Music Magazine evaluation

All music magazines include forms of conventions and my product has developed some of these to make the magazine seem more realistic. For my masthead I have called the magazine ‘Generation’ this is because I am informing the target audience, which is generally males and a variety of age groups, whether it be older people reminiscing or younger people interested in the subject. The masthead is bold and red which automatically stands out from the rest of the text and links with the theme. The theme colours are red, blue and white as this links with the Mod culture. Also music magazines front page always have a barcode, price, date of the release and a stylistic feature. I have included all these things. The main focus point is the picture. This fills the full page and informs the reader what is going to be inside. On most music magazines the picture fills the full page, and writing over laps the picture. The language used on the front page is a variety of quotes, or colloquialisms which involve the audience and can make them relate. The style is informal and snappy which attracts the reader because it is simple but exciting. My double page spread is quite basic in the aspect it has a picture, an interview and a headline, but I feel it is effective because of the simplicity but has a lot of detailed writing. I have a large picture and include all the necessities; pull quotes, a headline and captions under pictures. In my contents I have developed different story lines which are imaginary in the rest of my magazine. The storylines link with the Mod theme, questionnaires, gigs and other interviews with different band members.
My magazine represents particular social groups by having just one theme. The whole of my magazine doesn’t switch from topic to topic, the entire thing is all based on 1960’s Mods and their lifestyle, so the reader will recognise the theme and expect information just on that topic otherwise it would be pointless purchasing it. I have included interviews, pictures and questionnaires all to relate to the Mods. The intended gender is very obvious as not many females are interested in different cultures and if they were, it would be because they were part of the culture when they were that age. However males are generally more interested in motorbikes, drugs, and successful bands, especially the most famous Mod band, The Who. The magazine doesn’t involve a lot of stereo-typical female interests except fashion, but the fashion aspects are male orientated and from the past. The magazine is aimed at working class due to the price, it is not exquisitely expensive but it isn’t cheap, and also working class would suggest they are slightly older so would have more knowledge on the topic. The audience will generally be British, only due to the fact Mods were a ‘British subculture’ and they were usually from London, Brighton and places like that. My magazine would probably attract institutions like NME or MOJO because these magazines all focus on the same bands which I am writing about for example, The Jam, The Who and The Kinks. Also the layout is very similar to the style I have attempted to use. Also the magazine would be more idyllic for people who work in history or music, because my article involves a lot of topics that were going on years ago, including politics and rivalries which can be relevant to today’s cultures and could interest or entertain others.
My magazine front page, contents and double page spread all have the same colour theme which immediately suggests what topics the magazine will be focused on. I have included union jacks, pictures of celebrities drinking and wearing certain clothing which also attracts the intended audience. In my double page spread I used a pull quote which said, ‘the scooter allowed you to go everywhere; It was also a hit with the ladies’ This attracts specifically the male audience because of it suggesting female relationships. The information I have included are questions and answers produced by the Journalist (In this case me) and Pete Townshend. I have made up the answers accordingly but related them to the question and what I feel Pete may have said. I found out the information via the internet so a lot of my questions are based on truth especially the ‘Success Story.’ I also used adjectives in my interview like ‘insane’ this makes the language of the article seem more relaxed and informal also the use of colloquial language and slang. This attracts the audience, makes them feel involved and makes it easier and more entertaining for them to read and also can relate a little more. For my headline on my double page spread I edited a union jack on Paint shop pro to make the flag look messy and ripped. This links to the Mod theme and gives a slight rebellious look which also attracts the audience as the spread isn’t all neat and tidy it gives a relaxed approach. My contents is full of different pictures, colours and information which gives a wild sort of a look and because it is jam-packed with information it doesn’t look demanding, it gives the reader an opportunity to read it if they would like.
Throughout this piece of coursework I have learnt a lot of things due to using so many computing skills. I have really developed my skills on paint shop pro as a lot of my pictures have been cropped, or edited on this programme. I have taken pictures, made them larger or smaller and adjusted the contrast to make them darker or lighter, and made some softer and some more sharpened which gives a complete different effect on the overall image. Also I have learnt lots on Microsoft publisher as this is the programme we used for the entire project. I have learnt how to make booklets instead of simple one page spreads. I have also learnt how to make things seem more like a magazine by arranging different font sizes for different words at the beginning of sentences.
Looking back at my preliminary task, when I first started it my computing skills were not incredible so pictures were not edited and fonts were average. Through constant improvement I have added more and more effects and arranged the page layout differently because at first the page looked like a poster, I had bullet points and a picture and a title, now I have intertwined pictures with words and made a column at the side to include different topics which are in the magazine. However I do feel my music magazine front page has elements of a poster because their isn’t much organization with writing on the page it is all just placed on top of the picture, where as my college magazine has columns and different sections, but this is the effect I wanted, and a college magazine is completely different to a music magazine because of the target audience and purpose. My college one, was to inform and educate where as my music magazine is to entertain. I have used the same type of language though for both, but made it clear that the college magazine was aimed at teenagers and the music magazine is aimed at a slightly older generation. So the language had to be even more informal for the college magazine and I had to make sure the information wasn’t boring and included a lot more pictures than the music magazine. I have learnt overall that you have to have so many different plans, ideas and designs for magazine double pages to work. The simplest things can look good or bad so you have to keep repeating the same things over and over again until you get it to the standard you would like.