2. 1) In what ways does your media product use, develop or
challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
The conventions of a media product
Having a bold red and
Eye contact with the black masthead.
artist makes it seem as if
he is looking directly at The chosen background
you. colour makes the artist
stand out more when
The name of the looking at the magazine
main artist has the
biggest font and is The main image in the front
in red to stand out cover is only of the artists top
from the rest. half of his body .
Having the main image
This cover of VIBE in front of the masthead
doesn’t have a barcode. and all the other titles
means that the
magazine will mostly be
about that artist.
3. There is a little similarity
between my masthead and
VIBE’s one both being red and
black.
Having the artists arm in The eye contact gets the reader
that position makes the to think that the artist is only
reader follow the direction focusing on you and nobody
of the arm and read what else.
ever is below the arm, in
this case it will be the main
headlines. The chosen background color
makes the artist stand out
more and makes him more
The main headline is in red
noticeable.
and has the biggest font to
stand out from the rest
In compression to VIBE
my magazine but other
titles on top of the main
image to show that my
artist is not the only
artist spoken about.
Compared to the real magazine
my front cover has a barcode at
the front and the VIBE
This tells us what else
magazine doesn’t.
could be found in the
magazine.
4. On the slides above I have
identified the forms of convection,
now I will be writing about how my
magazines challenges the real
magazine.
With my magazine the way it challenges theses form of convections is by trying to improve them or to be
done a little bit differently. For starters the use of a barcode in the front cover to indicate it is a UK based
magazine. Having my artist do a hand gesture to get the reader to follow the arm on to the main headline
which is in big red writing to show it’s the main headline. Also I chose to be different on the way the
picture was taken, for example the main magazine only had the top half of the artist whereas I chose to
add a little bit of my artists bottom half to make differ my magazine from everybody else's.
5. Companies Logo
Main image Articles laid out with
page numbers and
information about
them.
6. My logo
Main article
I deceived to put in a
image that corresponds
in with my main article
All of my magazines
features are written
there. Pull Quotes
I used pull quotes
beneath the image to
make the reader want to
read that article
7. Drop Cap
Articles usually feature a
drop cap when the first
letter is bigger than the
others
This is the
main image
In this issue of
Vibe there are
quite a few
columns
The footer is
always located at
the bottom of the
page.
8. My headline was printed with a much
bigger font then the rest of the text to This is the stand first that tells us a little
catch the readers attention more about the artist.
Main images,
I used them as the
background so I
could write on top of
them, this was done
because I wanted my
magazine to stand
out from every other
magazine we know
of.
With my text I
decided to write
in white because
it is a colour that
goes well with my
background I also added an
image . extra image to
show my artists
graffiti work
The footer is always at the bottom
of the page
9. 2)How does your media product represent particular social
groups?
My magazine will be targeting both male and the female audience aged between 16 – 25. This is a
suitable age because the magazine is aimed for teenagers and young adults. It is also aimed at an
audience of a social occupational class between C1-E
Not only music will be featured in my magazine but also dance, art and cloths will be part of the
magazine. With art it shall include graffiti from my artist, dance will include break dancing and
music will include hip – hop & RnB.
My magazine will be published monthly and sold monthly in the UK, America and also other parts of
the world. It will be distributed in the main cities such as Manchester, Liverpool, Bristol, London,
Glasgow and many more.
My chosen language was not formal but also not informal, this is because I wanted to use yours such
as ‘yute’ to communicate with the younger generation.
10. Reader Profile
James is seventeen years old. He got kicked out of
school at the age of fourteen lives in East London,
most of his close friends are in prison. Not
knowing how to change his ways he tried looking
for other things to do for example trying to find
success in the music industry.
11. The images I have chosen they contrast a thugest life style that impacts on my artists old life style. Taking the
pictures in the block also represents their childhood days when they used to spend their time in the blocks
doing stuff they shouldn’t be doing. The chosen clothing had to be appropriate to the lifestyle I wanted to
portray. This is important because the magazine has to comply with the genre.
12. 3) What kind of media institution might distribute
your media product and why?
Magazines are distributed by their publishers, Vibe magazine is published by Time Inc, whose main publisher is Time
Warner. The magazine that I have made is to be published by IPC Media.
In a magazine the having an obvious content is an important part of the representation of the magazine image and the
language that I used were all essential to the genre of my magazine. As I am making a Hip-Hop and RnB magazine I
needed to use some slag words to fit in well with my target audience. Also the images I used had to fit my format.
My magazine will be sold at newsagents, supermarket, music stores such as HMV and many more other music stores.
13. 4) Who would be the audience for your media product?
My target audience for my magazine are people who are interested in Hip-Hop&RnB and for those
who aspire on being national and international stars in the music business. Like I mentioned before
hand, my magazine is aimed at both males and females aged between 16 – 25. it is also aimed for the
social working class C1-E. my magazine includes articles which my relate to the younger generation
such as how to make it from nothing to something and it also tells them about the positives out there
in the world and not everything is negative even though there will be people trying to put you down.
My main article will is about a up and coming artist who had everything against him when he was
trying to make it to the majors.
14. 5) How did you attract/address your audience?
When trying to address my audience, I looked at previous magazines of the same genre as my own to
determine how they connected to their audience. I looked at the front cover, contents page and
double page spreads of both Vibe and XXL because they are both magazines with the same genre as
my own. Once I got my information, I put my article together used some slag words to attract the
attention of the younger generation.
I took pictures of a surrounding which will be very familiar to most of the younger generation. I had
to make sure that everything complied with my selected genre, or my magazine will fail to appeal to
its target audience and therefore the magazine will not be successful in the market.
Also my magazine sort of teaches the the young teens that there are better ways in life than just
hanging around causing havoc in their area and it shows them that you don’t need life to hit you hard
before you realise that this shouldn’t be the right path to pick.
15. 6) What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing
this product?
Making my magazine I have learnt all sorts of things from cropping out pictures on Photoshop to
making a whole new magazine with InDesign. At first I found both programs very difficult to use
because I have never used them before, however over time I became very familiar with both programs.
I used InDeign to make my front cover, content page and double page spread, Photoshop to edit my
pictures, Wordpress to blog my work, this is also the first time I have used this program. Lastly I also
used Google to look up information on other magazines
I had to book out cameras from my college in order to use them, at times this was a problem because
the college didn’t have the right equipment needed for my magazine. I purchased CS5 for my personal
use at home, but when trying to work at college I couldn’t open my file because the college only had
CS4 which then made me have to bring my laptop to college to be able to complete some work.
After a few tried of Photoshop editing my image became very easy.
16. 7) Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression
from it to the full product?
Whilst constructing my preliminary exercise, I learnt many different skills from how to use InDesign
and Photoshop to taking a good cover photo and I also learnt about the conventions of a magazine
and the measurements required to make a full sized magazine.
The main skill I think I have developed over the past couple of months was how to use Photoshop and
InDesign, I have never used theses programs before taking on As Media but after using it often I feel I
am more comfortable using them and if I had to use it again I would be more confident.
Also working as a group of 4 helped me construct my magazine seeing as we were able to bounced
ideas off each other for the concept of making a Hip-Hop&RnB magazine for 16-25 year olds.
There was a massive difference between making my preliminary exercise to making my final
product, the preliminary exercise was on a college magazine whist the final product was on a music
magazine so designing both of them where slightly different.
I feel that I didn’t spend as much time making my preliminary excise as I did making my final
magazine, I gave my self more time on working on my final product which gave me a better
understanding on what I was doing.
I also feel that my magazine was not up to scratch due to me not knowing how to set it out, this is
something which I think I need to improve on my next task
I have also learnt many things about manipulation of photos whilst completing my course work. The
main thing I have learnt is that almost every image you see in magazines and advertisements have
been manipulated using Photoshoped. This is often done to enhance them and make the people look
picture perfect.
