Evalutation Question 1: In what ways does your music magazine use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real music magazines?

Masthead

My masthead follows the conventions well for many reasons. The font I choose to write my masthead in is called “The Deeper”. I decided to use this font as it was very bold which makes it stand out on the shelves, however, it still followed the convention of a women targeted magazine being very curvy. The colour I used to have my masthead was bright yellow; this was to make the magazine eye catching due to its brightness as well as following the convention of having the brightest colour on the page coming from the title and the main article. The yellow also fitted nicely into my colour scheme of, purple, black and yellow, I used these colours as they complimented each other by making each other stand out. In the market there is a lack of female music magazines so I couldn’t find much inspiration for the masthead, however, in order to overcome this problem, I decided to look at female magazine that were related to fashion or as they are commonly known as “Girl Mags”. By researching them I learnt that the majority of them had a big bold, curvy title that had a bright colour to bring the young female audience into the magazine.

                                                                        My Masthead.




                                                                            Examples

My masthead is less solid than the ones above however I think it follows the conventions of mastheads for a teenage female target audience as it still consists of being curvy and bright. I chose the name ‘TOXIC Fusion’ because a lot of the music magazines need a title that has attitude. It also symbolises the new music as being toxic which is powerful and the fusion of the music as there is no set genre for my magazine as there is too many genres of music to just label fraction of the audience. My masthead is bold and placed in front of the main image which does follow conventions of many of the magazines I researched as well as being able to allow my audience to identify my magazines more clearly on the shelves or just in order to simply find my magazine easier.

Mis En Scene

I choose Emmer Green Park as my photoshot location. Emmer Green Park would be the perfect place for my photo shot for many reasons. The first reason I choose the park was because it is a very spacious space, this would allow me to do my photo shot without getting in the way of other people as well as having enough room to various shots such as long shot. The location is perfect as my magazine has no set music genre as to me music is a very open community and shouldn’t be over categorized as nobody is one set genre. The location helps me show this as the park has buildings surrounding it but is natural inside, this helps the audience feel relaxed as it makes it look like it’s a part of a community, which music itself is. It also allows the audience to feel free as it has the contrast of having the hectic life style surrounding it, meaning the audience could associate the magazine with escaping from the outside world. The music is mainly based around where the bands come from now days so by having the photo shot in a place where my models grew up helps bring a more understanding between the audience and the models. The park itself is very easy to access for both me and my models, the light is always just at the right angle as the sun rises and falls along the centre of the park with the selected spot of my photo shot aliened, meaning that the pictures will have a warmly glow to them, making it seem ever more of a friendly atmosphere. Also because my target audience is female, they are more likely to respond to a peaceful calm picture as opposed to a rock band almost screaming at the camera. This makes Emmer green the perfect place for my photo shot to be held. I wanted my model to have fun and make there personality shine through to allow the audience to feel connected with them, I found it would be easier for my model to have fun at Emmer Green Park as it was a place she used to hang out with, so she felt more emotionally connected with the surroundings and could have fun and be herself there.


Example Of Photoshots

These images above have there models portrayed as the lightest colour on the page. They do this by surrounding the model with dark colours which makes the model stand out more as well as using photoshop to make the lighting appear brighter, which catches the audiences attention and also presents itself as a convention of magazines. The top image above is a picture of a model in a photoshot. The image is originally a mid shot however, when it is put onto the front image of the magazine it is zoomed into only to see the face of the model, in order to create a connection between the audience and reader as they feel as if they model is talking directly to them. I decided to do a similar thing for my image for my front cover as it would involve following conventions of editing a picture to make the model seem bright and eye catching as well as using there convention of getting the perfect image, by editing it.

The picture I decided to use was a picture of my model, Emma White look directly into the camera to follow the convention of having the audience forming a connection with her as well as having her smiling at the camera as women are more likely to connect/ buy a magazine with someone smiling at the as women normally appose to something more confrontational or violent. The shot I used was angled down at Emma, I decided to use this shot as it made Emma look really vulnerable almost showing she was opening up to her fans and creating a sense of friendship. 

In order to manipulated my photos I used photoshop. In most of my pictures I adjusted the brightness and sharpness off the image, this made the image appear to be brighter and more eye catching bringing the audience in. I think by making my pictures make the model seem even more flawless and bright makes the audience feel like the magazine is friendly compared to the male targeted magazines which often have the artist look down upon the audience in an almost aggressive behaviour, because of this I think I targeted my audience well.  

Professional Photoshop Edits

My PhotoShop Image

My model, Emma follows the conventions of my music magazine for many reasons. Emma is at the age of 17 making her one of the oldest target audience for my magazine however, this works in my advantage as it creates a role model for my younger readers and as many girls are now insecure about what they look like or how they should act, I think it is important for them to have someone to inspire to be like, who has got to the age when you really don't mind what people think about you and just get on and be who you are instead of being influenced by the people around you. Also I think my younger audience need a more positive person to look up to in the light of modern society as the Disney Stars, who young children look up to, such as Miley Cyrus has recently been taking drugs and throwing their lives off the track giving the younger audience the wrong impression of what they should look like or how they should behave. Out of the limited music magazines that are targeted for women I looked at the magazine "Rock Sound" as they tend to have more of a positive bouncy image and I think this would be more appealing to an audience as my target audience are more bubbly as they are young and want bright colours to attract them as they are very curious to bright colours such as Yellow (one of the colours for my magazine). For my magazine I didn't want one style of music genre as I believe modern society has no set genre anymore and they like the music that simply reaches the charts as they conform to the music their age group likes, in this case on the sky line of my magazine front cover I mentioned stars that are from different music background such as "paramore" being an "Emo" music genre and "Lady Gaga" being more pop.

The costume I decided for Emma to wear was very bright and eye catching as I wanted her to be promoted as pure and innocent like my readers. For this I choose to put Emma in a white dress as it helps the audience see her as sweet and innocent however, at the same time be a grown up women as to not ruin her image but also relate to the teenage girl readers who want to be seen as grown up, thus allowing the audience to relate. I had Emma where bright red lipstick to attract a contrasting clash to my colour scheme making my audience be captured by the brightness as well as wearing dark eyeliner as young children are more inspired by the darker look than a plan innocent girl so by using the contrast of Emma being sweet and innocent due to the white dress but having the contrast of her make up allows the audience to see they can be who ever they want as styles like music are made to be mixed and matched. I followed the conventions of using one plain colour costume as the fact that the colour white was contrasting to the black background. However, I broke the convention of the artist having a nose ring being violent but making the red lipstick bring out Emma's smile more showing a nice friendly personality. I think this worked well as it shows that music can be mixed like everything else.

The fonts I decided to use portrayed a feminine vibe as they were very curvy however, still worked well with the boldness making it stand out. In order to make my magazine seem professional I decided to keep this approach of curvy bold text running throughout my magazine. As the fonts I used are bold this makes it easier for the audience to read it, as well as being curvy to appeal to the women audience not male. As there was not many fonts that appealed to my audience, I decided to use the technique of outlining some of the text differently to make each text individual and different to the rest. The website which I got my main title font from was DaFont (http://www.dafont.com/). This was due to the fact that they had various types of font allowing me to search for the ideal font for my target audience making them become more intrested in my magazines. I used a variety of fonts as whilst researching female magazines I found that they use various types of fonts to make the page seem busy and more appealing to the female audience by the variety as well as making them more interested as my target audience like to see new things so the deviation of fonts makes them more involved with in the magazine.

The font I used for my masthead was called ‘The Deeper’. I decided on this text as it was bold however, still kept its curvy female appeal therefore add to my audience expectations.

The language I chose to use was using very slang terms that teenager(my audience) often use, as this helps reflect to the audience that it is targeted at there age group. "OMG" and ‘WTF’ were examples of some of the slag terms I used. I decided to use these because these words are very common slang terms for teenagers as when a magazine uses them it automatically brings the audiences attention to it as it's  almost speaking directly to them. I used buzz words to bring importance to some of the main articles as well as using conventions of using alliteration to highlight the main article, making the audience excited and wanting to know more. I used common terminology (slang) as the audience can understand  it more than the proper English making it easier for them to understand and want to read more off. The use of having the artists names highlighted also brings them in as they are automatically drawn to the artists name, making them want to know more.

For my magazine I decided to have no set genre. I decided this as music has such a wild range of genres, it is almost impossible to put a label on it, also my target audience are often just listening/ liking the music which is in the charts which varies from R'n'B to Pop, which means if I put a label on my magazine I would cut out a lot of my audience. In order to show that there is no genre on my magazine I decided to add singers from different genres on the skyline above my magazine such as "Lady Gaga", "Eninem", "Paramore". In order to attract my audience attention I used bright yellow and funny pun words such as "Pop Queen Avril Lavigne Spills The Beans" as it would amuse my audience and make them want to read more. By using the pun and bright colour it speaks to my audiences bubbly personality and child like attitude.

Layout

The layout of my front cover followed many conventions of female targted magazine. I decided to follow a typical female targeted magazine layout as it would help me learn what other females look for when buying a magazine. A typical convention of a female magazine is the fact that the main image is also the main article of the magazine. In order to establish this I made sure the colour of the title was the same colour as the main article, this is typical of a "Q" magazine layout, thus, helping the audience establish what is important on the page. The Masthead laso follows conventions as it is the  largest text on the front cover and is also placed just below the Skyline, which helps build up what the audience should expect from the magazine. In order to follow the conventions of the magazine rock sound I used a ovaral shape as the "Flash" as its the most curvy shape reflecting the female audience as well as having advertise free posters as a lot of people admitted they liked having a free gift with the magazine as it helps bring the audience in. Another convention I used was the fact that the second biggest text on the front cover was the main article, in order to make it stand out I used the same colours I used for the title making it more eye catching for the reader. I added a box of shocking interviews to bring the audience interest in my magazine up to a higher level, as it grabs there attention as well as allowing it to look professional. The fact that I put a lot of text on my front cover shows that I have analysed that the teenage female magazine has a lot of there articles placed on the front page as the target audience is very visual so they want to see what they are getting themselves in for. My barcode is placed on the right hand side in the middle of the page as many of the female magazines did this so it was following conventions(I got the image of the barcode of the internet to help my magazine appear more professional)

   For my contents page I decided to use the influence of the contents pages I have researched to help influence my contents page.I used a vast variation of fonts for places such as Title, and clips of what the articles are, as well as the page number. This allows the audience to establish the difference between the two types of texts and associate the different types of fonts which what they are, making the audience find it easier to locate the articles etc, as well as making my contents page appear more professional and easier to interpret the information on the page.I continued to use my colour scheme of using the colours White, Purple, Black and Yellow. The balance in which on my page is that ¾ it shall be the articles in columns. I shall then have the page numbers organised next to the  article in order for the layout to be more presentable as well as making it easier for the reader to find the page they want as well as the article. On the left hand side of the page I have one big picture over lapped by a smaller image, this shows the variation of posters inside as well as advertising the main article like many magazines do on their contents page. I decided to have a variation of text overlay on the pictures to make the text needed to establish an understanding of why they are there more clear. This follows the conventions of a typical contents page.The conventions in which I followed are, such things as having a few images that takes up the one side of the page, variation of texts to show off different parts of the articles, keeping to the colour scheme, explaining why the picture are there as well as having the page number in front of the article name. I also have to remember my flat plan to make sure the number etc match up.

For my double page spread I decided to have the article about an interview with Emma White, who is portrayed as the female Justin Bieber (World dominating). I  used a variation of fonts for places such as Title, quotes, summary and clips. This allows the audience to establish the difference between the two types of texts and associate the different types of fonts which what they are, making the audience find quotes if that’s what they like.I kept to my colour scheme of using the colours White, Purple, Black and Yellow. The balance in which is on my page is that ½ of one page shall be the text in columns. I shall then have a main quote organised over both pages to bring the audience in as well as letting it linking the two pages together (Conventional). The rest of the spread then just consists of one main picture. I decided on this as the majority of magazines have the picture on the left and have bright quotes emphasized to catch the audiences eye as they flick through.The conventions in which I followed are, such things as having a main image that takes up the whole of one page, variation of texts to show off different parts of the articles, keeping to the colour scheme, having quotes to bring in the audience.  For inspiration on for my double page spread I looked at heat magazines lay out and copied the idea of having the main image on the left hand side with the text on the right as well as having a quote linking the two pages together. I think my double page spread worked well as I used heat magazine as a basic outline of how to make my magazine look professional so people would buy it.

With everything considered I believe I have followed conventions well throughtout my magazine as I wanted my magazine to have a high quality finsh and I used a lot of magazines for advice on how to layout my magazine and how to make sure I follow conventions.I think all in all my magazine helps target my audience really well.