1. Design
Pitch, style sheet and flat plan
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2. Conventions
Magazines, like any other media product, have conventions that they follow
Certain elements are common to almost all magazines regardless of their audience
It is the way these elements are presented to the audience that defines each magazine
You can break conventions down into those they are general and cover most magazines
and those that are more specific to a genre.
For example, photographs appear in almost all magazines but the style of photograph
changes depending on genre.
Text also appears in all magazines but the type and size of font will change depending on
the demographic that the final product is aimed at.
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3. Who is this for?
The next 3 slides all contain the same elements of text and pictures
They have all been arranged with a specific target audience in mind
Look at the colour scheme and the overall layout of text
What the image depicts is not important
Can you define the demographic that they are aimed in terms of gender, age and taste in
music?
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4. TITLE
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TEXTTEXTTEXTTEXTTEXTTEXTTEXT Males aged 15-24 into rock/metal music

5. TITLE
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TTEXTTEXTTEXT Either gender aged 35-50 into classical music

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Girls aged 12-15 into pop music

7. Pitching your idea
Your research so far should have given you a good idea of the conventions of
your chosen genre.
Your audience research should have given you further information on what your
demographic wants and expects.
You should have ideas about the key aspects of your magazine.
This week you will develop and formalise those ideas and use three different
methods to present those ideas.
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8. Style Sheet
A style sheet allows you to present your ideas for the key stylistic elements of your
magazine quickly and simply.
 It will help you organise your thoughts and ideas
 It will allow others to see what you have planned
 It will let you receive feedback on your magazine without having to make it
It should contain:
 Examples of fonts you will use for your Masthead, cover lines and body copy
Examples of the kind of photography you will include – these can be found images for
illustration purposes only
Examples of the colour scheme you expect to use in your magazine
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9. Example style sheet
Potential fonts for article headings
Blues
Colour scheme
Blues
Blues
These are the types of images I will use.
They are a mixture of live shots and high
This is a font the quality portraits
main body text
will be written in. AS Media Studies 2010 9

10. Magazine Layout
You could maybe create a mood board to get your ideas going before
making your style sheet.
Creative Media Production 2011 10

11. Flat plans
Flat plans are simple drawings of a page layout that show where the different
text, picture and graphic elements will go on a page.
Flat plans give designers the chance to experiment with a wide variety of
different layouts quickly and easily, before coming to a final decision on page
layout.
They will allow you to experiment and try and find a layout you are happy with
before going into production.
This helps to cut down on production time and leads to a product which has
been clearly thought out.
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12. Flat plans
b
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13. Flat plans
From these simple first draft outlines you can then produce a more detailed plan
which incorporates some example content
This will help to give you a better idea of how your page might look.
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14. Example Layout
Article Heading
Text
Text
Text Text
Information bar
20 21
www.bluesmag.co.uk www.bluesmag.co.uk
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15. Example Front Cover Here is a basic layout for
a front cover along with
MASTHEAD an example image
Main Sell line
Additional cover line
Picture
Additional cover line
Additional cover line
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16. Example Front Cover
This example
brings together
the basic layout
Peter Green
Playing live again
with examples of
fonts and pictures
Lightnin’ to make the front
Hopkins Plaung live again
cover.
Rory Gallagher
History
The blues progression Plus:
Gigs
New releases
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17. Pitch
Your pitch should be a brief explanation of what your magazine will be like.
It should include:
 A name
 A target audience
 A description of what music it will cover and how it will cover it (articles, reviews, news,
interviews)
 A description of the style of the magazine
 Some idea of what your double page will feature
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18. Pitch
Pitch
Blues is a new magazine aimed at the mostly male 35 – 60 market. Readers are likely to
be affluent white males with a settled family life.
It will cover all aspects of blues music from its roots right up to the present day. It will mix
interviews of musicians and famous fans alongside pieces on the history of blues. It will
also review new and re-release albums and cover other blues events and news.
It will be simple in style with pictures and text given breathing space and a greater
emphasis on text backed up with limited but excellent photography.
The example double page spread will be an interview with John Lee Hooker, discussing his
new album and tour. The interview will be supported with side bars giving a brief history
and discography to fill new readers in on his past.
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19. Getting good marks
Grading Criteria
 Work on layouts,
In order to gain high marks you
must show that you have drafting, scripting or
drafted a range of ideas. One storyboarding.
single idea will not get high
marks  Care taken in the
presentation of research
You need to present your work
clearly and neatly. Badly and planning
presented work will not get
high marks  Time management
You need to make sure you
manage you time well, so that
you hit your deadlines and you
produce a good range of work
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20. Over to you
Now it’s your turn to produce a pitch, a style sheet and a flat plan
Look at what you have found in your research and use it to inform and influence
your design
Your project should have a clear progression from research to planning and then
to production
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