Friday, 27 March 2009
Thursday, 26 March 2009
Development of skills and understanding
I feel that looking back at my college magazine in comparison to the magazine that I have just created there is a massive gulf in class. In the preliminary task I rushed lots of things that I did and it ended up coming out tacky whereas with the music magazine I spent lots of time working on it which resulted in a good end product. It also went better as there was a lot more planning that went into this version with things such as: audience questionnaires, annotating of existing magazines and just generally studying magazines. One of the key features in me creating a good magazine this time around was my concept that I chose. It’s unique to pretty much all other magazines on the market and although I have taken snippets of ideas form magazines like: NME and Kerrang, the idea behind having a whole magazine that battles two different genres has created a hybrid identity in itself and is also a unique selling point for my magazine. In contrast to this, last time around I had no real unique ideas. I also believe that the first crack at Photoshop helped me this time around as I was more experienced and did then not experience as many hiccups and therefore wasn’t as time consuming so I could spend more time on other things. Receiving feedback from other students for creative ideas was also helpful, as I could compare ideas with them and take them if they’re better at certain aspects of the course. Another thing that proved a big help in the creation of my magazine was how after my first attempt I was much more willing to be attentive to detail. This will help me attain a better grade as the work will be of a lot higher quality. The main thing that I focused on in creating my magazine this time around was how much effort was put into my journalism. After my first attempt having rushed things like the cover lines and them coming out a little shoddy and generic, I worked harder to try and put more effort into making them funny and witty and therefore being a more satisfying read for the audience.
I feel that looking back at my college magazine in comparison to the magazine that I have just created there is a massive gulf in class. In the preliminary task I rushed lots of things that I did and it ended up coming out tacky whereas with the music magazine I spent lots of time working on it which resulted in a good end product. It also went better as there was a lot more planning that went into this version with things such as: audience questionnaires, annotating of existing magazines and just generally studying magazines. One of the key features in me creating a good magazine this time around was my concept that I chose. It’s unique to pretty much all other magazines on the market and although I have taken snippets of ideas form magazines like: NME and Kerrang, the idea behind having a whole magazine that battles two different genres has created a hybrid identity in itself and is also a unique selling point for my magazine. In contrast to this, last time around I had no real unique ideas. I also believe that the first crack at Photoshop helped me this time around as I was more experienced and did then not experience as many hiccups and therefore wasn’t as time consuming so I could spend more time on other things. Receiving feedback from other students for creative ideas was also helpful, as I could compare ideas with them and take them if they’re better at certain aspects of the course. Another thing that proved a big help in the creation of my magazine was how after my first attempt I was much more willing to be attentive to detail. This will help me attain a better grade as the work will be of a lot higher quality. The main thing that I focused on in creating my magazine this time around was how much effort was put into my journalism. After my first attempt having rushed things like the cover lines and them coming out a little shoddy and generic, I worked harder to try and put more effort into making them funny and witty and therefore being a more satisfying read for the audience.
Technologies
The first thing that I had to do when it came to creating the products was to take photos for my magazine. When I had come up with the design and idea for my magazine I decided to take pictures of a person who looked ‘Indie like’ and a person that looked ‘Metal like’. I decided that with my photos that I wouldn’t bother too much about lighting and composition as I knew that my skills on Photoshop would get me over them hurdles. However, I tried to ensure that I used props and facial expressions to get over which was the Indie rocker and which was the Metal rocker. I tried to make the Metal rocker look a little more menacing on the front cover whilst the Indie rocker would look more chilled out and decided to present him sporting some red love heart sun glasses to create the contrast between the two. The only time the sunglasses were taken off throughout the magazine was in the double page spread as I wanted them to be looking each other in the eye. I also tried to concentrate a little on camera angles to show the two peoples emotions. On the front page of my magazine I tried to make both men subtly contrast each other through camera shot distance. I tried to make the indie rocker look a little bit further away to show his laid back body language and In contrast show the metal rocker a bit more close up to show his facial expressions and to show his ‘in your face’ like style. After I had taken the photos I then had to edit them using Photoshop. As I’d used this service before I was aware of what to expect from it and had already developed certain skills on it. Two of the things that I changed by using Photoshop was the lighting and the composition. On the front cover I brightened both photos up quite heavily to make them stand out and jump out at the reader. I struggled a little with time management as I found that on Photoshop you need to be quite the perfectionist and it ends up being very time consuming.
The first thing that I had to do when it came to creating the products was to take photos for my magazine. When I had come up with the design and idea for my magazine I decided to take pictures of a person who looked ‘Indie like’ and a person that looked ‘Metal like’. I decided that with my photos that I wouldn’t bother too much about lighting and composition as I knew that my skills on Photoshop would get me over them hurdles. However, I tried to ensure that I used props and facial expressions to get over which was the Indie rocker and which was the Metal rocker. I tried to make the Metal rocker look a little more menacing on the front cover whilst the Indie rocker would look more chilled out and decided to present him sporting some red love heart sun glasses to create the contrast between the two. The only time the sunglasses were taken off throughout the magazine was in the double page spread as I wanted them to be looking each other in the eye. I also tried to concentrate a little on camera angles to show the two peoples emotions. On the front page of my magazine I tried to make both men subtly contrast each other through camera shot distance. I tried to make the indie rocker look a little bit further away to show his laid back body language and In contrast show the metal rocker a bit more close up to show his facial expressions and to show his ‘in your face’ like style. After I had taken the photos I then had to edit them using Photoshop. As I’d used this service before I was aware of what to expect from it and had already developed certain skills on it. Two of the things that I changed by using Photoshop was the lighting and the composition. On the front cover I brightened both photos up quite heavily to make them stand out and jump out at the reader. I struggled a little with time management as I found that on Photoshop you need to be quite the perfectionist and it ends up being very time consuming.
Addressing the audience
The way that I addressed my audience was through things such as: language, layout, colour, graphics, images, cover lines, content, feature articles and ads. I tried to address my audience through witty language such as: puns and through addressing the audience with direct text such as ‘you’. I attempted to make the layout and colour not too childish by having quite a unique layout on all three of my products but at the same time a magazine that tried to show the contrast between Metal and Indie whilst making it easy for the reader to understand e.g. the way in which I had a direct colour scheme for both Indie and Metal (red – Metal, light blue – Indie). I also did this through the layout as in most of my products I kept one side for Indie and one side for Metal. With the images on the cover of my magazine, I tried not to keep with the traditional style of one person on the front and text around it. I chose to have two people on the front cover as this was more suitable for my magazine. Although some people will claim that this is not the best way to do it as it’s not engaging the reader as well, I tried to engage the reader through other ways such as cool colours and radical styles and relied on my quality content to pull the punters. With all my pieces of writing I attempted to be quite witty and almost ‘In the know’ with the goings on in the music world and with having in my double page spread a lot of dialogue based on the backgrounds of both genre’s of music I think I maintained this goal.
The way that I addressed my audience was through things such as: language, layout, colour, graphics, images, cover lines, content, feature articles and ads. I tried to address my audience through witty language such as: puns and through addressing the audience with direct text such as ‘you’. I attempted to make the layout and colour not too childish by having quite a unique layout on all three of my products but at the same time a magazine that tried to show the contrast between Metal and Indie whilst making it easy for the reader to understand e.g. the way in which I had a direct colour scheme for both Indie and Metal (red – Metal, light blue – Indie). I also did this through the layout as in most of my products I kept one side for Indie and one side for Metal. With the images on the cover of my magazine, I tried not to keep with the traditional style of one person on the front and text around it. I chose to have two people on the front cover as this was more suitable for my magazine. Although some people will claim that this is not the best way to do it as it’s not engaging the reader as well, I tried to engage the reader through other ways such as cool colours and radical styles and relied on my quality content to pull the punters. With all my pieces of writing I attempted to be quite witty and almost ‘In the know’ with the goings on in the music world and with having in my double page spread a lot of dialogue based on the backgrounds of both genre’s of music I think I maintained this goal.
Target Audience
The main way in which I decided on who my target audience was, was by studying magazines that were similar to mine e.g. Kerrang, and partaking a similar approach as them. Although a lot of people chose who their target audience was through their questionnaire, I chose to aim my questionnaire at the target audience that I wanted. I chose to aim my products towards Metal heads and Indie kids, therefore making it quite difficult to come up with an audience profile as it would be so varied. I would say that the demographics of my magazine would again be similar to that of Kerrang, which means that the main gender of my magazine would be male as the music that I am covering doesn’t fit the majority of women’s likes. Their age will be around 16 to 25 as my magazine would be too high wit for anybody below the age of that. The social status will be the working class i.e. C2 and below as this type of music is not suited to the higher class and is mainly related to the working class i.e. the lyrics however the introduction of Indie in this issue will attract people of a higher class . My magazine is aimed more towards people who live in more derelict areas on the outskirts of countries, again though; this particular article will attract people from the city area. The audience of my magazine will be what the society call Metal heads, yet for this magazine there’ll be the introduction of Indie kids.
The main way in which I decided on who my target audience was, was by studying magazines that were similar to mine e.g. Kerrang, and partaking a similar approach as them. Although a lot of people chose who their target audience was through their questionnaire, I chose to aim my questionnaire at the target audience that I wanted. I chose to aim my products towards Metal heads and Indie kids, therefore making it quite difficult to come up with an audience profile as it would be so varied. I would say that the demographics of my magazine would again be similar to that of Kerrang, which means that the main gender of my magazine would be male as the music that I am covering doesn’t fit the majority of women’s likes. Their age will be around 16 to 25 as my magazine would be too high wit for anybody below the age of that. The social status will be the working class i.e. C2 and below as this type of music is not suited to the higher class and is mainly related to the working class i.e. the lyrics however the introduction of Indie in this issue will attract people of a higher class . My magazine is aimed more towards people who live in more derelict areas on the outskirts of countries, again though; this particular article will attract people from the city area. The audience of my magazine will be what the society call Metal heads, yet for this magazine there’ll be the introduction of Indie kids.
Institution
I think my magazine could be published by Emap or as it’s now known as Bauer as this publisher launched radio stations off of the back of Kerrang which is similar to the style I am looking for. This company would be good for my music magazine as it has lots of money to distribute my magazine to big companies.
I think my magazine could be published by Emap or as it’s now known as Bauer as this publisher launched radio stations off of the back of Kerrang which is similar to the style I am looking for. This company would be good for my music magazine as it has lots of money to distribute my magazine to big companies.
Representation
In the pictures on the front cover of my music magazine, I tried to show a clear difference between the Indie rocker and the Metal rocker. I did this through different facial expressions and different camera angles. I made sure that the metal rocker was looking more aggressive and used a slightly low angle shot of him to make him look more powerful and overbearing to reflect the stereotypical Indie rocker. In contrast to this I chose have the Indie rocker looking more chilled out and having a slight smile on his face to connote that Indie rockers have a more chilled out approach to life than metal rockers. I also show character in the metal and Indie rockers in the double page spread. I had the Metal and Indie rocker opposite each other almost going head to head. I did this to represent the way in which young people are seen as people who enjoy a bit of competition and perhaps confrontation almost. Despite these two being very different to each other in the minor landscape of things, overall they are very similar in the way that they present teen youth cultures. They both show the trends that teenagers now have in terms of social fads when you are younger; in this case Indie kids and Metal Heads. The title of my magazine has been given a font that is also designed to connote teenage attitudes. I have created it so it almost looks like a blade to show that lots of teenagers are violent and again goes back to the point of competition to show that young people would be willing to draw blood for victory. The font also looks as if it has a metal texture to it and hence is almost an inside pun as my magazine is a ‘Metal’ music magazine.
In the pictures on the front cover of my music magazine, I tried to show a clear difference between the Indie rocker and the Metal rocker. I did this through different facial expressions and different camera angles. I made sure that the metal rocker was looking more aggressive and used a slightly low angle shot of him to make him look more powerful and overbearing to reflect the stereotypical Indie rocker. In contrast to this I chose have the Indie rocker looking more chilled out and having a slight smile on his face to connote that Indie rockers have a more chilled out approach to life than metal rockers. I also show character in the metal and Indie rockers in the double page spread. I had the Metal and Indie rocker opposite each other almost going head to head. I did this to represent the way in which young people are seen as people who enjoy a bit of competition and perhaps confrontation almost. Despite these two being very different to each other in the minor landscape of things, overall they are very similar in the way that they present teen youth cultures. They both show the trends that teenagers now have in terms of social fads when you are younger; in this case Indie kids and Metal Heads. The title of my magazine has been given a font that is also designed to connote teenage attitudes. I have created it so it almost looks like a blade to show that lots of teenagers are violent and again goes back to the point of competition to show that young people would be willing to draw blood for victory. The font also looks as if it has a metal texture to it and hence is almost an inside pun as my magazine is a ‘Metal’ music magazine.
Forms and Conventions
The genre that I have chosen to work with for my music magazine is Metal music. This meant that I had to have a messier, more matt like look about the magazine in comparison to the majority of mainstream magazines. This style almost echoes the style that a magazine like Kerrang will use as it sort of reflects Metals trash like music and non-commercial ideology. Although my magazine is a Metal Magazine, this particular issue of my magazine is a special edition version which saw the Metal style clash with the style of Indie creating a Metal vs. Indie special edition. I did this as I believe that a lot of the time rock music is split up in to too many different genres and thought it would be a good idea to combine two of my personal favourites. This particular issue of my magazine you could say has created a hybrid style as instead of concentrating on one particular genre it has concentrated on two. Mixing these two genres together is almost a mixture between NME which is an Indie magazine and Kerrang which is a Metal magazine. (See Blog for analysis of my three covers.)
The genre that I have chosen to work with for my music magazine is Metal music. This meant that I had to have a messier, more matt like look about the magazine in comparison to the majority of mainstream magazines. This style almost echoes the style that a magazine like Kerrang will use as it sort of reflects Metals trash like music and non-commercial ideology. Although my magazine is a Metal Magazine, this particular issue of my magazine is a special edition version which saw the Metal style clash with the style of Indie creating a Metal vs. Indie special edition. I did this as I believe that a lot of the time rock music is split up in to too many different genres and thought it would be a good idea to combine two of my personal favourites. This particular issue of my magazine you could say has created a hybrid style as instead of concentrating on one particular genre it has concentrated on two. Mixing these two genres together is almost a mixture between NME which is an Indie magazine and Kerrang which is a Metal magazine. (See Blog for analysis of my three covers.)
Tuesday, 17 March 2009
Friday, 13 March 2009
Wednesday, 11 March 2009
Friday, 30 January 2009
Friday, 23 January 2009
Friday, 16 January 2009
Monday, 12 January 2009
Thursday, 13 November 2008
Planning my College Magazine
The planning that went in to my college magazine i felt was reasonably in depth. We started the research for our magazine by sending out a questionnaire for what sort of things that students would like to see in the college magazine. The choices which came up quite alot in my questionnaire was reviews so i chose to have reviews for film and music. Other things that came up were: Gym information and UCAS information which i added to my magazine. The audience also expressed how they'd like the magazine to have a 'jokey' feel about it, so i added a section for jokes and also tried to make some of the more serious cover lines seem quite 'jokey'. For example: i added a column with the head teacher and i named it: "A-Head of the game" for the clear use of a pun.
Before the analysis of my college magazine we were put into practice by analysing a ready made magazine. I analysed the magazine soup.
We then had to plan for what the magazine would look like. I chose to call my magazine padlock as this is something that all students are aware of and most use. I decided that i'd have a medium shot on the left of the page as this is where the reader looks first. And as my magazine is called padlock i decided on somebody stood at lockers as this is where padlocks are used most often and would therefore immediately engage the reader.
Before the analysis of my college magazine we were put into practice by analysing a ready made magazine. I analysed the magazine soup.
We then had to plan for what the magazine would look like. I chose to call my magazine padlock as this is something that all students are aware of and most use. I decided that i'd have a medium shot on the left of the page as this is where the reader looks first. And as my magazine is called padlock i decided on somebody stood at lockers as this is where padlocks are used most often and would therefore immediately engage the reader.
Friday, 24 October 2008
My finished College Magazine
Analysis of my front coverIn this media project we had to create a front cover and a contents page. In this part of the analyis i will look at the front cover of my project. Firstly i chose to name my front cover padlock. I chose this as it is a name of a common tool that most college students use in every day life. I also chose it as i felt that there was alot i could do with this in terms of design and background. The first thing i had to do to create this front cover was to take a picture. I took a picture of a boy standing at some open lockers. This was so that me giving away a free padlock would give the reader an extra insentive to buy the magazine as if not it would be rendered useless. I then had to choose a colour scheme to use for the magazine. I decided to use a gold colour to emphasise that the title was padlock as this is the general colour of padlocks. Gold is also a colour that you would associate with prestige and class so it also brings this to the magazine. To contrast this i used a strong red colour to try and bring out the danger that you could possess by leaving your lockers open. I also decided to use a red cross at the top of the page to show that a padlock insures that you cannot enter and that it is wrong to do so. Choosing to have the chain hanging from the 'O' was also to show something being broken into to try and fit in with the rest of the magazine. Also, the font that i used is quite 'blocky', therefore making it have a feel of a padlock about it.
Analysis of my Contents Page
The contents page i used has a more simple format to try to make it seem a little more formal so that it wonot take away from the information that it's presenting to the audience. The first thing that i decided is that i'd have a plain white background. This was so that the writing would stand out on it and so again it wouldn't take away from any important information. I chose to use a red and black font for the writing on the contents page. I did this as black stands out very well on the white background and red also stands out on the white background whilst contrasting the black. I also stayed with the red from the colour scheme on the front cover. The only real design technique i used was to have the 'Padlock' and 'Magazine' font tight together. I did this to give it a feeling of it being locked together to again revert back to the title.
What i liked and disliked about my magazine
The main thing that i liked about my magazine was the design of the front cover. I feel like it suited the name padlock well with: the 'blocky' writing, the golden colour and the broken chain hanging from the letter 'O' all made the magazine title seem credible.
What i disliked about my magazine was my contents page. Although i created the contents page with the idea of making it formal so that the information would not be overlooked, i still felt as though it should have been a bit more jokey to aim towards my target ausience a little more.
What new skills i've learnt fron the preliminary Task
I think that the main thing that i have learnt from this preliminary task is a better understanding of Photoshop. Learnt how to use some of the tools much better e.g. the chain round the letters is something i wouldn't have been able to do before this task. I also got a better idea of time management. I realised that i need to be quicker and spend more time on getting the important things on rather than wasting time with extra additives. The last thing that i realised is that i need to stick with the same theme in the front cover and the contents page as in this project they look very different.
Friday, 10 October 2008
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)