Music Magazine Research

I decided to try and compile some initial research on music magazines.  By using the Bing internet search engine I looked specifically at front covers, contest pages and double page spread articles.  For each of these pages I took a screenshot of some examples and commented on them in bullet point format. I typed up my notes on Microsoft Word and I have posted a PNG image of this research below.

Music Magazine Audience Profile

For my next task I compiled my moodboard audience  feedback and I have created  an audience profile for my magazine which I have embedded below.   The target demographic age group that I have chosen is the  16-25 age group  and  I have also put some images of items that relate to the teenage audience that my magazine is trying to appeal to. For example the magazine is targeting a young tech savy audience so I have included some social media images such as Facebook and Twitter and memes like Netflix and Chill.

Magazine Moodboard and Audience Research

I decided to create a moodboard in order to map out my early concept ideas for the magazine. I decided that I wanted to make a pop magazine so I have collected a series of ideas around this genre of music. The moodboard that I made was created on Powerpoint and below you can see a JPEG image of it.

I then printed off this moodboard and showed it to some people who fitted within the target audience. I was then able to gain some valuable insight into what they liked and disliked about the idea.  I also asked people to pick which title they liked from some of the ideas in the box and a lot of people went for Shockwave. All of this information I have learned has proved insightful and I will  present it  as an audience profile in my next post. 

As Media Semiotic Analysis of a Magazine Cover

For an AS Media task I had to review the front cover of a music magazine as part of a group. We took a look at XXL magazine which featured Chris Brown on the cover.  For the review we decided to make a video so we recorded the audio and edited the footage on Adobe Premier Pro.  Below I have embedded the video which has been uploaded to YouTube.

Researching Music Magazines

I  created a Prezi presentation about the UK Magazine industry which I have embedded below.  The first part of my presentation  gives a general overview of the best selling magazines  and publishers . Then towards the end  I focussed specifically on the music magazine genre by picking out individual titles such as Q and Kerrang! which also gave some information such as target audience and circulation figures.

As Media Music Magazine Introduction

For my AS Media main task I have to produce a music magazine. I will be required to produce a front cover, contents page and a full double page spread article. Furthermore, I will also  have free rein  to choose what genre and target audience would be suitable for this magazine.  I will be using the same software that I used in the preliminary task such as Indesign and photoshop in order to create the magazine pages and edit the photographs that I will take.  One of the first steps  I will take in order to complete this project will involve me researching some existing music magazines and compiling some audience research.

Anatomy of a Magazine Cover

 

 

For this task I had to analyse the features of a music magazine cover.  I picked an issue of Q magazine featuring Take That to look at and on PowerPoint I  wrote a few paragraph  describing the key features(see below). I then annotated the cover and  picked out some feature such as straplines and buzz words.

 

 

 

 

Preliminary Task Evaluation

I created a PowerPoint evaluation for my preliminary work and then I turned it into a video. I uploaded this to Youtube and I have embedded the video below.

 

 

 

 

Final Pieces

 

Below I have embedded an image of my final magazine cover and contents page designs.   The magazine is targeting college students as its primary audience and this is reflected in the design. A college student is on the front cover which can allow people to associate with the magazine. In addition, a few key  buzz words such as gaming and music are included in order to target the 16-19 year old demographic that attend the college.

 

 

 I used the Bradley Hand ITC font for the writing as it is relaxed and this reflects the mood of a college student.  It also resembles the sort of handwriting somebody would use for a notebook which fits with the college theme.

 

Contents Page Research

For the contents page I went and found three different magazine contents pages to analyse and learn from.  I wanted to make sure that I covered a variety of magazines so each contents page I picked is from a different genre and they all target different audiences. I also wrote a small paragraph about why contents pages are an integral part of a magazines.  This work was all typed up onto Microsoft word and I have embedded it below.

After completing the research I then designed a mock up of my contents page on PowerPoint.  I created this design after I designed my front cover so it is more consistent with my final cover rather than the preliminary cover.   

Front Cover Research

Before designing my front cover I went away and researched existing college magazines. I wrote up what I learnt in bullet point form in Microsoft word which I have embedded below.

 

When I was creating the mock up for my cover I was still unsure as to which image to use.  I created a design on Powerpoint that could work with either cover image. I tried to include all of the key features that are common in magazines such as bar codes and a bold title.

Preparing the cover Image

For the cover image I wanted to  have a medium close up shot of a person as that is a typical convention for a magazine. I took 4 photos which I have displayed below as contact sheet.  I had a persons stand in front of a solid purple background as I thought it would be easier to remove them from this background once colour correction had been taken into account.  However for my second set of photos I had a shot of a person leaning on the college sign post. I  thought it would be a good idea  to incorporate this object into my covers design by having it run down the side of my image. I thought that the pole fit into my idea of a contrasting black and white colour scheme.

I selected this photograph for my cover  and I removed the background on Adobe Photoshop by using the polygonal lasso tool. I then corrected the colours with the colour contamination tool.

Photoshoot 1

I took some photos of the college and then arranged them into a contact sheet.  When taking photos I had to think carefully about composition, shot size, and I also employed rule of thirds.  Image 9382 is a long shot and it was composed so that the students occupy the first two thirds of the image while the college is in the background in the final third.

 

I took image 982 and cropped out the building in the background to focus on the two individuals. I also corrected the colour slightly by adjusting the levels.  Below I have placed the original image and the edited image.

 

Original Image

 

Edited Image

 



Preliminary Task

For this preliminary AS Media task I had to design the front cover and contents page for a college
magazine. In order to do this I researched existing college magazines and then I went out with a camera and took my own photographs of the college.  After sketching a rough outline of my magazines front cover I began to edit the photos on Adobe Photoshop.  I removed the background  from one particular image and then I imported it into InDesign where I used it to form the basis of my magazines front cover.  I used InDesign's grid system to organise my front cover and I also created the mast headings and text. 

Once I finished designing my front cover I exported it as a PDF file and saved it as a JPEG. I used the remaining images to design my contents page and then I exported it in the same way.