Evaluation Essay
In my print brief, i feel that i have challenged the forms of a real media product, but the way that i have fit it into my my house style seems to work. The way that other magazines such as Q have a house style, the Logo and title of the magazine seems to be on the left side of the front cover, I have positioned mine more central and at the top, and it would stay like this for all editions of my magazine. Another thing i have done, differently to most other conventions of other magazines i have done is, have a lot more images, than most other magazines have. For magazines such as Q, and Mojo, they manage to keep a balance of around 50/50 for text and images, but i feel i have done around 70/30 to images. It works though as i think that my target audience look more at pictures than read the text, and it tells a story, so even if the text hadn’t been read, the audience still would be able to understand.
I think that my media represents a particular social group, due to the:
House Style
The language used
The colours used
The bands used.
The way the house style is set out, it can be seen as quite messy, so an older generation may not like it, as it would be hard to read and understand. The language used is quite simple as younger readers that would want to read it, could, and they would be able to understand and maybe relate to it. The Bands that i have used, uses a variety of famous, and not so famous, and old and new. The main reason for doing this was so that all age groups could read or relate to some articles in my magazine.
The kind of media institution that might distribute my magazine would be Emap. After doing a little research i have seen that Bauer Music, is the publisher for my kind of music magazine. Magazines that are already being published by Bauer, are Empire, Q, Mojo, Kerrang. As well as music magazines, they publish lots of other magazines such as, Thats Life, Bella, Bike, Zoo, Mother and Baby, Golf World, Pop, Closer and Grazia to name just a few. The Bauer company publish magazines for all kinds of people, that is why it would be a good publisher for my magazine.
The Target audience for my magazine would be young adults, and teenagers, but what i have found when doing my research that typical music magazines are what boys are more likely to read over fashion magazines, and girls are slightly put off my the dingey, dark messy layout, as what i have found out from getting some audience feedback. So i have used the house style to try and get more girls to read, and relate to the magazine, this is the main reason why i have used the colour pink, as it seems more like something girls can relate too. What else i have found was getting some audience feedback is that the photography is good, the layout is good, and the text that i have used represents the bands and the genre of music. Some of the comments i received in my audience feedback
I tried to attract and address my audience by targeting not one, but multiple genres of music. The main reason for doing this is to get as many readers as possible, as this would make my magazine popular, and liked my multiple music fans. Some of the genres i have used are Indie, Acoustic, Classic, Techo, and Rock. I think this works well because i have set it to the house style and managed to keep the layout and style to the way i want, which i think works really well.
What I have learnt from constructing my product is, to become comfortable using Abode Indesign CS4 and Adobe Photoshop CS4, by myself and not having to rely on the teacher as much. I thought this was good as i could work on my magazine in my own time and didn’t get stuck at all, i could just get on with it and work. I feel more comfortable using Abode Indesign CS4 as that is what i used the most actually putting my magazine together. Overall i think i would say i think i have come a long way since starting my magazine and doing my preliminary task.
After looking back at my preliminary task i feel i have come a long way, in using the programs i have used. i designed my first front cover on adobe photoshop. After looking back now, i really, don’t like it. It does show how much i have progressed. With my preliminary task, i didn’t take the images myself, so that would have lost me some valuable marks. I have also just copied Q’s layout to try and see how well i can use the programs where as now, i have used a whole new layout and a whole new type of magazine. Another thing i don’t like about my preliminary task is how bare the cover is, and the lack of information and things to offer on the magazine. Where as my finished final cover, has lots of information and things to see throughout the magazine. What i do prefer about my preliminary task was the fact there is more colour, and the main image is a colour images, but thinking about it, i think that my final magazine, would have looked a bit silly if it had a colour image, and i think if the images had any light colours in. I would have had to change the house style as the white text would not be able to work. Overall what i like about my final finished issue is how much more fun it seems, and how much people would enjoy and have fun reading it.
