AS Media Studies

My music magazine Cross-Fade challenges and develops forms and conventions of real life media because it is a Dance and DJ genre magazine but the use of colour and costume suggests that the magazine may belong to a rock or indie genre like NME or Kerrang!. I analysed in detail three front covers of existing music magazines which were mixmag, Kerrang! and NME to establish and gain knowledge of conventions in music magazine to give me a greater understanding of what I would use for my own. For my own front cover I followed the forms and conventions of real life media products by giving my music magazine a big bold masthead that stands out clearly from the rest of the magazine as this is what is going to catch the readers eye first following by the image. I wanted to include a free mix CD in my magazine as this would entice my target audience to want to buy it even more. I place the text promoting the free CD in the top right hand corner this is called and EAR in media language. When I got feedback from other people on my music magazines front cover I asked them what genre would you say Cross-Fade is and when I typed my results up in a graph 9 people out of the 15 I asked got it correct and the other 6 thought different genres such as rock, hip hop and indie. For the people that didn’t get the genre right I asked them why did they think it wasn’t dance and they all said it was the use of black and red making it look like it belonged to a different music genre such as NME. Cross-Fade is commercial to make money. It is horizontally integrated within IPC media. IPC media saw a gap in the marked for Cross-fade to make money from young people and dance music.

I also researched three contents pages of existing magazines to establish how a contents page is set up and what sort of things are seen in them such as an editors letter, images and text promoting things in the magazine. The three contents pages I researched were also mixmag, NME and Kerrang! I discovered that each genre of magazine had a different way of setting out there contents pages. For example mixmag’s contents page I thought looked very colourful and the image was very funky and artistic, the image would catch someone eye. The layout of text was very plain and simple to read. I liked the idea of mixmag’s contents page and took some of there ideas and adapted them for my contents page. I included three images on my contents page so it didn’t look plain and dull only including text. It has 10 main features spread out onto a number of pages and has 25 pages in it. I think that 25 pages is average for the price of £2.10, I think that my target audience of young people would pay that much for what it includes.

I used the same model on my front cover to be on my double page spread he is the main feature in the magazine. I had one picture of my model taking up half of the page and included a pull quote which is a convention of a double page spread. The background and colour scheme matches my genre as it is very abstract and the use of lots of colours represents dance music. I did three different double page spreads drafts because I couldn’t decide which front looked more effective. I decided to go with the original one of black and blue because I think it goes with the background.

My music magazine focuses on particular social groups such as young people interested in new upcoming artists trying to make it big. The magazine promotes new artists and the main image and feature in the magazine is a new artist trying to get more well known. My magazine also promotes a weekly competition to try and win tickets to see a well known band, this is beneficial to particular social groups like young people as they don’t have spend loads of money to go to a good gig. I wanted my model to wear stylish, fashionable cloths because young people like nice cloths and hair, it also promotes the clothing line G-Star as this is written on my model t-shirt.The artist is represented as a fashionable young person this represents the social group of teenagers.

The main target audience for my magazine is young people aged between 16- 26 this is because young people are more interested in new music and the music I am promoting though my music magazine. Because my magazine promotes so many good offers like a free CD and competitions each week young people are more likely to buy it. The target audience is for both genders as it doesn’t just promote things that men will like, the music that is being promoted anyone can listen to and like.

I have tried to attract my audience through the front cover as this is the first thing they will be looking at. The contrast of colours by using a black, grey and white jagged background this contrasts with the cover lines, sell line and mast head. The red and blue works very well as they are both very powerful colours. The red glow around my main image makes it stand out more and gives it dominance. The name cross-fade is a type of equipment DJ’s use so people that like that type of music genre will instantly know what the magazine will be about. The mast head is in big bold jagged writing which will catch the audience eye. I think that the bands that I have mentioned in my magazines front cover are well known bands/people which will attract/appeal the audience to buy it.

In making my music magazine I have learnt a number of new skills. I have learnt how to use Photoshop successfully in doing so I have learnt how to edit pictures professional changing the gradient and contrast of the colours. I also have learnt how give my pictures and text special effects like an outer glow making the pictures appear more professional. I have also learnt how to use blogger were we have posted blogs about our music and college magazine. I used Microsoft publisher for my double page spread as it would be more suitable then using Photoshop as the double page spread is mainly text. I edited all my images in Photoshop and were happy with the outcome that I got.

From my preliminary task I have learnt how to use Photoshop more easily and effectively. I now know how to make images bigger and smaller and edit the look my images like giving it an outer glow and changing the colour brightness. I have also learnt conventions of real media products, in my college magazine I didn’t concentrate on what the text font was or were I placed it. The text colours do not stand out enough as everything is the same colours. It isn’t eye catching and is very simple and plain. Now in my music magazine I concentrated more on how it looked and how well it suited the genre. I made mind maps on the colours and texts I wanted to use so that when it came to putting my front cover together I knew exactly what I wanted. I also thought about costume and props because it is a young persons magazine I wanted the model to look fashionable and modern so young people could relate to his style. I got my model to wear a pair of headphones I did this because it is a music magazine and seeing the headphones portrays this.

When I handed out my questionnaire I produced the question what do you like about my music magazine Cross-Fade and are there any improvement you would make. This is the feedback I got from fourteen participants.

“Good colour layouts, colour and images which make it look professional but I wouldn’t buy it because it not my type of music”

“Eye catching”

“Colourful- like”

“Bright colours make it look like a dance magazine, looks less formal making its audience teenagers”

“Not very eye catching”

“Gets attention/ colourful, shows what’s in the magazine”

“I prefer the blue background and the jagged text of title”

“It stands out making it noticeable. You win tickets. Doesn’t say any articles featuring in the magazine”

“Front cover- very good looking person on the front. Good colours”

“Good layout- nice looking guy”

“Its great”

“I like this front cover it is not simple but not over loaded, it looks like an interesting magazine to read”

“Good colour scheme. Nice use of pictures”

“Colour scheme works well- attractive and eye catching. Represents genre well and effectively”