Our task was to create a music magazine including a front cover, contents page and a double page spread. Before creating the magazine I decided that I didn’t want my magazine to be specifically for one type of audience such as Kerrang, which is aimed mainly at the rock/metal social group. I wanted my media product to represent a number of social groups as it would increase sales of the magazine and be more widely distributed. To do this I included a number of genres of music that would appeal to various groups such as indie, rock and dance, this is similar to magazines such as NME and Q which look at a slightly wider range of genres, also, I wanted to take inspiration from these magazines as they are the most popular magazines on sale.
I concentrated on the younger audience (late teens) by using a less formal approach to the layout and using images of younger, fashionable artists that are appealing to the younger generation. I made sure my magazine was not gender specific by making the colour scheme for my front cover and contents blue and red, these colours both made the magazine stand out and look bold and vibrant whilst being appealing to all genders. After asking for audience feedback, however, one peer stated that they thought the colour scheme was slightly masculine but that this was offset by the use of a female model as the main photo on the front cover.
If my magazine were to be distributed then I think the institutions that distribute magazines such as Q and NME would be interested in my magazine as it follows the popular style of these magazines and would be appealing to a lot of people because of the wide range of genres the magazine covers.
During the process of creating my magazine I have learnt how to use various different technologies including the use of a digital camera during my photo shoots – using different flash/lighting effects and filters. I also learnt new skills on Photoshop CS3 when editing the photos – different tools in the tool bar such as cropping, healing, text etc and how to edit the images by using adjustments such as brightness/contrast, hue and saturation which all helped me in creating the look I wanted for my front cover and double page spread. I also learnt how to import free-to-use fonts from dafont.com, which meant I was able to select a font that portrayed the right representation I wanted from my magazine. Another application I learnt how to use was Microsoft Publisher when creating my contents page.
In comparison to my preliminary task I think I have drastically improved in many aspects of creating a magazine. The original magazine I created for the preliminary task looked very simple as I only had a very basic knowledge of Photoshop and did not know how to download fonts from the internet and therefore it didn’t look particularly professional unlike my main music magazine. Also, because I didn’t have much of an understanding of creating a photo shoot and using a digital camera I had a very simple imagine for the front cover which wasn’t of as good a quality as the photos I used for my music magazine. When creating the preliminary product I didn’t really consider the representation of my magazine or my target audience so it didn’t have much of a style or theme, which is what I like about the final product I created.
After creating my final product I asked my friends, parents and peers to offer me constructive audience feedback. My friends and peers told me that the front cover, contents and double page spread looked very professional and similar to that which they would find on the shelves. The also noticed the similarities between my product and popular music magazines such as Q and NME. My parents also confirmed that my magazine looked well made and professional however they said they would be unlikely to buy it if they saw it in the shops as it looked like it was made for a younger target audience. They were correct about this and therefore I am happy about the overall look of the magazine as I wanted it to appeal to the younger generation more than an older audience.