my double page spread. It's very similar to my front cover, however on a different background. I wanted a brick background on at least one of my pictures, I feel that it gives the band a more 'street-wise' look, and shows that they are still young lads, and they're raw talent, almost torn between their childhood background on the streets, and their new found fame.

I kept the facial expressions the same as on my front cover, as I liked the way it looked, and also the connotations that could be made with the facial expressions. With this one however, I had Dan looking directly at the camera, I decided to do this as now that the reader has chosen to buy the magazine, they will want to feel as if they're getting to know the band more, and with having Dan looking directly at the camera, for the audience it's as if they're looking directly at them.

This picture is used on my contents. To be honest, i'd seen a very similar picture, that i'd used on my mock-ups, however by an actual band. I really liked the way the picture looked and decided immediately that I wanted one of my pictures to be similar. I drew inspiration from the picture, and then slightly rearranged it with my models, to be more fitting for my band. I think it works well, and i'm very pleased with the way it's worked.

This was the final picture I decided to use. Despite it being a long shot, I still decided to use it. I feel that it works really well with the sunset in the background, I also really like the countryside in the background, it shows that they are standing out from everything else, and I almost get the feeling that the sun is shining on them, showing that they really are a special band and that there's great things to come.

The rest of these pictures were also ones that were taken for my final shots, however I didn't choose to use them because I felt I have picked out the best pictures for what I want.

update

i've done a lot of work on my coursework today. i've been rearranging a lot of my pieces of work on photoshop, and i've also added my new final shots to my work.

It's taken a lot of time to do the little things on photoshop CS5 to get it exactly how I want it, with a lot of fiddling about. In particular, i've found that rearranging the DPS columns, making the font bigger etc has been the hardest, as i've had to me moving text around into various columns to ensure that the article still flows well and correctly. I also did have to delete some of my questions and answers in my article, as it simply wouldn't fit on when I made the font a read-able size. I was slightly disappointed at this, as I wanted all of my article on there as I felt it gave a really good insight into the band.

I feel that asking for other's opinions on my work has helped me vastly improve it. This is because i've asked people who would fall at all parts of my target audience. They've helped me make decisions, based on what I like, and then what also, they as the buyer and reader would like to see.

This helped me a lot with my front cover, as I have done an awful lot of rearranging to try and make it look as good as I possibly can.

Models

I've recently decided i'm going to change my music magazine models for the front cover and double page spread. I got some feedback that my models look slightly to young. I had the chance to use a few members of staff that I know, to try and give my magazine, a more sophisticated look, at possibly it could increase my target audience to beyond 26. 

I've decided however to just replace one of my band members in an attempt to try and keep the 'young and new' look for my magazine, however with my new model, he does look older than my a previous band member I had. 

Hopefully this will work how I want it too, attracting my target audience, and I believe if I keep to using my young models, it will be easier to style them, as they'll most likely already have the fashion sense I will need for my magazine. 

Update

i've been making some changes again to my contents page recently. Taking on board everything i've been advised, i've removed a few pictures, made some of the fonts bigger and stronger. I have also now made a third column on my page, which I feel gives it a more professional look.