AS Media Studies Evaluating your Music Magazine Coursework

QUESTION 1 Blog post title: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Make a Prezi analysis, containing explanation and illustration of at least ten conventions drawn from your three finished products. Write about what the conventions are for, and how you have used them to create your own house style and brand identity, and to attract your target audience. Add clipped images of similar conventions from real magazines too, if you can, to show how your use is similar to or different from professional products. Try to choose similar or contrasting examples from real media texts (but if you have based your designs very closely on a real product DO NOT USE THAT PRODUCT!!). Conventions to explore masthead and title mise-en-scene and technical code of your main cover photo and other images Cover lines Graphic and other layout devices Colour scheme and house style Kicker Drop Caps Pull Quotes Cross-heads Column structure Use of white space Use of other layout conventions like rule of thirds, z reading patterns End signs/jump lines The journalist style of the written content The division of your contents page into regulars and features Techniques to connote the excitement and busy-ness of the magazine on your contents page (inset photos with drop caps etc) Remember, some magazines are more conventional than others.

Cover page terminology

DPS layout Explain what genre/hybrid genre of magazine you produced (rock, pop, glossy lifestyle, etc) and discuss some of the magazines that you took your influences from. Add pics of these.

PRESENTATION SUGGESTION: Use Prezi for your analysis of your three pages and link the Prezi to this post.

QUESTION 2 Blog post title: How does your media product represent particular social groups?
Media products take the world and RE-PRESENT it to us. In doing so they make choices about HOW to represent different sorts of people. Think about how you have represented, say, male youth, or early teenage girls, or heavy metal fans, or indie music fans, or your target audience generally (say who they are demographically and psychographically). What qualities have you implied that this group of people possess? You have represented them through your photos, your choice of language, your use of colours, your writing, and even the things you have LEFT OUT and assumed they are NOT interested in. For example, lets say your magazine is aimed at early teenage girls. What sorts of personalities and interests does your magazine suggest teenage girls have? Have you reinforced stereotypes (eg connoted that they are interested in clothes, makeup, boys, etc)? Have you challenged stereotypes? (Eg aggressive poses in photographic shots, or cover lines about unusual topics such as politics or fast cars?) Illustrate your answer with clips from your products to show what you are talking about, and if you like compare them to clips/images from real media texts. Take one photograph and compare it to a photo of a similar person taken from a real media text. How are they similar, and how different? When discussing photos of the group you have represented you should consider posture, gesture, angle, shot type, lighting, costume, expression, hair, etc. PRESENTATION SUGGESTION: Do this as an illustrated blog post or as a Word document, uploaded to ISSUU as a PDF then embedded in your blog.

QUESTION 3 Blog post title: What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
Look back at the work we started with this year, and decide on a company to produce and distribute your magazine. Think about what sort of magazine it is and which publishing company would be the best to sell your magazine concept to. You need to refer to actual company names and processes. If you think you could get your magazine produced by a big publishing house, like IPC, Bauer, Dennis, Future etc youll need to justify it in terms of the size of your target audience, the advertising pull they would have, and the companys existing range of magazines. Consider whether it would be best placed with a major, medium and small/independent publisher because there are advantages and disadvantages of each route. What would be the advantages or disadvantages of going with a big company compared to self-publishing? Clash is the only magazine published by Clash Magazine Ltd but actually it is in some ways more successful than NME which is published by IPC. Similarly, if you think you could get your magazine distributed by one of the big UK distributors, like MarketForce, WH Smiths, Menzies or FrontLine, and into the major retail spaces like WH Smiths and ASDA, youll have to explain why. Also remember that digital distribution is possible, or selling through subscription, or even giving it away and relying on advertising revenue (The Fly). The key here is to consider all these issues and name some real companies and their products. And be realistic about the potential of your magazine - dont be nave! Can you remember how many titles fail within their first three years? (Bonus marks if you can, and put it on your blog!). Finally don't forget to reflect on the need for synergy e.g. there will probably be an online version of your magazine, there might even be sister products such as a radio station. Some magazines get involved in sponsoring awards

ceremonies. Maybe there are tie-ins with iTunes, Spotify, etc depending on the scale of your venture, the genre of music and your target audience. Note: Don't forget to use company logos and images of related magazines to illustrate your post. PRESENTATION SUGGESTION: You could present your response to Qu3 using a Word document which you .pdf and upload to ISSUU and share onto your blog.

QUESTION 5 Blog post title: How did you attract/address your audience?
Use Flickr's annotation tools or create a Prezi to highlight the ways in which your magazine is designed to attract and address your audience. Why would they buy it and what would keep them interested? Begin by thinking about the point of sale (ie a shelf in Asda, WH Smiths or whatever). What element of the front cover are designed to grab the target audience and attract them to pick up the magazine in the first place? Does the main cover photo use a direct address (eyes to camera)? Do the cover lines use second person pronouns (hey YOU!) or command or question sentences which demand action or an answer (You MUST see this!)? What other elements would attract the TA masthead, colour scheme, font styles etc? Explain why. And dont forget you can think about the CONTENT of the magazine implied by the cover lines. Are there competitions with prizes that the TA will want, etc? Now move on to thinking about how the CONTENT and LANGUAGE is appropriate to your TA. Concentrate on your use of language, photos, colours/graphics. What mode of address does your magazine adopt towards the reader and why would this be appropriate for your target audience? Is the magazine trying to be like a best friend? A knowledgeable older brother/sister? An expert in its field? Analyse in particular the language of your DPS article does it use slang? Is it relaxed or more formal? How is its attitude appropriate for the audience? What is the Unique Selling Point of your magazine, which you expect to attract your audience? Refer to the fact that you constantly asked for feedback from your audience throughout the production process.

QUESTION 4 Blog post title: Who would be the audience for your media product?
Take a photo, find an image online or do a drawing of a typical member of your target audience . Post it to your blog and compile a profile of them in terms of demographics (age, class, gender etc) and psychographics (lifestyle choices, tastes in music, films, shopping habits), etc. Use the words demographics and psychographics. You could use UK Tribes links (be sure to add the links to your blog). You should also refer to your audience research here. Tip: look at the type of content featured in the media kit for magazines (sometimes called the audience profile) which you can find on magazine websites or look back through your notes. Be sure to include similar details about your planned target audience. Write a few lines on why they would buy/subscribe to your magazine. Make sure you think about the AUDIENCE AS A PRODUCT too what sort of advertising could you attract through your audience. Are they a viable audience for a magazine to target? PRESENTATION SUGGESTION: You could present your response to Qu4 as a video clip or flipbook using a Word document, converted to a .pdf, uploaded to Issuu or Flipsnack and shared with your blog.

QUESTION 6 Blog post title: What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
Make some images that show your use of the various technologies you have used. You could take a picture of each other holding the kit you have used. This might just be the camera and tripod, the lights and a PC but there may be other things you want in the shot. Do some screengrabs of techniques you used in Photoshop. You could use the logos of Blogger, Flickr, and the online graph maker you used. Post these images onto your blog and annotate them, adding details of what you learnt about them/from using them. Your written text need not be too long, but should be specific. Eg describe some of the tools you have used in Photoshop. Make some images that show your use of the various technologies you have used. You could take a picture of each other holding the kit you have used. This might just be the camera and tripod, the lights and a PC but there may be other things you want in the shot. Do some screengrabs of techniques you used in Photoshop. You could use the logos of Blogger, Flickr, and the online graph maker you used. Post these images onto your blog and annotate them, adding details of what you learnt about them/from using them. Your written text need not be too long, but should be specific. Eg describe some of the tools you have used in Photoshop. List the advantages and disadvantages. Consider some of the disadvantages to relying on free internet applications like Blogger and Flickr, especially over the College network. PRESENTATION SUGGESTION: Place directly onto a blog post or use ISSUU.

QUESTION 7 Blog post title: Looking back at your preliminary task (the college magazine task), what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?
Grab some frames from both tasks and put them on the blog and show what you have learnt about photography, layout, fonts, modes of address, audience etc. What Photoshop devices did you use and how did they improve your work? Mention 4 Photoshop techniques that you used and the effect they had. Tools and techniques you could mention include: text alignment and space reduction, blending options such as stroke and drop shadow, text wrapping, image manipulations, text box sizing, using Photoshop rulers, colour picking, quick selection tool, feathering edges, varying the opacity, layers. For example, one of your 4 points could be: I learnt that the clone stamp tool, which I used to remove unwanted pictures on my model's T shirt, improved the cover image because the readers eye was not distracted by this unnecessary detail. You should also discuss Audience appeal (choosing a layout design concept, fonts, mode of address and type of feature article) The need to research existing texts/magazines The importance of proper Target Audience research for several reasons Your need to seek feedback and share creative ideas Your need to be attentive to detail Focus on written skills/journalism, proof reading, etc. PRESENTATION SUGGESTION: DO this on a Prezi, or via ISSUU, or using some other interesting Web 2.0 technique.