My preliminary task
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My media product challenges conventions by representing both old and new school of R&B and soul music, giving it a wider audience. It uses the colors red, black, and white to represent passion and class while staying calm. The central image on the cover is a medium long shot of artist Nicky Jane Ross making eye contact, attracting the audience. The target audience is ages 18-35 since it represents both generations of the genres.
My preliminary task
- 1. · In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? My magazine was inspired a lot of different magazines from different genres but I would say mainly by VIBE magazine as my magazine was partly a hip hop magazine as well. I looked at the layout, colour scheme and the mastheads they used, to get inspired. I noticed that with most magazines the masthead would be placed behind the heads of the artists, but that depended on how popular the artist was and also if the magazine itself was popular enough to partly hide the magazines name. In my magazine (RnBsSoul) my artist “Nicki Ross” is slightly covering up the masthead, because even though the magazine is quite new, which means that the masthead should actually be in front of the artists head, so that people could read it, I wanted her to be the centre of attention, because due to her popularity people would buy the magazine, and like that they would get familiar with the magazines name. By having the masthead in white and being on a black background it stands out and catches the audience’s attention, and at the same time it brings calmness and softness into the front page. This was important as the name of the artist is in a bold red, which shows the passion, so it needed a color to bring calmness, so that it would be balanced. I used the following conventions to make my magazine look like a real magazine: Barcode (so that my magazine can get scanned), cover lines (Nicky Jane Ross and stories that are in the magazine), I did this so that when people saw the cover lines it would attract them to buying the magazine, as well to just give them a little inside to the magazine. I made sure that some cover lines are bigger than others, as this shows the importance of the different stories, and as Nicky Ross is the centre of attention in my magazine, it was very important that her cover line was the biggest one. As she is a well-known artist, a lot of people would be attracted to her story and therefore buy the magazine. For the placements of the cover lines, I looked at other magazines to get inspired, and saw that most of the time the cover lines were placed around the central image, but without distracting or confusing the readers, it rather made it more appealing. So that’s what made me place my cover lines around the image as well. I wanted to challenge other magazines by not just having one genre as most magazines, that’s why my magazine represents both old and new school of both RnB and Soul. This gives me a wider audience but also makes my magazine stand out from others and makes it break out of the stereotype.Throughout my magazine I kept my color scheme consistent. So that it wouldn’t lose its focus. I mainly used red, black and white on my magazine. The red represent the passion of RnBSSoul and also keeps on catching the readers eye, the black just makes sure it stays calm and doesn’t lose the main focus of the magazine, and the white shows the class and purity in the magazine.I kept the colour scheme consistent throughout the magazine. My main image of Nicky Jane Ross is a medium-long shot in the middle of the front cover. I made sure that the image was taken in a direct mood, as it is very important that the person on the front cover keeps eye contact with the audience, as that also attracts the audience. I also tried to follow and develop conventions on both Contents page and my DPS. On my contents page I used more than one image to show other artists that were going to be in the issue and the featured artist. I also placed page numbers on the images so that people only interested in certain
- 2. artists could look at the image and jump straight to the page. Again I looked at music magazines to get inspired, for my contents page, I tried to keep in close to their layouts so that it would look real. Then for my features and regulars of my magazine I once again looked at different magazines and used parts of their layouts of that as well, for my own magazine. In my Double Page Spread, I followed conventions by including a small cover story about Nicky Ross’ struggle with the media and an interview between the artist and the interviewer. I did this because both of these are very common in music magazines. I also used a defining quote from the interview in bold text and placed it on the side of the interview so the reader can get a sense of what certain questions will be about, I got this idea when I was doing my case study(VIBE magazine interview with Solange Knowles. This is something that is used very often in magazines. · How does your media product represent particular social groups? My media product represents both male and females and probably has a wider age range (18-35) as usual magazines as it represents both old and new school music. Because my magazine doesn’t just represent one genre as well, (as it represents both RnB and Soul) it gives me a wider audience as well. My artist that I used for RnBsSoul is 25, this is right in between the age bracket, which is good because like that both the younger and older generation can relate to her.Her style, morals and music appeal to everybody is this age range. The central image on the front cover shows a young black woman that is very sexy but still classy. She shows the sexiness by curving her back and resting her hand on her hip, this little but important details help to exaggerating her figure. Even though the dress is quite fitted, I made sure it wasn’t too tight and didn’t show to much skin, so that the image would still have class. Her sophisticated look also shows her class. I used this image because it shows her sex appeal and class very nicely. This is important, because sex sells and the class makes the crucial difference between an porn magazine etc. and an actual music magazine. Females would most likely buy this magazine, because of her appearance/fashion (her hair, make up etc) as they idolize these celebrates and try to get their inspirations of fashion from them. Males would probably be attracted to the woman herself, but then in a more sexual way and therefor buy the magazine. · What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why? Miller publishing would be a publisher that would be interested in my magazine as they publish a lot of magazines that go into the direction of my magazine such as VIBE magazine, but also Gospel Today. Even though Miller does not just publish one genre my magazine would be the first one that represent more than just one genre in a magazine, and this would be another reason this company would want to publish my magazine, because it would gain much more publicity. · Who would be the audience for your media product?
- 3. The main audience would be 18 to 30, as my magazine does not only present the new but also the older generation of RnB and Soul. RB’s Soul doesn’t just have one specific social class that it is talking to, but rather covers all of them as it is intellectual, classy, but still hip, fun and easy to read. My magazine will be targeted both at male and females, so I will make sure that there will articles in RB’s Soul that will interest both genders. There is no specific ethnic group that I’m targeting at either, as this genre of music can be listened to by any ethnic group. · How did you attract/address your audience? I attracted my audience firstly with my artist that is on the front cover. Secondly I made sure that each cover line speaks to a broad audience and doesn’t narrow it down to just one particular group. I also showed artists fashion in RnBs Soul magazine, their stories (biographies etc.), and the links between oldies and newbies. I also showed that the magazine has a website, so that people that don’t want to actually go to the store to buy it would have the ability to go online and subscribe and read it there. Like this they can keep up to date easier, and because we live in a society that’s very used to technology and that has become comfortable it will attract more people. · Use of models, colours-layout, language, genre and style of content The colour scheme is calm, classy, but still hip! I achieved this by using white, black and a red. The lettering is in a cursive style.The red represents the passion of the music and magazine. It represents both old and new school of the two genres that I’m using and because old school had a lot of bright colours I thought red would suite it very well, as it shows the fun of the music!The white shows the pureness and elegance of the magazine and shows that unlike other magazines of this genre this magazine is rather representing the class and elegance of the celebrities that are being presented in the magazine. And the black calms the magazine down and evens out the red. · What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product? Camera, studio, Photoshop, InDesign, prezi, blogger, survey monkey, slide share etc. The process of constructing my product has taught me a lot about using cameras, software such as Adobe Photoshop and InDesign and also websites such as Prezzi and Survey Monkey. When first using the cameras I had a very basic knowledge and didn’t know about important factors such as shot types and lighting. Using the photo studio I got a small inside to a professional photo shoot. I was able to use a lot of equipment I was not familiar with before, this expanded my knowledge about photography. Because of the introduction we had with the photography teacher I did not have any major problems on the day of my photo shoots. All in all it was a fun experience and also thought me a lot about photography and organising a shoot.
- 4. For my front cover I used Adobe Photoshop, because I was already familiar with that it wasn’t that difficult, but still challenging as I used it in a different way than I was used to, but now I do feel more comfortable with that program as ability of using it has expanded. I can use more tools and effects and know more than I did before. Adobe InDesign was something I had to get used to first, as I hadn’t used it before, so at first it was quite tricky, but after I understood the basics of it was fun and helped me to develop my magazine even more. I’m glad that I was able to use it and learn about it, as I feel comfortable on it now. For questionnaires and presentations I used websites such as Prezi and Survey Monkey. This wasn’t particularly difficult, but I had fun doing it and now know a different way of doing questionnaires and presentations. · Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product? At first I felt very uncomfortable about this task as I didn’t know anything about it (lighting, colour schemes, shot types, posing etc), but after completing this task I must say I feel much more comfortable with it and can confidently say that I would be able to create another magazine successfully. In this task I learn how important it is to have the right lighting and background as well as clothing as it affects the shoot/ image very much. I believe my skills in planning and improvisation have improved as well, because that’s what this task was mainly about- planning the shoot, dates, layouts for the magazine etc and improvising with the models. I learned about the importance of planning, by not planning it so well on some parts, because this showed me how much easier it would have been if I would have planned it all out.