Question 1

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

Layout

The layout of my completed magazine I had inspiration from various different issue of ‘Billboard magazine’ I wanted to create a sense of professionalism however still managing to portray the informal style within the magazine. I personally felt I was successful in incorporating mise en scene, combining the suitable colour, costume, lighting and dialogue for my chosen genre ‘Pop’ and constructing it in an effective way.

The double page spread was the most successful part in reflecting the expected conventions of a professional double page spread. For my main article I wrote a reasonable amount of text, making sure the page layout wasn’t to over crowned ,  too much text is unappealing to the target audience, lead to people not even reading the article which is meant to be the main focus of the magazine. Therefore I used several images to break up the text and to add more colour and life to double page spread in order to engage my readers (aged 13-25).

Throughout my cover, content and double page spread I have kept the same style, structure and colour scheme in the magazine so that that the overall finalized pages of the magazine will interlink with each, having a consistent theme.

Location

I used two different locations for my photo-shoot, in order to gain a variety of different style photography however both photo-shoots had similar colour schemes. The 1^st location I used an abstract wallpaper with the colours black and silver. The 2^nd location was a plain grey wall, both locations for my photo-shoot was located in my models house.

I had both locations having interlinking colour scheme this is because I already decided on the themes and colour scheme of my magazine due to the results I received from my questionnaire, so I felt it was important to incorporate my target audiences ideas and opinion. Due to used different locations it’s allowed me to gain more detailed and diverse photos giving my target audience a personal insight to their lifestyle. This particular convention of direct address to the audience is portrayed successfully in the professional magazine such a ‘billboard’ and ‘Q’. I thought that the abstract wallpaper would be unusual but effective with good use of lighting as my main double page spread image.

The majority of the front cover photography is taken in a studio with a plain coloured backdrop. However I didn't have access to a studio therefore I improvised and used a plain wall in order to get my front cover image, while editing it in photo-shop to blemish and lighten the colour background. As well as the front cover the double page spread has a variety of photos to spate the text, the photos usually consist of the artist performing at their concerts and the artist with their bands/friends at former events such as the ‘Brit music awards’. On the other hand this wasn't possible for me to gain access to although I used a previous image I had taken at a party of my model and a few extra people. I placed this in the magazine to show my artist/model in her former spilt band ‘The Supremes’.

However I would like to change my front cover image, where the image would be angled at a mid-shot capturing my models top of the head to her waist line to add more length to the photograph rather than cutting mid-way during the photography as from researching professional magazines, the main cover image is generally a mid-shot or long shot of the artist.

Title, Font and style

I used the same style font for the ‘Title of the magazine’ as the traditional conventions of the masthead often signify the logo and company of the business so that it is recognisable to the target audience, therefore I used same font throughout the magazine. However I used diverse fonts during my double page spread article, keeping the factual literal text simple and readable to the audience giving it that sense of a professional style, although used drop caps and creative fonts when quoting some of my artist responses to questions. This way it stood out from the page rather than making the text look to formal. I also used different sizes fonts as well as the style of them to dominate some text more than others. For instance on the contents page the headings ‘features’ and ‘regulars’  was published in a larger different  font size to make appealing to the readers. My skyline on my front cover used a bolder with subtle design to make the magazine look professional and informal.

Props and costume

The genre of my magazine is ‘Pop’ and the general convention of this particular style magazine is the models are portrayed as sexual, seductive objects towards their readers this was signified and connoted  through the colour scheme of red. Therefore I felt it was important for my magazine to confine in these particular ideas. This was reflected through choose of clothing and props my model was pictured in. For my double page spread and front cover my model was pictured wearing a black embroidered dress with light, skinny feathers at the end of the dress. I chose this particular outfit as it was sophisticated but seductive, and the colour scheme linked with my colour scheme of the magazine. For my double page spread image I had her pictured in another black dress with a red rose. The red rose symbolised the sexual natural and beauty of my model as well as combined with the link of my main article of the artist , talking about her recently being a solo artist and misses performing with her former band members, as well as talking about the subject of romance. Because of this I felt it was appropriate to signify and dominant the colour red throughout my magazine as ‘red’ is a symbol of love and loss of other, which is portrayed in my magazine through a variety ways such as costumes and props.

People

I used one main model in magazine, Emily North. Whilst doing my research of professional magazines such as billboard and Q analysing their conventions and themes of the magazine, each issue published has their main star artist that was focused in the magazine. For instance they will be stared on the front cover as well as the contents and double page spread. This particular structure and layout allows the magazine to flow with a sense of continuity throughout the magazine. It also enables the audience to have a personal connection and a detailed insight of the particular artist’s lifestyle.

Although the photos I published on my contents page had a variety of different models such as Marnie bishop, Megan chapman, Lead Coppen and Alice Connelly. However this photo’s wasn’t in a created environment for the photo-shoot like my main model was, these photos was taken in a natural environment, each of the portraits I myself captured. I chose these particular models to feature in my magazine as I believed they had the right appearance and overall look to suit my music genre

Written Content

I felt the written content was the hardest part in creating the magazine as I had to use my imagination and creatively of literacy skills to create an appealing interesting double page spread article that reflected my chosen music genre Pop as well as having a relation to the photograph featuring on my double page spread. After analysing the conventions of professional double page spread’s for my particular genre, many of the magazines didn’t have a longer piece of written dialogue that’s tended to be in the form of an interview, question and answer. This is because the target audience don’t engage with long formal journalist article, they prefer having a deeper insight to their person life, referring to subjects such as love and cloths. Once realising that this was the main convention of a Pop magazine I found the task simpler, and used this particular layout for my own double page spread, using the photograph of the artist with a red rose, the article interlinked with the article referring to the topic of romance.

Contents Page

Some of my ideas of the structure and layout of the contents page was received from billboard magazine however I adjusted a few elements that would be more suited for my genre. I kept with the same colour scheme as the double page spread and from cover of red, black, grey and white. I had my featured model placed in the bottom left corner and was enlarge mid-point of the page with my headings “feature” and “regular” articles on the left side, shaping round the image. I felt that this layout was more spatial rather than the page being over crowned with text. I didn’t follow the conventions of a contents page as I had the issue number placed underneath the content title. As the majority of professional magazine have the issue number placed on the front cover with the price, however I didn’t want my front cover to be crammed with text their I had even space to place it on my contents as it had limited text. I also felt that my article headings was two longer, I should of kept it shorter and simpler not given to much away to the target audience. I also wish I would have placed my ‘editor’s message’ someone different as it looks unprofessional where it is originally positioned.

Apart from making a few adjustment and improvements to my overall outlook to my magazine. I am pleased with my finalized pages as they look professional although they lack some of traditional conventions of a ‘Pop magazine’.

Title

The expected convention of a magazine masthead is that the title takes up the whole top width of the front cover. However my magazine didn’t follow this expected norm, as my masthead is stopped mid-point at the top of the cover. This structure of a masthead was inspired by ‘Q’ magazine as they only use the top left to place this masthead, I felt it was effective and unique from the other professional magazines. Although it may look misplaced to my target audience and it is noted that the masthead it the first feature of a magazine that engages the reader eye. On the other hand the style and font of my masthead was admired by ‘fabulous’ magazine using a lower-case script font.