MUSIC MAGAZINE EVALUATION QUESTION 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Q1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

From the beginning of the course I have looked at 2 music magazine front covers to get some ideas of how my magazine would look. Also I have analysed magazine and presented the conventions to see who they were targeting .In my music magazine I have used some ideas from popular music magazines, I’ve kept it simply looking but did not spoil the realism in the magazine. My making my masthead stand out with the colour red from the rest of the magazine text it make it stand out and attractive too my target audiences. The font used is impact, I choose this font because it gives a modern style and it’s relevant the theme and genre of the magazine, and also I fell that is more suitable to my target audience. Moreover another recognisable conventions I used is placing the masthead behind the models, I did this so it looks professional and better, attractive.

The magazine style I was trying to follow is ‘vibe’ music magazine, although ‘vibe’ magazine is hip-hop and RnB music and my music magazine is pop I used similar structuring. In order to follow the conventions of a music magazine I used barcode and dateline to show this, also some music magazine place there dateline just under the masthead or top of the barcode, I decided mine to go on top of the barcode, to make it stand out.

 Furthermore, to fully attract my target audiences I had to use cover lines which is another convention generally used in magazine as they give a close view or idea what will be in the magazine and what will attract my target audiences. My covers lines are short plain but eye – catching. I have used the same font to not make the magazine look busy but I have made it bold so it can stand out and also so you can tell that is a cover line. My cover lines are just under they main image on the right side of the magazine this is because I wanted my magazine to look simply and easy to read. Moreover usually music magazine are vertically and they arrange there cover lines on the left hand side of the magazine to attract audience , but personally the cover lines should be placed either left or right , this is because of the image you use on your front cover . I’ve used two models which I placed them in the centre while taking the shot this is because I planned that my cover lines will look better on the right hand side, which this would stop the magazine front cover looking busy.

Disparity, those popular conventions of a music magazine is to use medium close up shot as a dominant image, but again it depends on the genre of the music magazine and theme. My music magazine is pop so I used medium/long close up to focus more on the image. Which this will attract more attention for pop music lovers.

My contents page also followed and has been developed conventions used in real music magazines. First of all I included different image, which this is used widely in conventions in real magazines, this is also used because it brings different issues and does not focus on one news and relates to the magazine and what will be in it. This would help the readers to decide if they want to continue to read the magazine or not. To attract my audience I have only used two images and made my contents page look simply and easy to read.

Furthermore, I also included categories that I arranged vertically around the page; this made the page look professional and also made me use the space of the page correctly, it looks organised and neat so which this makes it easy to read.

Differently in my double page spread and did not want to follow and use conventions, this is because I wanted to create my own style it still looks professional and its similar to other real double page spreads but I just wanted to create the layout myself. Also I wanted to link my double page spread to my front and contents page , I did this by keeping the colour theme similar but not the same this is because I wanted my target audience to see different style in one magazine. The double page looks modern and professional I did this by arranging my article on the left hand side with a stand out and the Headline was on the right hand side which this made me again use the space on the page neatly and made the page look simple. Also I used both left and right side of the page for the article to help me attract my audience because it made it eye catching and different from other articles.