Additional Magazine Research

Another popular music genre magazine that is popular today is 'NME' magazine. This is a British magazine in origin and is widely successful. It is published weekly and had a total circulation from July to December 2009 of 38,486. It was first published in March 1952 and it was the first British paper to include a singles chart.
It is the most associated with popular music culture and festival culture. The genres of music that it features are diverse, dependent on what is popular at the time. It also has a vast target audience, of young adults, teenagers and fans of all genres.

Here is an analysis of a typical NME magazine cover and the features that it uses to grab audience attention and appeal to its target readership.

This cover relies heavily on bright, eye-catching colouring of the graphic to grab attention and the connotations imply that the music industry is a lively, exciting and involving industry, which would particularly appeal to a target audience of young adults and teenagers, or anyone interested in the new modern music scene.

The use of a white background allows the black and red typography to really stand out and draw attention. Bold, sans serif fonts are used to make a dramatic impact and advertise the exclusive music stories that the issue includes. The masthead font also looks condensed, to be more professional in appearance. The main image used takes up most of the 2nd and 3rd thirds of the page, forming the main focus of the cover. Also, it is a medium shot, with direct eye contact to attract you to the magazine. The image represents iconic music stars of the time and this draws attention. An effective use on this page is also that it uses a wide range of typography to make the page stand out and reflect the ever changing trends of the modern music world. The cover lines focus on short, snappy wordings and heavy emphasis lies with promoting gigs, attracting a wide audience of young people to the magazine.
Puff space is relied upon on this cover to promote competitions for the readers, which also generates attention.
The iconic NME logo forms the main masthead, which is easily and globally recognised, and does not interfere with the image placement, which gives it a professional aesthetic aspect.
After looking closely at this cover's presentational elements, I think that it is a highly successful cover, as it presents the music interesting in a modern, interesting and exciting way, generating a wide target readership, resulting in high circulation figures.

Existing Product Research - Rolling Stone Magazine

Rolling Stone music magazine was first published in November 1967 and has been hugely successful ever since, with a circulation of 1.4 million. It is based in New York City and is a US magazine in origin. It's fortnightly content is devoted to music, politics and predominantly, the new popular music culture of the day. It gives reviews, star interviews and regular music charts. As this the popular music culture is an area of music I am particularly interested in, I may consider this as the music genre I would like to 'copy' for my own magazine.
The typical target readership for 'Rolling Stone' tends to be young adults and teenagers, due to its focus on new popular music culture and the stars that includes. This is a vast target audience, therefore making it more popular as this demographic tends to read the most magazines per year.


Typical Rolling Stone Front Cover:
Looking at the elements of this existing front cover, I can analyse it in order to establish its target readership and what makes it so effective. The most dominant feature of any Rolling Stone magazine cover is the iconic image. These are taken from photoshoots of world famous music and occasionally acting stars. The image is used to form the entire magazine cover, including the background. This instantly draws fans of the featured artist to the magazine. The main coverline then links to this image and effetive typography and fonts are used to make the text stand out from th image and also draw attention. On this cover, two fonts are used for the coverlines and text above the masthead. It has a 'circus' type design and I like this as I find it visually effective.
The main title Rolling Stone logo forms the masthead of the page, and is placed behind the main image, which is a common trait of the cover, from my research. The iconic red and white typography is recognized worldwide and changes dependent on the cover. I really like the overall appearance of this front cover, as it is effective and I know the magazine to be great in content, after having read it myself.
Here is an analysis of the basic elements:

Beginning The Main Task

In order to make some initial decisions, I need to carry out some background research and analyse some existing media products. The main focus of the Main Task is a New Music Magazine and will involve preliminary research, practical production and evaluation. I am required to create a double page spread, a front cover and a contents page of a new music magazine. I will now carry out sufficient research to help with the designing process.

FINAL PRELIMINARY TASK DOCUMENTS

Here are the jpeg conversions of my final Contents Page and Magazine Front Cover.
After getting feedback from the teacher, I was able to make some final editing changes to the front cover and contents page, and then export the file to save it as a final jpeg format.

Overall, I am very pleased with how my preliminary task products have turned out, considering I had little knowledge of InDesign computer program before I start my AS Media course. I have been able to use the program to create a professional looking document, which I am proud of. I feel that I have used various elements of college life to inspire the front cover. However, I do think that it isn't as professional as I would have liked, due to a few appearance issues I'm not entirely happy with, but this leaves room for improvement for my Main Task, and this I will work on.

Looking at my Contents Page as a whole, I am also very pleased with the end result. I am pleased with the way that it directly refers to and resembles the magazine front cover, and I also feel that I have used an unusual layout, giving it a more contemporary feel.
I found that I was able to use a wide range of images, both taken from the internet and taken from a first hand source (myself taking the photos around college site).
If I was to improve the contents page in a particular way, I would experiment with background shading, to see if this improved the visual appearance in any way. However, I am pleased with it as it stands. To improve for the upcoming main Magazine creation task, I will make sure that I experiment with backgrounds to widen my knowledge.

Overall, I feel that my products incorporate all I intended them to, and therefore I am pleased with them.

Final Contents Page

After the process of editing and arranging, I managed to create a final design image of my contents page. I used a basic layout that I drew out as a flat plan, and then added details to it, in order to create a full contents page, incorporating all the cover lines from the front cover, and a few more to fill up negative space. Here is a screen shot of my final design Contents Page.

Contents Page Production

After finishing my front cover designing, I have used my flat plan designs and the front cover image itself, in order to create the basis of a contents page. After adding some relevant images and a condensed version of the magazine masthead, I decided to add some page numbers and play around with the layout until I created something which I thought looked visually effective and similar to the corporate image of the front cover. Here is a screen shot of my contents page in production.

Final Copy of Magazine Front Cover

After a little more editing and adding of cover lines, I have now finished my final magazine front cover, and here is a screen shot of it from InDesign. I have found that I have become increasingly comfortable with using this program and some of the effects it can create on a document.

I am pleased with my final front cover as a whole, and I can now use my flat plans and the front cover design to create a contents page, which is my next task.

Creation of Front Cover Process

Here is a Screen Shot I took during the creation process, showing my thought processes and my magazine image as it stands. I have imported my two edited images I am going to use as the focus of my front cover. I am now experimenting with layout, font, images and the masthead to create a final design.
I have been constantly referring to my previous designs and flat plans in order to create this front cover, and also I have referred to my research to take inspiration from existing magazine designs, which has proved useful.

Final Masthead Decision

I have decided on this masthead image, as I think it incorporates all my previous designing work, and also looks effective on a magazine front cover layout. I decided on the green coloured background,  as it compliments the colour scheme based on the SouthDowns College logo, and it also forms a universal appeal, to both boys and girls. It is also current, eye catching and suits the nature of a college magazine image.

Photoshop Editing Process

After creating an initial blank InDesign Document, in the more compact format measuring 17cm x 22.5cm, I decided to import an image first.
In order to create a visually effective image, I used my original photo I had taken and opened it for editing in PhotoShop. Here, I used colour filters to adjust the brightness and saturation of the picture, along with using editing tools such as the 'healing tool' to wipe out any imperfections or unwanted shadowing in the picture. I decided on this image (below) because it fits the criteria, shows a college themed setting and also relates directly to my planned cover lines and nature of the magazine. I also used the crop tool, to bring the focus to the girl in the photo, and also cut out any 'empty space' in the background.
After finishing editing the photo, I saved it in an 'EPS' format, which enables me to add it to my InDesign front cover file, in high resolution, giving a good quality image overall.
Here is the comparison of the photo below:

Original Image 

Edited Image (Final Copy)

Flat Plan Sketch Decision

After creating and deciding on a masthead, logo and font designs, I have decided to rework my Flat Plan Sketches, meaning that I have taken inspiration from my first 2 original designs, however haven't replicated them exactly. I have designed this using a different media, Microsoft Word, to show my thought process on the layout of my magazine front cover.
Here is a summary of my new Flat Plan Sketches, forming the design for my Magazine Front Cover.....

Experimenting with Photographs

Photograph 1 - Zoomed out Shot

After planning and starting to create the basis of my magazine front cover image and design, I decided to begin to take some photos that could be for possible use on my front cover. The criteria is that it has to include a mid shot photograph of a student, so given this, I asked one of my friends to be in my photos.

Here are some of the photos that I took, using the basis that it was in a college corridor, including a window to see out of the college and the student (Emma) was looking happy and comfortable at college, indicated by the folder she is looking at.

Photograph 2 - Wider angle shot

I like this second photo, as the facial expressions are more relaxed and happy and would reassure first year students, that read 'Choice' magazine, that college isn't as scary as it may seem, and that it's a comfortable place to be. I have used the setting to indicate it is on the college campus, and to also show the freedom of clothing that students have.

I experimented with different camera angles and settings, in order to see what my options were for the photographs, before I edit them on a computer.

Photograph 3 - Direct Eye contact

For this third photo, I used more direct eye contact, in order to grab attention to the image and show the facial expressions more clearly.

With some editing on Photoshop and InDesign, I think these photos could form the basis of the focus image on my magazine front cover.

Experimenting with Image and Cover Lines

Using my previous designs, I decided to use some of the heading to create practice cover lines. I used my proposal to decide on some possible front cover line topics, such as money, first day at college tips, information about the sports oppurtunities at college and the success of students' work.
Using these topics, I wrote some cover and tag lines as possibilities for my front cover designs.

Title Image/Logo Decisions

After experimenting further with my previous Typography designs, I have decided on which font, colouring and overall layout I would like to use. In the screen shot below, you can see that I have used InDesign to continue my designs further and show my process of thinking as I designed.

I used an image of the South Downs College logo to inspire my designs, using the green and blue colours predominantly. I am doing this to relate the college magazine directly to South Downs College and its students who are more than familiar with the college logo.

I have decided to use a font that is quirky, easy to red but has a young, fresh looking style of its own. It appears to be slightly graffiti-like and can appeal to both genders of students, which fits to my initial ideas. Also, it has individual characters which are different to the rest, showing individuality and also it makes it eye-catching.
After deciding on what font and colourings, I decided to experiment with the arrangement of the two words 'choice' and 'magazine' in order to create an effective logo. I used a rectangle shape and drop shadowing to see which arrangement looked best. I am pleased with these designs and will go on to make a final decision when I create the Magazine front cover.

Experimenting with Typography

After deciding on what name I would like to call my college magazine, I have been experimenting on InDesign with different fonts which could work/look effective on the masthead of the magazine front cover. This is the starting and focus point of the magazine, so I would like to make this look professional
Here is a screen grab of the progress I have made with typography.

I have used a variety of fonts to experiment with colours and effects to work towards creating a masthead/title logo for my magazine.

Using effects such as drop shadows and positioning, I have been able to create some effective ideas that I may use for my final cover designs.