Evaluation 7) Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Evaluation 6) What have you learnt about technologies from the process?

Evaluation 5) How did you attract / address your audience?

Question 5 from Alice Kent

Evaluation 4) Who would be the audience for your media product?

Question 4 from Alice Kent

Evaluation 3) What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

I would want my magazine to be published by Bauer Publications for the reason that they are one of the worlds biggest publishers having 80 brands serving 19,000,000 people. Bauer have a huge audience with 4 out of 10 people experiencing at least one of their products and they state on their website: "Our business is built on millions of personal relationships with engaged audiences". The success of Bauer and the worldwide recognition that it holds could help my magazine to grow in the competitive industry. Being published by Bauer could be beneficial as I would be supported by a company who understands the media industry completely. As my magazine, Vinyl, is a multi-platform brand I would want each platform to be as successful as possible, like website, radio station and television channel. Bauer says that they want to 'connect with diverse and valuable audiences' and this is what I would be looking for when publishing my magazine. Even though there is a broad range of publishing companies like IPC media, I feel that Bauer would help to push my magazine to reach it's full potential and attract a whole new audience to add to it's already huge fan base. The company publishes brands such as Q and Mojo magazine and I feel that there is a place in the market for Bauer and my pop music magazine, Vinyl. 

To distribute my magazine I would want the biggest UK magazine distributor, Frontline. Frontline distributes over 160 magazine titles, including 54 of the top 200 selling magazines. Frontline distributes Q and Mojo's magazines. As frontline are such a successful company, it is the obvious choice to use them as Vinyl's distributor. Frontline also raise money for good causes and I feel that if my magazine was to be associated with this it would help to appeal to a wider audience. 

Evaluation 2) How does the media product represent a particular social group?

When I started out my research into music magazines it gave me ideas of the type of images, sell lines and colour schemes that I wanted to include in my magazine. I wanted to appeal to a pop genre audience and I had to portray this social group in my magazine. I also wanted to appeal to 15 ~ 25 year olds and this also had to be evident throughout my magazine.

I started my research by looking at this Q magazine front cover of Liam Gallagher. I liked the simplicity of the image and I felt like I could use this medium close up shot of Huw when taking my images, I decided to keep the colour in my image simply because I felt like having a front cover image in black and white would look too much like a rock and roll magazine. In the image on Q's cover, you can see what Liam is wearing and this is something that I wanted to incorporate into my front cover because my audience would be interested in fashion.

When I created my front cover I wanted to focus closely on the two artists outfits. Huw, in my main image is wearing a brown jumper with jeans and some designer shoes which says pop star! I also wanted this approach with Lottie in my subsidiary image. Lottie is wearing; black ripped jeans with black boots, a black top tucked in and a dusty pink suede jacket. I feel that Lottie also looks the part of a pop star. My colour scheme of black, red and white represents my pop genre audience for the reason that I saw this colour scheme featured on lots of pop magazines and pop music needed that red 'POP' of colour injected into the magazine. I also included the sell line 'Stacey Rees is back with more fashion tips'. This will appeal to my readers, again for the reason that they are highly into fashion. Another sell lines that I used that will specifically represent my social group are; 'We talk to Max Knighton to find out what winning the tv show 'you've got talent' was like' as my target audience are the sort of age to enjoy watching talent shows.

The images seen on my contents page, again, represent the pop social group from the artists clothing as this is something that runs closely alongside pop music. My first subsidiary image of Huw is a medium shot of the male setting down with his hands together. You can see his outfit clearer in this shot. My second subsidiary image of Lottie is a long shot of the artist and in this image you can now see her whole outfit. My third subsidiary image shows the 'fashionista, Stacey Rees' who is dressed in the latest fashion, like the other two. She is wearing black jeans and a top with a blue denim jacket over her shoulders, she also has lots of accessories like a bracelet and watch on both of her wrists. I also added in the Spotify logo with the corresponding text 'check out our website for links to the free downloads throughout our magazine www.Vinyl.com' This represents my chosen social group because they are technophiles who enjoy to download music onto their phones, iPods / iPads. I have used the same colour scheme as on my front cover and then throughout the other pages as well.

When doing my research into how I wanted my double page spread to look, I came across this article in Q on Lady GaGa. I liked the initial layout of three columns and I liked how they added in the splash of red colour. I wanted to incorporate both of these features into my magazines double page spread. The image in this article is also something I wanted to put into mine as I like the images being in black and white to give an elegant finish.

My image featured on the right hand side of the double page spread is of Huw and he is dressed in the latest fashion to appeal to my specific pop social group. Huw's outfit is something that my readers would be interested in wearing. This again is because fashion is something that runs closely beside pop culture. I edited this image into black and whit to give it a 'pop music' vibe and the image then links in to my magazines colour scheme of red, black and white. I used red to draw attention to the important aspects that will appeal to my readers like the quote 'I started going out more in the night, drinking too much. My target audience are the sort of age group to be going out drinking and so they can relate to this.

Evaluation 1) In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and connections of real media products?

Front Cover Contents page Double Page Spread

Double Page Spread.

The Process.

I started off by adding my header and footer into my inDesign document. I then put the title' The Pop Star That Disappeared' on top of my header, like on my contents page I overlapped the text onto the white page because I really liked the look of this. I then added the logo and the page number into the left side of the footer. I then opened up bridge so that I could transfer my article onto the page, after doing this I split my first paragraph up from the main article and set it across the top of the page. I then made sure my article fitted into the three columns equally, they fitted straight away with the correct font size. I added a drop cap to the first and last paragraphs in the article and then finally added in a quote from the text with the article 'tapped' around it. I then decided to make a change by making the text of my opening paragraph slightly larger than the article and I put it into a bold font so that it would stand out. To finish the first page of my double page spread off I added in the three red graphics to the pages, I think that these gave the page a splash of colour and helped to separate the text up.

After editing my main image in photoshop I used bridge to transfer it to my double page spread making sure I got a clear image. I made my image the full size of the page with the header and footer bars overlapping the image. I then added the date into the the right hand corner of the header bar and in the footer bar I added 'Subscribe at www.Vinyl.com' in the left side of the header bar and the page number and logo on the left side of the header. To finish my page off I added 'picture : Alice Kent' to make it give the pages a professional look.

The Final Product.

I am overall extremely pleased with how my double page spread finally turned out. I had a clear image of what I wanted the outcome to look like and so this meant that not many things had to be changed along the way. I feel that my double page spread has turned out exactly the way that I intended it to and there is nothing that I would want to change about it.

Contents Page.

The process.
I started my contents page by putting the header and footer bars onto the page. I then added 'Vinyl' and the page number '2' into the left hand corner of the footer bar with 'Subscribe at www.Vinyl.com' in the right hand corner of the footer bar. This could show that the brand is expanding. After that I then added in the boxes for my subsidiary images to sit in and added smaller header bars to separate the content into different sections, this then created a layout for my contents page. Next I added all of my text onto my page leaving a small gap between the number and the corresponding content. Like on my front cover I decided to add in separation lines to give the 'regulars' section two columns. I also added another of these lines beneath the 'reviews' content to add a link to Vinyl's website to show its readers that it is a multi media platform. This section also advertised Spotify and I used their logo on the left of the text.

I decided that I wanted to change the page numbers corresponding to the content to red after seeing this done in Q and NME magazine. I felt that this then made my magazine look better and made it easier to read. I then added in my title and masthead to the top of the page, coming above and below the header bar, I thought that this made the title stand out a lot more.

The Final Product.
I finished my contents page by adding all three of the subsidiary images in with the corresponding page number in a small white box with a red outline in the top, left hand corners. I am extremely pleased with how my contents page turned out and I like how I have included aspects of NME and Q's contents pages and adapted them to fit with my magazine. I am overall extremely pleased with how it turned out and I would not change anything.

Front Cover.

The Process.

I started out by putting my main image on the first layer and adding small details like; my header and footer bars, my pug and my subsidiary image. After sorting out the size of my header and footer bars, I added the text 'Loads of quiz's with the chance to win a ski trip!' to my header bar. I took some time adjusting where exactly I wanted my pug to sit on the page. I lined my subsidiary image up with the top of the head in the main image. Next I added in my sell lines down either side of the main image, I had one sell line left that did not fit on the page properly, as I did not want to overcrowd my cover, I decided to leave it out. I then added the issue number and date into the eft hand corner of the footer bar and I also added in a barcode to the right hand side of the footer bar. I finally added in my masthead which slightly overlapped the main images head, which was planned and I then put my splash and pull quote in just above the footer bar, covering the chest of the main image.

After taking a step back to look at my page, I decided that there were a few things that I wanted to change. These included adding a red box around my subsidiary image and to keep with my red, black and white theme I also changed the separation lines from black to red, highlighting key words that would appeal to my target audience in red also. I then moved my masthead up slightly so that it was positioned in a better place between the subsidiary image and the header bar.

The Final Product.

The finishing touches that I made included; adding '£1.00' into the barcode box so that readers knew the price and moving the text inside my pug down so that it looked more centred. I believe that my front cover has turned out well and looking back at my first drafts I have noticed that I have made a handful of small changes. However, I think that my final outcome works much better and looks well presented as a professional magazine would. I feel that I have achieved everything I wanted to achieve when I first started drafting ideas for this front cover and I do not believe that I would change anything now.

My images for my pages.

 

My Article

The Pop Star That Disappeared.

From the picturesque village of Llanellen to the busy city centre of London, Huw was miles away from family and with this came his downwards spiral into alcohol and crazy nights out. Nevertheless he's now back "bigger and better!" This pop star who had been destined for the stars since he was only 11 years old, ditching school for guitar and singing lessons every week, had finally made it until suddenly he couldn’t be found. Read on in Vinyl’s exclusive interview.

Vinyl had just sat down at a small corner booth in a café in Camden when in came Huw looking extremely well for someone that had been MIA for the past two months. I was pleasantly surprised by his neatly combed hair and his smart attire of a long blue trench coat, a smart white shirt with some, brand new looking, brown suede Chelsea boots. He greets me with a warm smile and a handshake before joining me in the booth. We speak about his childhood and his lack of interest in education. He tells me that music had been his passion since he was 11 years old. Skipping class became the Tuesday and Thursday usual for him and he dropped out of school at the age of 16 to try to make a name for himself in the music world.  When he was 17 his father bought home a guitar after supporting him and his love of music for years even though Huw’s mother did not. After the small talk about where he grew up and what drink the two of us wanted, he then sits back in his seat and we move onto the intended topic. We started by chatting about how successful he had become in such a short space of time and how he had a fan following like no other. Then we spoke about where everything went wrong.  ‘’I started going out more in the night, drinking too much and I would be walking around the streets of Soho at 3am trying to get back to my apartment.’’ After this statement his head tilts down so he was staring at his lap and I knew this talk was upsetting him, though he carries on. ‘’I guess that the paparazzi noticed the pattern of me being out at such early hours of the morning near the bustling clubs of Soho. They started photographing me and publishing articles that were completely untrue.’’ After this Huw looks up and sits forward. ‘’Things just got too much, the stories about me were so unfair, I was only trying to fit in with what all the big pop stars were doing. So I went into hiding for two months back with my family in LLanellen in the Welsh countryside, just to get the paparazzi off my back and find someone else to pick on…’’ his famous smirk then lights up his face as he continues ‘’…but now I’m back and with my new album MIA to celebrate.’’  For the rest of the course of our conversation this boyish smirk does not disappear off his face. We chat about the dates that his album and single are coming out and he orders another drink. We chatted about where he is going to go from now, ‘’I don’t plan on going into hiding again anytime soon [laughs] I mean I never meant to in the first place!’’ He made eye-contact ‘’…there’s no getting rid of me now, I’m back, bigger and better!’’ We wrap up the interview and he thanks me for helping him to open up as we are the first people who he has spoken to since his disappearance. After a small chat about his second album, tour and his new single, we told him to look out for on his tour later this year and he even offered us some free backstage tickets so we can ‘catch up again’!

Huw’s second album ‘MIA’ including the new hit single ‘Lost and Found’, that hit the top of charts a matter of days after release, is out on February the 21^st along with dates for his UK 2017 tours shortly after. Head over to www.Vinyl.com for the dates and links to purchasing tickets. We’re going to be on there ordering ours as soon as they come out! 

Words : Alice Kent

Magazine Photo Shoot Planning.

Shoot dates and times - Friday 13th January 2017. 1:30 ~ 2:30.
                                         Saturday 4th February 2017. 12:00 ~ 1:30.
                                        Saturday 11th March 2017. 3:00 ~ 4:00


Image descriptions -      Medium close up of the artist 'Lottie' [Ellie].
                                         Medium shot, long shot and an extreme long shot. [Huw]
                                        Medium close up. [myself]


Shoot location -              In school, against a white wall.
                                        At my house, again against a white wall.
                                        In a park against a tree.


Permission details -       Both are willing to pose as models and dress in the way that
                                        I want them to.


Props -                            No props will be used for the any of the shoots.        
                                       

My Magazine Analysis