Voltage Music Magazine Presentation.

Main features of my front cover

MastheadSkyline

Main Image

FreebiesBarcode

Main features of my contents page

Main Image

Features information

Information as to what's inside the magazine

Page heading

Main features of my double page spread

Featured artist images

Featured artist logo

Featured article

Ways in which my magazine uses, develops, and challenges forms of real media products. . .

Front CoverThe whole purpose of my magazine was to appeal equally to both male and females, as

from my research often the main metal/rock magazines where mostly aimed at being sold to men. This was an important aspect to take into consideration when designing my front cover. As well as this the masthead needed to stand out and be instantly recognisable on a shelf, so I used a large bold font and the colour white so it contrasted with the black background. From my research on what would be my competitor magazines they used this style for their masthead designs too. The masthead was also important to attract the right target audience for my magazine - being people interested in metal/ rock music, so my masthead font uses kind of splattered paint effect, and looks quite a rocky style.

Metal Hammer

Mast design Kerrang Mast design

My Design

Front cover continued . . .Images. . . The images used on my front cover where also important for the magazine as

from research I found that there was a lack of women featured on the front cover of metal music magazines. I found it important to photograph them in a serious pose, and in a non sexualised way, as that is also often the only way that women got onto the front cover of these magazines.

Kerrang magazine, half the image concentrated on her chest!

My front cover image – The girls have not been sexualised, and the image is concentrated on the band

Contents Page . . . It was important for my contents page to have to main qualities:1. Carry on the ‘house style’ – this is an important thing that my magazine needed to have as I

wanted my magazine to look professional, and look like every part of it belonged together.2. Easy to read- from my research I found that many people buy a magazine based on the

information that they read from the contents page. People said they often flick to the contents page whilst in the shop where they purchase the magazine to see what is included inside of it. Therefore it was essential for my contents page to include a range of what was inside the magazine, and provide a small piece of information about each article. I found that this is something that most of the big magazines already on the market do.

My easy to read contents list, providing information about the article

Double Page Spread. . .

My double page spread was used for introducing a ‘new band’ on the scene of metal/rock music. Instead of following the DPS set up that many of the big magazines used of having the image one side and all of the text the other, I decided to have the page mainly concentrated on the text and the band logo. This was something I felt important to do as it concentrated on promoting the new band on the scene, and not just an image of the band. Using this setup has also made me able to spread my text out over a larger amount of space, and break it up more, making it less bulky and easier for the reader to read.

Typical DPS layout from Kerrang magazine

My layout

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

My media magazine was aimed at a target audience of 16-25 year old Males and Females, interested in alternative music such as metal and rock. Therefore the social groups that my magazine would be representing is along the lines of Emo, and Metal Heads. These are the groups that are associated with the type of music that I included in my magazine. Stereotypically these social groups all have alternative fashion – often known for wearing black, and both genders wearing black make-up. My main front cover image represents these social group through the black clothing, leather jackets, and the Male wearing eyeliner.

Stereotypical emo and metal head looks

My front cover male

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

I would choose Bauer Media to distribute and publish my media product. This is as they publish and distribute the main Alternative weekly rock/metal magazine Kerrang. My music magazine appeals to the same target audience as this magazine, and would feature many of the same Bands. Bauer media also promote other big music magazines such as Mojo, and Q. Both these magazines feature all sorts of genres of music, often including classic rock- a genre I would be including within my magazine too.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

My main aims where to create a magazine for a target audience of people interested in alternative rock and metal music. From my research I found that most people that purchased music magazines where

aged 16-25. Therefore when designing my music magazine I tried to appeal to this audience. I also researched my target audience for any other interests they had such as computer games, gigs, reading etc, to see if anything else could be included in my magazine to appeal to a wider target audience.

A mood board I made before designing my magazine

How did you attract/address your audience?

Audience Feedback:By conducting audience research before I started the designing

process of my music magazine I was able to see what my target audience would expect/like to see in a magazine appealing to this music genre. These are my results. . .

The main feedback I got from my Survey Monkey results

Gender . . . Throughout my research process I asked both Males and Females what they thought about the

Metal/rock music magazines that are already on the market. After collecting results I found that many people found that most of the three big Metal/rock magazines already available (Kerrang, Rocksound and Metal Hammer) mostly seemed to be targeted at males. The magazines themselves are even stocked under the ‘Male interest’ section in the shops when you go to purchase them. Many of the Females I spoke to where not happy about the presumption that only Males could enjoy Metal and Rock music, and that contents of the Music magazine seemed to be male dominated, for example mostly males where featured on the front cover, but on the rare occasion that a female was featured on there they would be heavily sexualised, e.g. showing a lot of flesh.

My Survey Monkey Results showed that there was not much difference between the amount of Male and Female readers.

How I targeted gender . . . In my music magazine i tried to target Males and Females equally. To start with the front

cover featured a photo shoot with both males and females featuring on in, but in a non sexualised normal way. I also tried to design the magazine to look non gender specific, using black and white- colours that are not associated with either males or females, but appeal to my target audience at the same time. However, I had to be careful when designing the magazine not to make it too feminine, as when asked many Females interested in this genre of music would not purchase a metal music magazine if It was too feminised- e.g. in the style of a magazine like heat.

Attracting the right audience. . . Music- As my magazine is a music magazine it was important to establish what music was the most popular

with the majority of people.

The most popular music linking to my music magazine genre was Hard rock, Pop rock and screamo- these where the types of music I included in my magazine.

Continued. . . Other interests:Many of the music magazines already on the market also included

other subject matter inside the magazines e.g. Games etc.These where my results from my survey monkey as to what else could

be included in my magazine that would interest people:

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Photoshop:The main skills I have learnt

through my magazine coursework is photoshop skills. I have learnt many new things such as editing images to make them look more professional, editing text, and playing with different layouts. For example, these are some of the images that I edited for

my music magazine.

Blogger. . . The other piece of technology that I have learnt to use is Blogger. Before I

started my magazine coursework I had never blogged before. I now know how to as I have had to do regular blogs on my media coursework.

Example of some of my work on my blog

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

First magazine

Final music

magazine

The main thing that I have learnt throughout the process of making my music magazine is photoshop skills. It is clear to see that my work looks a lot more professional now as compared to my first music magazine. I am pleased with the quality of my music magazine now, and think it looks visually good.