Conclusion To The Coursework.

Finished Music Magazine.
THE NOW!

To conclude on This media coursework piece, I enjoyed exploring the different ways music magazine present different genre's, I enjoyed learning different graphic work and writing articles, I have learnt alot of media terms and ideas through this Coursework.
If I were to do it again, I would change the Software that I used to create the magazine itself and get more familiar with the designs that are necessary to create a professional looking magazine. But in a final statement, I believe that overall, this piece of coursework went well.

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

The top two images are my front cover and my contents page from my preliminary task of which I had to compose the front cover and contents for a school magazine, I started the project with not much practice in this sector of work, I found that my work was amateur and lacked substance.

From the preliminary task, I realised that I had to add some character too my work, but then again I found it hard too put character into a school magazine. I found that my School magazine looked a bit too much like a Prospectus, with far too much of a formal look, although with the old school buildings I believed that an old fashioned look would be appropriate.

In the progress from the preliminary task to the final cover and contents, I added it's own style, I went for a personal indie look that I have discussed in previous blog posts, I used appropriate pictures to get my own look, i designed my own Masthead logo on Microsoft Paint, and encorporated it on there, I designed my own theme for the front cover and for the contents, both are different but they use music as their theme, the contents being that of the theme of an Ipod Touch, and the front cover being my own theme making it look like it was being held together by Cellotape.

Looking back I have encorporated a more developed theme to my final front cover, the school magazine cover has lures in the same sort of theme as that of my music magazine, such as the abstract squares, trying to obtain an informal look, I took it a few steps further however with my final piece.

I have also added an information bar and more advanced graphical techniques.

With the contents page you can see that I have completely changed the theme, in the preliminary task, I used a very basic and original theme, this I felt lacked character, so I designed a template of an Ipod Touch and filled it in with text and pictures to try and replicate the theme of the Ipod Touch, I am happy with the originality of my contents page, because that was one of my aims to create an original magazine.

Since my preliminary task I also created two double page spreads to fit my article in, however because I did not do an article for my school magazine, I do not have anything to compare it too that I have done.

Comment.

Although I started this project working with a partner, I eventually branched away and did my own independant study.

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

I used a range of software, the majority of which I had never used before, I slowly learnt how to use the software as I went along, but also the tutorials i found online were useful too.

This is the software that I used.

The software I used was Serif Page Plus 11, this was the main software I used for the project, however I found that at times it wasn't that user friendly, and I would preferably chose to use a better software like Adobe Photoshop given the chance to do this again.

I also used Microsoft Word and Powerpoint 2003, these programmes were used mainly for my blog posts, but also to write my main article.

Blogger was the software we used for writing the blog and Slideshare was the software I used for uploading Powerpoints, Microsoft Paint was used too make collages like the one above.

 My camera was used to take the pictures for the magazine, I found it easy to use, fortuantely I did not come into any problems whilst doing the project, however I learnt how to improve on my photography skills.

 My memory stick was useful for carrying the information of my work on, the only problem I had was the difference between my laptop at home and the school computers, some of the settings kept on changing, for example the fonts on my magazine pages.

 My laptop was where I did all of the work, except some of the research, I ran a new range of software on it, therefore I learnt how to use my laptop differently.

My Ipod touch was mainly used too get the design of my contents page from, however due to it's internet browsing skills it came in handy for research.

I have learnt too use different softwares within the space of time, I found this a challenge at first, but after some practice i found it to be quite easy, the programmes and technology i used were all fairly familiar too me, apart from the Serif Page Plus 11 software, that I had the most problems with, however after a while I managed to over come these issues.

How did you attract/address your audience?

First of all i did a survey over the half term and collected the results, this way I was able to find out what the majority of my audience had going on in their lives to do with music, I posted this on a previous post, but this is the results of my survey.

1.)Are you male or female?




Male: 8

Female: 7



2.)In what age range are you?



12-15: 4

16-23: 6

24-35: 2

35+: 3



3.)What is your favourite genre of music?



Indie: 5

Rock: 2

Dubstep/Drum 'n' Bass: 5

Rap: 3





4.)What do you look for in a magazine?



Good customer feedback: 6

Pictures: 4

Lots of articles: 5





5.)What genre of Tv do you watch?



Comedy: 7

Drama: 8





6.)How do you purchase music?



Itunes: 6

Shops: 4

Online such as amazon: 5





7.)How often do you buy music magazines?



Once a week: 3

Once every two weeks: 8

Once a month: 4





8.)Do you have an ipod/mp3 player?



Yes: 11

No: 4





9.)Do you go to gigs/concerts?



Yes: 12

No: 3





10.)Have you ever downloaded music illegally?



Yes: 8

No: 7



In conclusion to my research I have discovered that the majority of people that read music magazines are in the 16-23 age range, prefer Indie rock and/or drum and bass or dubstep type of music; look for good customer feedback the most in music magazines, prefer to watch drama over comedy which can relate to the type of music they like too listen too also. I have also discovered that people in the majority purchase music of itunes due to its practicality, this is good to note because it could influence free gifts available in a magazine. Also i discovered that people would prefer to buy a music magazine over buying one every week or every month; it is a good middle value. The majority of people that i asked also have an ipod or another form of mp3 player, this shows that people are more keane to listen to music on the move, i also found out that most people go to gigs or concerts, to see their favourite band live but the majority of people have admitted to downloading music illegally online.
 
 
I addressed my audience in this manor, and then began to plan my magazine around this, for example i found that the majority of people had an Ipod so i set my contents page in the theme of an Ipod, because of the majority of my audience would appreciate this.
 
I originally attempted to make a contents page that was simulating that of an editors desk, I however did not finish it because I believed that my audience could not relate to this as much as the Ipod themed contents page.
 

As you can see the differences between the idea of the editors desk as a contents page and that of the completed Ipod contents page are quite drastic, so I had to choose which one to develop and in the end I believe that the Ipod was the good choice to go for.

To appeal to the audience of 16-21 year olds I used the main band in the same age group, We Fight Dinosaurs, who luckily I am very close too, I used pictures of young bands to promote the young readers too purchase the magazine.
I then addressed the audience by doing a questionnaire after I had finished my pages, asking for their feedback, overall I got a popular review.
To conclude with the use of imagery, such as colourful rave colours and existing media products and the use of the modern slang in my article, I managed to attract and address my young audience.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

As I stated before the main audience for my media product would be the Stereotype of the Indie genre.


As you can see in this picture of myself, I am dressed in the indie style, sort of going for a vintage look, with the long hair, ear piercing, braces and a fully buttoned up shirt, this is the sort of audience I am aiming for.

The particular audience I am aiming the magazine at is people that go to gigs alot, enjoy the music and have the taste in music that include bands such as Foals, Kings Of Leon, The Libertines etc.
I have aimed for an age group of 16-21 which is roughly that of the NME magazine since I have roughly based my magazine around that of NME.
I have aimed for both genders, as too not single out the audience and not too gain a wider appeal, people that purchase or download regular amounts of music and want too keep up to date with the current music scene.
I have also tried too appeal to the audience with my Ipod themed contents page, so they can relate the menu to something they own or have used.
I have also tried to target it too students

To conclude I have gone with the stereotype of the indie scene, aiming at the young generation, both genders and those that have a big interest in current and old music.

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

The Media institution IPC MEDIA might distribute my media product, because they are the publisher for magazine NME, although the company Time Inc. owns this IPC MEDIA.
 
The magazine NME is fairly similar to my own, so I believe that IPC would choose my magazine too publish. The company however also publish the magazines What's On TV, NME, Country Life, Marie Claire and Nuts.

The company offer a wide range of selection when it comes too magazines, I feel that my although my magazine is a music magazine, it also tried to push the boundries, therefore I believe that this will be acceptable for the company too take on my magazine.
The corporations main target audience are males but it also has magazines that will appeal too women such as Marie Claire, I feel this is important to note, because it shows that the company are trying too appeal to both genders, much like my magazine is trying too.

A company I am also considering is Bauer Media Group , the reason for this is that they also produce magazines such as Kerrang! and Q, these magazines are fairly different, so therefore are aiming for different stereo types of an audience, which could also come into my favour because my magazine as stated before is trying to stretch itself too as many possible audiences as it can.

I am going to choose to go for IPC MEDIA however, because The NME magazine is the most similar to mine, and has a wider audience range, which I believe will benefit my music magazine.