Evaluation

In order to gain public feedback to my magazine, I have set up a poll asking my audience their thoughts and opinions on my magazine. The majority of people who have completed the poll have been between the ages of 16 to 24 years, which is the primary age group that my magazine is aimed at, therefore the response to my magazine is taken from what would be my potential audience.

In what ways does your Media product use,
develop or challenge forms and conventions of
real media products?

I believe that my music magazine follows the conventions of other products within the same medium. I learnt these conventions when I carried out my research, where I looked at a selection of other music magazines from a variety of genres. My front cover contains conventional features such as a masthead, an edited photograph, a bar-code, price, issue number and a headline. The contents page follows the conventions of real media products by containing additional edited photographs and by giving information such as page numbers, article titles and short descriptions of the magazines content. The article on my double page spread follows the conventional layout of an interview, and again contains an edited photograph, a headline and a strap line. This spread is also conventional as the photograph is the main focus point of the article, as it takes up the whole of the right hand side page, in the same way as the articles in the magazines I looked at in my research. The limited palette of colours which I used on my contents page follows the same conventions as "Q" magazine, which uses simplicity in order to attract it's audience. The masthead on my front cover follows the same conventions as "NME" and "Q", as I used white text against a bright red background to make the page as eye catching as possible.

How does your Media product represent
particular social groups?

The social group that has been represented in my magazine is young men and women, between the ages of 16 and 21, who are members of bands or who are solo artists. They have been represented through the original photographs that I have taken. I felt that using people from this age group in my photographs would appeal to my primary target audience of 16-24 year olds. I portrayed the models as being happy and relaxed, as I wanted their positive mood to reflect on my audience. I wanted to represent the models in my photographs as being modern and fashionable, and styled them accordingly. I felt that styling them in this way would appeal to my target audience because they would be attracted by way the models are dressed. I also used props such as guitars so I positioned my models in a way that made them appear as though they were enjoying playing their instruments, because this gives a positive representation of the music industry. I also felt that using photographs where the models were actually playing their instruments would create a feeling of energy and excitement amongst my audience.

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

The kind of publisher who might wish to distribute my product could be one such as “IPC”, who publish “NME” magazine. This is a magazine that could easily be compared to the style of my own magazine "Jam", as they would contain bands from a similar genre and would appeal to a parallel target audience, so their publisher might also be interested in distributing my product. This similarity in style can be supported with evidence from my poll. From the appearence of my magazine, the majority of voters believed that my magazine covered artists from the indie/rock music genre. This is the style which I wanted to create, as "NME" covers artists from this same genre, therefore I believe that my audience will have noticed some similarity in the style and representation of artists in my magazine.

Who would be the audience for your Media
product?

The audience for my music magazine would cover both males and females, primarily aged between 16 and 24 years. This is supported by the results from my blog poll, as the majority of voters who saw my magazine also felt that my magazine was targeted at this particular age group. However I believe that my magazine could also be enjoyed by a more mature age group who are interested in the genre of music that my magazine promotes because of it's professional appearance. Additionally, it would be suitable for younger readers as it would not contain taboo language, and the level of informality in the written articles makes the stories very easy to read and understand.

How did you attract/address your audience?

I used a variety of techniques to make my magazine appeal to my initial target audience of 16-24 year olds. I wanted my magazine to appear sophisticated so I used colours and font styles which made my product look professional. I also used lots of bold, capitalized text where appropriate so that my audience would find it eye-catching. However because my target audience is primarily older teenagers to young adults I kept the language informal and chatty so that the articles didn’t seem too hard going. I also think that my magazine's name "Jam" would appeal to my target audience because it is short, punchy and therefore memorable. In my poll, the majority of voters thought that the title held the connotation of a magazine aimed at geniune music fans and one that specialises in promoting upcoming artists. This was the connotation which I hoped my audience would take away from the title.

Another technique which I used to attract my audience was to give short, vague descriptions of the articles on the contents page so that their interest would be captured but so they would have to buy the magazine to find out more. I also feel that my original images would appeal to my audience as I styled the people in my photographs in a way which a younger audience would find appealing, for example they were photographed wearing modern, fashionable clothing. The photograph on the front page is edited to make it look refined, giving the magazine a professional feel. However I used more natural photos on the contents page so that my magazine didn’t look too heavily polished, as I didn’t think this would appeal to a young audience.

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

I have learnt a number of new skills from constructing my finished product. I have learnt a lot about the conventions of magazines, particularly music magazines and the kinds of techniques that they use to appeal to their target audience. I have also developed my skills of editing photographs, and how to frame them effectively. On top of this I have also discovered lots of features on Microsoft Publisher that I was not aware of before this project, such as how to wrap text around images and how to adjust the margins on the page.

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

From producing a college magazine as part of the preliminary task to going on to produce my music magazine, my production skills and knowledge have greatly improved. I have become more confident and adventurous in taking photographs, and have experimented with a variety of different shots, angles and frames. I have also developed my understanding of magazine conventions and how these are used to appeal to a particular kind of audience.