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

Preliminary Task Final Front Cover

Music Magazine Final Front Cover

As you can see, I have made a big improvement in my Photoshop skills and the design of my music magazine is a lot more complex with a lot more going on than in my college magazine. This is shown by my increased use of layers. Things I think I improved on include:

• Bigger understanding of Photoshop
• Better design of front cover
• Better use of pictures
• Better font styling of masthead
• Good colour scheme

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

How did you attract/address your audience?

I attracted and addressed my audience by creating a questionnaire. I did this so that I could directly interact with my audience. Because of this, I could ask my audience what they wanted to feature in my magazine. By doing this, I was able to give my audience what they wanted and put this in my magazine.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The audience of my my media product would be mainly young adults and this is further shown by my questionnaire research. As you can see, the majority of my readers are teenagers. Because of this, I know what age group to aim my magazine at. Other age groups that were 26-30, 41-50, and 75+. 

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

One media institution that may distribute my music magazine is Bauer Media Group. These may distribute my music magazine as they lack a music magazine in my genre and this will help them move a new space in the market. Additionally, Bauer distribute their products worldwide which will also help me sell y magazine.

Reasons why this publisher would be the best one to distribute my magazine would be:

• Bauer distributes over 600 magazine in 17 different countries
• It has a world wide reputation and they would do a lot to make my magazine successful
• They lack a rap magazine in their collection of 600+ magazines which would mean my magazine would help them branch out into a new field that they have not yet explored
• Every magazine they distribute is successful
• They have over 100 years experience with marketing as they were founded back in 1875

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

My music magazine represents particular social groups by me asking people in my questionnaire information about them and what they like musically. In my questionnaire, my first few questions asked for the persons age, gender, weekly income and what is their favourite artist in my chosen music genre (rap/hip-hop). From this, I have a basic understanding of my audience as this is more personal information about them.

Another way in my questionnaire that shows my music magazine represents particular social groups is by finding out how people consume music and what they do actively with the music. This is shown by the next 4 questions of my questionnaire which asks the person about whether or no they go to gigs and if so how many, how they listen to music, how many hours a day they listen they listen to music and what do they usually listen to music on. From this, I can find out how I can aim the contents of my magazine at what people do with music. For example, I saw that not many people went to gigs so I didn't include live shows in my questions.

Finally, my media product represents particular social groups by finding out what gifts people are interested in and how much money they are willing to pay for my magazine itself. I did this as I wanted people to buy my magazine so I needed something to peak peoples interest as a free gift and also make it a reasonable price for people to pay for whats inside but also not making it too expensive that people cant afford it and a not interested.

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

My media product follows a lot of conventions from real media products as shown by my research and analysis below whilst also going against conventions.

Front Cover

This is a magazine cover that I looked at when I was designing my front cover.

 This is my final front cover in comparison.

As you can see I have gone for a very similar design to the cover shown in the VIBE magazine. For example, I also have a main image that takes up the majority of the front cover that slightly overlaps my masthead. A way that I have gone against the conventions is by including extra images on the left and right hand sides of my cover. I did this as I felt this was a unique way to show what was in my magazine without just having text.

Contents

This is a magazine contents page that I looked at when designing my contents page.

This is my contents page in comparison.

As you can see, my contents page is quite similar to the contents page I looked at from Q Magazine but it is also quite different. For example, I have also placed my masthead at the top of the page but in a different format. Additionally, I have also gone for a very basic design, like the Q magazine. I copied certain aspects from the Q magazine contents page as I thought that it would make it easier for my music magazine to be followed as my magazine contents page is a simple design.

Double Page Spread

This is a double page spread I looked at when designing my double page spread.

This is my final double page spread in comparison

As you can see, I copied the "image takes up whole of one page and article the other" that is also featured in the Q Magazine double page spread. I have also

Photos taken

Final DPS

Final Contents Page

Final Front Cover