Magazine Evaluation

Magazine Cover Evaluation

The music magazine that I have created does challenge forms and conventions of real music magazines due to the bold fonts, the words, colours and the picture. This can give the reader a hint that it’s a hip-hop and RnB magazine. Compared to other leading magazines it is similar because of the different colours in the fonts. I used the colours yellow for the general information. And the colour white for words that I wanted to stand out. For example the main heading, ‘Switch’ and other words like ‘Beyonce’ and competitions.

I also included the website so that readers could always get the latest information as the magazine is only a monthly issue. I also included two free latest CDs so that more readers would be persuaded to purchase the magazine. I priced the magazine at £1.99 because I feel this is the appropriate price for a young girl to afford. My magazine cover also has its own logo of an arrow next to the heading so that readers will automatically know what magazine it is as this would be our signature logo. Therefore in this way it has a convention of a real magazine.

My music magazine cover can represent certain social groups due to colours, the background and the young girl. This can represent teenagers and the reader can therefore relate to them. I included female artists so that it relates to the genre of the magazine. As it is targeted at females, I thought it would be good to have interviews with female artist, as this would attract the audience.

I would like my music magazine to be distributed to media institutions like Emap, they will help be with ideas and headlines and therefore this will sell more magazines.

My target audience for the magazine will be young female teenagers/adults. I will attract the audience through interviews and latest news from artists. For example, winning VIP concert tickets. I will also attract my audience through the bold colours and the use of language, for the readers to understand.

I have learnt many technologies from the process of constructing this magazine front cover. I learnt how to use Apple Macs because I have never used it before including using Photoshop and learning hints/tricks to emphasize the picture and how different layouts can make the magazine cover better.

Before I constructed my magazine cover I made a small questionnaire so that I could find out what my target audience wanted and expected. From the questionnaire I found out that my readers mainly liked the colours yellow, white and blue and this is why these were the main colours of my cover.

One of my questions in the questionnaire was what kind of music do you mostly listen to?
I found out that people mainly like RnB and hip-hop music and this is why I chose this genre for my magazine. I also found out what kind of cover lines people would be interested in, people mainly wanted to hear about interviews with artists, what’s hot in the charts and if there was any competition for fans to meet their idol. Based on these reasons, I these were my main cover lines.

If I were to make another cover, I would take much more pictures so that I have more of a variety and most likely have a better picture. I would also have more props in the picture to make it more abstract. Before doing the photo shoot I would have done more planning, this includes doing more background research and looking at other genres and seeing which one I would be best at.

By Shahida Choudhury

magazine evaluation

MUSIC MAGAZINE REPORT

In my media classes I have looked at many music magazine covers aimed at different type of audience. These music magazines have different genres including Hip Hop, RnB, Rock and others. In a group of four, we decided to base our genre on Hip Hop and RnB. We then thought of who our target audience will be and came up with a solution that our magazine will be aimed at female teenagers. This was because from looking at many different music magazine covers, mainly the ones that are Hip Hop and RnB, it’s mostly aimed at male teenagers. So we thought it would be fair to aim it at females. 

We decided to call our magazine ‘Switch’ because it relates to the genre of our magazine. In today’s lesson we were using photo shoot programme to make our magazine covers. Taking pictures with a digital camera which were then uploaded onto the programme on the computer. We first were given the task to get use to the tools so that when it came to editing our magazines and making them we knew what tools we could use. 

Such tools we used like cropping, dragging with an arrow, cutting a picture without the background and replacing it with a new background and sing different styles to make the text look very attractive. 

With these little tasters on how to use the tools, it gave me an idea of how I would structure my magazine cover, making sure that I added a strapline, masthead, cover lines, logo, and barcode with the issue date, the main image and the price. 

I was working in a group of four we had to make sure that our masthead and logo were the same font size and the same font. The font we decided to use was called ‘cracked’ and the size we used was 156 pt. For our logo we used an arrow symbol which links with our masthead because the arrow can symbolise ‘switch’ or ‘turn’. 

The colours that I chose for my magazine was black and pink, this mainly showed that my magazine is directly targeted at female teenagers. When it came to my cover lines I found it a bit difficult to decide what colour my font would be. After testing different colours with my background, I managed to work out the colour it would be. I added on style to my text to give my magazine a lift and also make it eye catching and attractive to my audience. By using different fonts and styles I managed to make my cover seem more realistic. 

My main image was placed at the centre of my magazine cover to get the audiences attention. I placed it there because I think that the image is the important part as it will catch interest as looking from other magazines, I noticed that all images were placed on the centre to draw attention. For my main image, I decided to put a male image as I thought my target audience are interested in looking as well as reading. What's more, my cover lines include a lot of female artists which show that my magazine will include a lot of gossip on females. 

Such stories I made up like Beyonce and Jay Z many of my audience would be interested to find out what is going on between them two. I have added on others like the latest interviews with many artists including Snoop dogg, plus win two free tickets to the live concert in Birmingham. 

Furthermore, I have included a bar code and the issue date to my magazine which will be released on April 2009. We decided in our group that our magazine will be released monthly. I added on a strapline on top of my masthead for the audience to find out more of what is inside. 

I think that a certain type of media institution who are interested in Hip Hop and RnB magazines might distribute my magazine because I believe that my magazine includes all issues that meets with the genre, therefore as long as my magazine meets the genre my magazine will be distributed equally. 

I have learnt that technologies over the past years are improving dramatically. Theses technologies show me that everything can be done easily. My magazine was constructed by a digital camera and photo shoot which shows how simple it is to produce something. 

My magazine cover was an achievement, as it contains a list of features which makes it suitable for my target audience- female teenagers who look into Hip Hop and RnB music. My cover shouts out all these matters and covers a variety of these issues to attract the audience’s attention. I’m happy with my layout as it appeals to my audience and expresses different styles and fonts to stand out. I carried on other research to find out whether my magazine included enough to grab my audience’s attention. I made up a small questionnaire and tested it out on five people to see if my magazine is what they expected. I asked questions like if the colours are suitable for my audience and is my competition seem real enough for females to buy it. From the data I have collected, I found out that my magazine included enough for my audience to buy the magazine. I did then change a few bits like the spacing to make it look clearer to my audience including the size font. The colours that I have chosen make the whole magazine itself very striking and bold, which shows that my magazine will sell well. Overall, I am pleasured with my magazine cover if I had a chance to do it again I’d probably research more on what my audience would expect on the magazine what they like, add other interesting images and also work out the size of my font to make it look exciting. 

By Fahmida Begum