In my evaluation I aim to describe how the conventions of my music magazine appeal to my target audience (young people aged 16-25 who are interested in rock/indie music) and how I represent this type of audience through the conventions of my magazine.
The ways in which my music magazine uses conventions of real music magazines is by using similar types of images, logos, magazine price and issue number style as a real rock music magazine. In my research I also considered the conventions of other genres, such as mainstream music, to distinguish a difference between mainstream music magazine conventions and the conventions of a rock magazine. This was to help develop a specific genre of music throughout my magazine by avoiding developing the conventions in mainstream magazines. In my research I learnt that all magazines use the conventions of photography/graphics, a distinguishing logo, a masthead, a price and/or barcode and an issue number. Throughout the development of my magazine I ensured that I included all of these conventions. I considered the masthead as the most important as it would be the first convention that the audience would see and it creates a distinguishing image that the audience will link the masthead to the magazine. The masthead also acts as a logo for my magazine, which is featured on the front cover and the double page spread. To create a consistent theme I included a copy of the front cover in the bottom left corner of the contents page. The images in my magazine are similar to other rock/indie genre magazine as they represent band members and guitars; this shows a clear link to the rock/indie genre in my model media texts. I have also given my magazine a suitable price to suit real magazines of the same type, as the target audience for my model text is the same as the target audience of my magazine. The magazine is aimed mainly at students; students typically have limited disposable income. Taking this into account I decide on a low price of £2.20. This convention helps to relate to real magazines as they sell for a similar price.
The target audience for my media product would be teenagers and/or students. It is aimed at rock and indie-rock music genre fans. The audience for my magazine are low/middle class students and young people, so it was important to produce a magazine which would suit there lifestyle. For example, in my magazine I have not used highbrow words that a low class audience would not understand and I have created a basic layout to make the information easy to refer to. The reader interacts with the magazine as there are representations of my target audience throughout my magazine. In my double page spread, I decided to do a guide on how to form a rock band. I chose this because it would allow the reader to not only learn about the music industry but to get entertainment out of it also. It interacts with the audience because it is aimed at people who inspire to start a band.
The conventions that I have chosen in the development of my magazine represent particular social groups in order to attract the right type of audience. When I was planning my magazine I aimed to represent the rock/indie music genre, rock/indie bands and young people. In my images I have represented young people through my images; the model is a teenager in a low/middle class sector. This is because throughout my research I found that the audience which my product is targeted at are more likely to purchase a magazine which represents them and relates personally to them. I have also used slang language used by the particular social group that I am representing; this represents the language that the audience use. My aim was to connect with the target audience by using words such as ‘gunna’ rather than going to. This slang word is common among the target audience.
In my magazine gender representation is irrelevant as the rock/indie genre is not gender specific. Whereas if my product was based on mainstream music, females would typically be represented as very feminine and beautiful and males would represent masculine dominance.
The institution which is most likely to distribute my magazine is Bauer music. This is the institution which distributes my model media text ‘Kerrang magazine’. I have aimed to develop my magazine using the same conventions of the rock music genre as Kerrang in order to attract the same type of audience. They are also likely to distribute my magazine as the price of my product is similar to the products that Bauer music distributes.
The ways in which I attracted my audience are by using conventions that they like to see in a magazine. By carrying out a questionnaire for my audience feedback, I found out that 50% of teenagers like rock music and 30% like indie music. Therefore, I decided to ensure my magazine included all conventions of these genres to attract my target audience. In my questionnaire, I also asked what the person’s profession was, the result of this was that all were students and some had part-time jobs. I aimed to attract students by including offers on festivals and gigs, competitions and special offers on merchandise. The audience also told me that the images in my magazine represents the music genre of the magazine and that the overall style of the magazine relates to them.
Throughout constructing my magazine I have learnt more about how to use Photoshop editing software and how to make the most of it to produce a magazine that looks professional. I have also used Photoshop to get the appropriate font styles which match the mise-en-scene and the genre. When putting the images in my magazine I have learnt how to manipulate them by using the ‘red-eye’ tool and the ‘spot healing’ tool and how to apply a more attractive background on rather than a plain white background. An example of my understanding of the ‘red-eye’ tool is the ‘phoebe can’t dance image on my contents page, before I had edited it there was red eye, a plain white background and the image looked simple. I changed this by adding a colourful background, fixing the red eye and using the ‘blur’ tool to make the edges of the image blend into the page. Another example of applying an attractive background is on my double page spread, I changed the background from a plain white colour to a notebook-style background. I did this so that it would correspond with the context (a guide), this would make it look more attractive and meet the conventions of the page. The way in which I changed the font style is by downloading them onto Photoshop from the website www.dafont.com, by using this website, I found appropriate fonts that suited the genre. For example, I decided to call the featured band ‘Pulse’ so I found a font that looked like a heart monitor. Another technology that I learnt to use throughout the construction of my magazine is a digital camera, I learnt how to take an appropriate image and how to transfer it onto Photoshop to be edited. As I have not used the type of camera before it was a new experience.
By looking back at my preliminary task I feel I have learnt more about the conventions of magazines and how they attract the target audience and represent a specific social group. I have also learnt that by improving the layout of my magazine makes a difference to the overall appearance and changes how the audience interpret the media text. In my preliminary text I realised my weakness was that the layout was not effective because it did not follow the rule of the left-third. While creating my preliminary text I did not know much about the conventions of magazines and Photoshop editing software so I resorted to using alternative software, which was not as successful and did not make the magazine look very professional. There was also limited text style fonts which I could use, so they did not match the mise-en-scene of the magazine. Whereas by alternatively producing my music magazine on Photoshop, I could use various other recourses to represent a certain genre and theme in different ways.
