Q1
- 1. Q1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? My media product has been inspired by certain magazines, through using these I have used, developed and challenge ideas of these magazines. The magazine I chose to use for my front cover was Q magazine. In my magazine I have used a variety of variables from Q magazine and used them in mine. I chose to use Q magazine as my cover inspiration as I like how it is laid out, but I also like the variety of colours and the colour scheme it uses. I also like the way the cover image is set up, as in the way her hand is by her mouth, I used this factor in my magazine, but used it to my advantage with the ‘quiet’ theme in my magazine. In my magazine I have chosen the same colour scheme, consisting of black, white and red. As you can see the masthead’s are quite similar, however I have developed the box around the masthead, it is the same colour, but I have added a ‘feather gradient’ which adds a shine or a glimmer to the masthead, and makes half of the ‘O’ blend into the background. I have also used the format on the left hand side; however I have made the text bigger on my magazine and the space between each letter is decreased, I developed this too as I added a line which I have placed between each piece of information, I did this to make it obvious where that part of the information stops . I also used the text below her face in the same way, but Instead of using a quote I just kept to two lines instead of the three, to stop the magazine looking to cluttered. As you can see on the real magazine it uses text saying ‘blows us away’ and in the image her hair is being blown back. So in my magazine I used ‘why so quiet?’ and in the image she is miming ‘shush’. I positioned the bar code in the same place but, on Q magazine it has the date, price and website on the part, however on my magazine I have put the website and price underneath the masthead and I have put the date and issue in the contents page. In my magazine I have added a line of text at the top saying ‘The music magazine that’s out of this world’ I added this because of the name ‘UFO’ I thought putting these together worked well. In Q magazine they now have something that is similar but says ‘The Uk’s first interactive magazine’. On the Q magazine there is a badge which shows that it is a special issue and it is the 300 th issue. While making my magazine, I attempted my own version of this (as you can see on the right hand side) I took inspiration from the Q magazine, I changed the colours and developed the badge. However, when I made my magazine I did not add the badges, I didn’t add them because I thought they looked a bit tacky and I think it would make my magazine look to cluttered.
- 2. For my contents page it was again inspired by Q magazine. I chose to use Q magazine as my contents inspiration as I like the layout, such as, the was it is divided into certain sections of the contents page (features, women in music, every month and pictures). In my magazine I divided it into similar sections to Q, I called these sections ‘features’, ‘women in music’ and ‘this month’. I chose to split them into these three sections because I think it makes it easier to determine what to put in each section and makes it easy for interesting stories. I chose to use ‘this month’ instead of ‘every month’ because I didn’t want to make it look like I was copying the magazine instead of taking inspiration from it. As you can see on each section and at the top of the page in Q magazine the boxes are filled with blocked colours, whereas on mine I have again used ‘feather gradient’ which adds a shine or a glimmer to the masthead in the corner, the contents page and each section (features, women in music and this month) I did this again to keep the contents looking similar to the cover and to give it a fading into the light look again. At the top of the page on the right in Q magazine, it has the month the issue was released, the issue and the website of the magazine. I have taken the idea of this and added it to my magazine, I have added the issue and date, and the website, I obviously don’t have a website for the magazine so I made one up. As you can see on Q magazine there is a section called ‘review’ which is a review of bands that people from Q have been to see and describes their thoughts on them. However, in my magazine I decided not to include a review so I developed a different idea instead. I thought my magazine needed more pictures, so I added a picture of an album cover that I had also constructed and next to this picture I added a picture of ‘Kimbra’ who is the artist of the album. For my images I challenged the way in which the image is displayed. On Q the model is look directly at the screen giving a deep feel, she also wears a dull black and has her hair tied in a bun. Whereas, on my magazine, my model is wearing a brightly coloured cardigan giving a natural but bright look. My model also looks away from the screen giving it a sense of deep thought. My models hair is straightened and a deep dark colour and styled into a bob, which seems more natural then being in a beehive etc.
- 3. For my double page spread it was again inspired by Q magazine. I chose to use Q magazine as my double page spread inspiration as I like the way it is laid out across the pages. I also chose it as I liked the big ‘C’ behind all the text, I think using this makes the magazine more eye-catching and pops out at you. I also like how the two pages are divided into two separate pages with a big photo taking up one page and text taking up the other side, I also did this in my magazine. In my double page spread I took some ideas for Q and incorporated them into my magazine. In my magazine I have chosen the same colour scheme, consisting of black, white and red. As I have previously mentioned about the big ‘C’ in the middle of the page.; I took this idea and developed it into my magazine, I developed this idea by incorporating ‘the silent 5’ into the background. I decided to use ‘5’ instead of ‘S’ because the 5 is more eye-catching and makes people think ‘what does the 5 mean’, and this will make them want to read on to find out what the 5 is about. I have also took the idea of having the artists name at the top of the page; I did this so that before the reader begins reading they know who the article is about. But I developed this by again adding a ‘feather gradient’, I did this to make it stand out more than it does on Q magazine. I took the idea of using a quote in the bottom left hand corner, I did this not to just fill up space but to sum up what the article is about. I also used an image in a similar way, the image in Q is a darker image whereas I made mine lighter. I also devolved some ideas, such as, the page number. In Q magazine there is a page number on one side whereas on my magazine I put a page number on both pages. I did this because I thought it would be a bit odd to have the page number on one side but not the other, I wrote the page numbers in red to make them stand out more and allow the page number to be obvious and to let reader know what page they are on with ease. I also challenged using some ideas in my magazine that were not in the Q magazine. I did this with the space on the bigger image, I left a lot of space between the top of the model’s head to the top of the page, I did this to make the image look smaller and give the magazine some space and not look cluttered. I also challenged the idea of putting a signature at the bottom of the right hand page, I made this signature on Adobe illustrator. I added this to make the magazine look more professional and make it more desirable. I think it make my magazine look a bit better than it did without it, because it fills up a gap and I think maybe looks good. As you can tell the layout is the same, but the models are completely different, so I had to challenge this form of media. On Q magazine the model is made into a ‘rock chick’ wearing leather and studs and trying to be sexy; where as my magazine is made to be the ‘girl next- door type’ where she is made to look more innocent and shy stood looking at the floor whereas, the Q model is made to look confident and independent but looking away from the camera, which demands the audience attention making her want to look at us.