Final pieces

Preliminary task complete

Thank you

To the moderator, my name is Grace and this is my blog for my AS Media Studies coursework. Since starting this coursework I have learnt new skills such as; how to use different software, the typical conventions of music magazines and how to attract a particular audience. Thank you for taking the time to read my blog!

Evaluation

Audience profile

I have created 2 audience profiles for the type of people who would read my magazine

Millie is an 18 year old female student who is studying music at college. She loves indie/rock music and always reads magazines like NME and Uncut. She keeps up to date with albums and reviews from her favourite artists and often attends their shows. She also spends her weekends at her local music venue seeing some of the upcoming bands from her area. She is also looking to start a band herself. She is interested in fashion and she gets her inspiration for her outfits from magazines and from following the trends of her favourite artists. When she's older she would like a career in the music industry. She is from a working/middle class background and is prepared to pay monthly for my magazine.

John is a 24 year old male who works full time as a photographer. He has always liked the indie/rock music and when he was younger used to attend gigs a lot of the time. Now he's older and married he doesn't spend nights out chasing his favourite bands but he listens to the radio throughout the day to keep up to date with his music taste. Him and his wife have been to concerts together for bands with the likes of Oasis and Coldplay. He also likes to read magazines like NME and Kerrang. He goes to his local pub on a Friday and listens to the band that play. When he was a teenager he played the guitar in a band himself and he still plays his guitar at home. He is working/middle class and is happy to pay for my magazine monthly

Although they are different genders and at different life stages, the thing they have in common is their music taste. I intend to target this audience by including key pieces about the music and include information on the instruments, upcoming gigs/events and lots more. I have written more about what I'm including in my magazine in the posts called 'market research' and 'stories/articles' on this blog.

By creating these audience profiles it allowed me to show the type of people I'm looking to aim my magazine at. This was helpful as it gives a real idea into what the audience will be like rather than just fitting into categories that I have made for the target audience. This taught me to imagine the type of person and apply the magazine qualities to them.

Left third

The left third is one of the most important parts of the front cover because when the magazines are stacked up on the magazine rack this is often the only part that is visible. This is something I've learnt in lessons and doing research of other magazines

This is my left third. I have fit my magazine name into it so it can be seen instantly by the buyer. I have also got part of my main image shown so that will be a celebrity that will be recognised by the buyer instantly making it attractive to them. I have also got 3 of my current stories which is important because this will want the reader to look inside to find out more

Before starting this course I had never thought about the left third, but throughout I have learnt how important it is and why I needs to have so much attention to detail.

Mise-en-scene analysis: 3

I chose this setting because it is very musical orientated! there are music posters in the background, a guitar, and on the left there's an amplifer. These are things all very involved in the music world and adds to the effect of the genre.

One thing that really bugged me after looking at this photo was that the bed she's sitting on wasn't made! Although it is meant to be an 'at home' interview and should look comfortable, noticing it now for me it was too comfortable and looks scruffy. If I were to take this again I would make the bed or get the model to sit on a chair instead.

 

 

I also took some extra photos to show more of the setting and the props involved in it.

I

 

Looking at mise-en-scene throughout the course allowed me to grasp real ideas and concepts of what it includes and how big an impact it has on the whole magazine. I learnt by taking photos and seeing what I can add in or what should be taken away to make it just right. It helped me get into the mind set of what I wanted my magazine to look like and create my final pieces.

Mise-en-scene analysis: 2

This boy is called Adam, like Carmen he is interested in the indie/rock scene and he loves music. He straight away fits into my genre by the tattoos on his arms, these are a sign of slight 'rebellion' but more the idea of just doing what he wants, because he likes it! I asked him to wear simple clothes of just jeans and a white T-shirt, this was to draw attention to the instruments and the idea of the music he would be involved with. He is wearing a beanie hat because I have seen many other artists dressed like this, and it just looks natural on him. I have included the guitar in this shot to show the genre of music and there are also other musical tools such as the amp and there is a microphone lead showing. Because my double page spread was about an 'at home interview' with this band, I made sure the shot was made visible that it's set in a real house, rather than a studio or made up set.

 

By doing an analysis of the mise-en-scene in my setting it gave me a chance to express the features I have used and how I have done it. I learnt that mise-en-scene is extremely important and without looking at fine details I could have given off the wrong impression or idea of what my magazine is about. Even though my aim was to have these photos look like they were taken in a home, because they actually were there are some things that I have accidentally left in the shot such as a glass, this could have been taken out to make it look slightly more professional. 

Mise-en-scene analysis: 1

This girl is called Carmen. She is an indie/rock music fan herself and reads magazines similar to the one I have created. I chose her because of her fashion sense, she's wearing a band t-shirt which is part of the genre. She is wearing simple, minimal make up and I chose this because with this type of music it's about simplicity, it's not about flashy clothes, fake tan, make up and looking like a 'dolly bird'. She is wearing a few bracelets which are plain and fit in with the style she's trending. I used a guitar because of the genre, and this made it clearer to see that it's an image used for a music magazine.

I learnt how to apply my mise-en-scene correctly throughout the course. I made sure it all applied to the genre and the article I was producing and by creating a profile about the character it really shows how I want the genre to be expressed. Looking at this photo there is one small thing that makes a massive impact, and that is the thermostat that I left in the shot. Even though I could easily crop it out, it is still something that shouldn't be there and that I would look out for if I were to do it again.

Editing process of photo

For my media product I had to edit some of the photos to get them the way I wanted them to look. Here I am going to show the process of how this was done

 

 

First I saved my photo I wanted to use onto my documents 

 

Secondly I dragged my photo from the files into photoshop

 

 

That looked like this

 

 

I then chose the polygonol lasso tool which selects parts of the image that you want when you click, it has a line that works as a lasso tracing around the shape you want. It is very faint in this picture but it shows where I have started selecting the part I want to cut out

 

After I had cut out the shape that I wanted, I then right clicked what I selected and chose 'layer via cut' which then cut my shape out and put it onto a seperate layer



 

Finally I copy and pasted it onto my plain white background to form the start of my magazine front cover

 

 Learning how to edit photos was extremely important for my media product because it was a big part of the magazine. This photo used was my main photo on my front cover so without learning how to edit it, it wouldn't have been right. At first I wasn't very good as it can be seen in the above photos, there are some things that need to be paid more attention to and with more precision, but I learnt this over time and the outcome was what I was hoping for.

Research: Artist/band influence

These are artists I've researched into during the course and they are ones that have influenced me with my own magazine and they are also the type of artists I would want my magazine to feature.

Florence Welch (Florence and the Machine)

What I like about Florence is that she has a unique style and her red hair is iconic, it's the thing she's well known for. She always has hit singles and her albums are always feautred in magazines such as NME or Q.

 

Oasis

 Oasis are a massive band and have always been successful in the indie/rock music industry. Even though they have split up now, all of their songs still live on and they are often mentioned in magazines in 2013. I love the image they are trying to make in this photo and this is the sort of photo I would like in my own magazine.

 

The XX

The XX have only recently become bigger in the music industry, although they have been making songs for a few years now. They are a band that create music with a different approach than any other band and I think they have great songs and style. They often have their abums and singles promoted in magazines like my own.

 

 

Other bands and artists my magazine would feature are: The Smiths, The Strokes, Arctic Monkeys, Kasabian, Kings of Leon, No Doubt etc.......

From doing this research I learnt what type of artist I should be looking to create and what the magazines and audience are looking for.

This is the start to my double page spread. I have kept my grey colouring the same as it is for the front cover and contents page, this develops the house style. I have 2 images in this at the moment that I have cropped, but I'm unsure whether I'm going to keep them or not because I've not finished all of my text

Colours

 

I started with just having a plain white background for my magazine. I chose this because I thought it would show the details of the magazine but instead I decided that it didn't look right and that it didn't blend well. I then decided on a rough, grey backround I made using the fill tool on photoshop.

I think this grey looks so much better because it just seems to work all the colours in together.

 

By trying out different styles and colours I learnt what looked good and what didn't.

Me using software

I have took some photos of myself using the photoshop software

 

Learning how to use the software was a fairly long process and I found that each time I used something like photoshop, I found something new and learnt how to do something different. At first my skills were relatively basic and I wasn't very confident in using all the different types of software, but over time I realised I could learn how to use all the different tools and I would say now that I can comfortably use any of the software again.

Photoshop app

I downloaded a photoshop app to my phone so I could try different types of software and media throughout this task. It isn't half as detailed as the PC version as you can only edit the images, by adding effects, changing the angles and cropping

With this photo I brightened it up and made the colours more vibrant

I cropped this image so it looked more intimate without much of a background, this was because the features of the 2 models could be more dominant. I also softened the photo to see what it would look like

 

With these last 2 photos they wouldn't be ones that I would use in my magazine, they were made to play about with the app to see what could be done. I liked experimenting with the different effects and it made me more confident with the app itself.

 

Learning how to use different versions of the photoshop software helped me when coming to make the real product. It helped me learnt the different effects and what I needed to do when using the PC version.

All photos

Here are print screens of all the photos I took for my magazine. As there were so many they were hard to choose from but I thought to take more would be better so I could experiment with different lighting, angles and shots

Colour schemes

I am unsure wheteher I want ny base colour to be black or white. My main idea is to have an image of the main article as the background, but for now I'm choosing colour schemes. This is using photoshop and it's where I've chosen my fonts and draft colours of red (and white or black)

I learnt what looks good together and what didn't. At first I made mistakes and wasn't sure what I wanted it to look like by after trying out different colours it made me realise what I wanted and then pushed me further to create it.

Images 2: not using

These are photos I have chosen not to use in my magazine.

I chose not to use this photo because his hand is blurred. This is because I wanted to have a photo where it looked like he was in action of playing, however it didn't then out how I hoped.

 

 

I chose not to use this because se doesn't look very comfortable. She is ducking down slightly and the full potential of the image isn't being shown.

 

By looking at the photos that I wasn't going to use, rather than just deleting them, I leant what makes a good photo and how to make it look right just how I had imagined in my head.

Planning

This is what I came up with for my planning, I have a list of shots I wanted to take and I had a list of what props and make up I wanted. On the actual day some of the plans and ideas changed but I kept the main idea the same but with just a few tweeks

I learnt that it was important to plan because without it I wouldn't have known where to start when taking my photos.

Research: Magazine's I'd like mine to be like

I took a print screen of popular indie/rock magazines from google to get more of an idea of what I want my own magazine to be perceived as or compared to. The main one I'm interested in is NME but Q magazine is also a very popular one and these are the 2 most frequent ones shown on the print screen.

This became very useful to me because it showed me a variety of different magazines that were very inspirational. I learnt how to apply the different techniques of these magazines to my own.

Images prezi

I created a prezi to show images I took which might not be used in my magazine but are associated with the genre and the band's lifestyle.



This was the first time I had used Prezi so learning how to work it took a fairly long time. I practiced by making other types and watching tutorials on YouTube and finally learnt how to use the whole software. At first I didn't like the idea of using it, but now I would use to to present any piece of work.

Stories/articles ideas

1. at home interview/meet the band (main article)
2. new album from artist (lee)
3. new collaborations
4. 13 best albums for 2013
5. festival line up
6. buying tickets
7. win guitar
8. 25 best gigs this summer
9. "who's gossipping about who"
10. win/promotional offers
11. 20 tastiest tunes

I chose these sorts of stories/articles by looking at other similar magazines and seeing the sort of things they had featured. This, mixed with some of my own ideas, made me decide on the sort of stories my audience would want to read.

MORE TO COME!

Double page spread article idea

My double page spread will be about a band who have allowed the magazine into their home to do an exclusive interview that they have never done before. It will include images of them in their house in everyday clothes showing us what they get up to in their spare time and when writing songs. It will show the instruments used when making their songs which will be exciting for the readers! Here are some images

This is my favourite image because it shows the two close together showing they come as a pair (or band). They are both looking directly into the camera which I like because it makes a connection with the audience. Both are standing naturally/casually and neither are pulling much expression on their faces, they have just simple half smiles, or smirks - but not in an arrogant way. They just look at ease with the image being taken and with the genre of the magazine I think this is a perfect look

I like the idea of having single pictures of the band members because I want the audience to know their personalities seperately as well as a 2 member band.

Magazine images: 1 (not using)

These are the photo's I decided not to use from the first photoshoot

With this photo there is a small part of the guitar cut off and it looks odd and doesn't fit in with the image. There is also furniture in the background that isn't supposed to be there.

I thought that this photo looked uncomfortable. The model looks awkward and it doesn't seem to work. Also there is some of the paper cut out and there is furniture in the background.

There are lots of things in this shot that aren't supposed to be there so I ruled it out immediately. I don't like the lighting and again like the one above I think the model looks awkward and uncomfortable.

This last image I wanted to try something different by having a "rock" approach. I wanted the model to look like he was throwing the guitar but instead it looked very staged and too posed, so I decided not to use.




Looking at what types of photos I didn't want to use was really helpful because it allowed me to see what was good and what wasn't. At the time when I was taking then I thought they were good photos, however after to carefully looking at them it became clear that they weren't right. By doing this I learnt how to take the photos that were of good quality and looked professional.