Preliminary Task Brief

Here is the brief I have been given to base my Preliminary Task product around:

Preliminary Task:

• Produce the front page of a new college magazine, featuring a photograph of a student in medium close-up plus some appropriately laid out text and a masthead
• Produce a mock-up of the layout of the contents page
• Include some relevant pre-production exercises

Music Genre Magazines

As part of pre-task research, I have listed some typical music genres of magazines and listed all the conventions, features and audiences that those genres tend to attract or use. Also, I thought about all the representations of social groups and music genres that the magazine industry uses, in order to help me understand how magazines are constructed and why they are successful. Here are the lists I made about music genres such as Dance music, Hip Hop and Metal music.

Music Magazine Cover Representations

Music magazines are widely popular today and have many different genres, which have to be portrayed to the audience instantly, from the cover, in order to attract them to buy and read it. The following ideas show how I would represent some common music genres on magazine front covers.

Dance Music

Intended audience: Stereotypically, young adults and teenagers of both genders. They are usually old enough to go to nightclubs and drink alcohol, too. Overall, the younger generation who are thrill-seeking, young and adrenaline filled.

Colour Schemes:

·         Brightly coloured, neons, in order to portray the fast-paced and uplifting nature of club music.

·         Yellows, pinks, greens and blues would be best, to be eye-catching and draw attention. This would go well with bold, black typography to make them stand out against warm/ intense background colours.

·         A rule of three colours would be best to be effective but not over the top.  E.g. neon yellow, blue and green – appeal to both genders.

Images:

·         Young people dancing in nightclub scenes and cocktail bars

·         Strobe/coloured lighting

·         Dancefloors and DJ’s

·         Youthful images that give good vibes and show ‘clubbing’ music ethics

Coverlines and Stars/Celebrities Featured:

·         Famous dance music artists/ interviews with them

·         Latest chart tracks/news and chart updates

·         Gossip about dance music videos

·         Latest ‘hot’ nightclubs

·         Best selling dance albums

·         Competitions for nights-out with friends etc.

·         The likes of Lady Gaga, Basshunter, 3OH3!, Roll Deep, Cascada etc. – Famous dance music icons/artists

·         Famous dancers and owners of world-famous nightclubs.

Fonts:

·         Sans serif fonts – bold and impacting – reflects outrageous/loud nature of dance

·         Black and white – neutral to stand out against loud background colours/schemes – draw attention and place emphasis on coverlines to attract readers to it on the shelf.

Hip Hop

Intended audience:  Mostly teenagers, young adults and keen dancers or DJ’s. Hip hop is a big part of modern day chart music and so would appeal to a wide range of young people of both genders. It also has a ‘black music ethic’ and associated with rebellion - appeal in this way to audiences.

Colour Schemes:

·         Bold, bright colours, graffiti-style – black and white typography to emphasise it

·         Appeal to younger people in bright, impacting colours e.g. red, black and white together, or blue yellow and black for example.

Images:

·         Stereotypical street dancers, young people having a good time

·         ‘Street life’ pictures – raw talent in dancing, rapping and singing

·         Famous hip hop icons in the media today

·         Dancefloors, dance battles

·         ‘City life’ e.g. New York silhouettes etc.

Coverlines and Stars/Celebrities Featured:

·         Hip hop tracks in the charts

·         Interviews with hip hop icons/artists

·         History/background of hip hop music and dancing

·         Hip hop DJ interviews and information

·         Gossip about hip hop artists’ new songs/albums

·         Interviews with them and their music/dance advice

·         E.g. Flo Rida, Ne-yo, Lil Wayne etc.

Fonts:

·         Mostly sans serif fonts – bold, reflecting bravery of music genre and impact that hip hop can have – personality shown in music

·         Stylistic – graffiti style fonts – reflecting background of music and appealing to young people

Metal

Intended audience:  More mature adults, however also young people that are interested in metal music. Because of the heavy nature of the music, a lot of (mostly male) adults would be an intended/ideal audience.

Colour Schemes:

·         Dark, metal reflecting – e.g. black and silver, with hints of white and maybe powerful, impacting colours like red.

·         Dark backgrounds/plain to make text and images stand out – dark atmosphere

Images:                                Rock legends/metal bands to draw attention

·         Impressive musical instruments

·         Musical icons and their band images/logos (old and new)

·         Dark images/ large concerts etc.

Coverlines and Stars/Celebrities Featured:

·         Latest news about metal genre icons/interviews with them

·         Concert dates and information

·         New songs in charts and compare to old metal iconic songs

·         Guitar lessons/tips/advice inside and concert ticket discounts etc.

·         Iconic metal genre musicians from modern and the past

·         Metal genre artists and graphic designers for bands etc.

·         E.g. Ozzy Osbourne, Metallica, Green Day etc.

Fonts:       Metallic, dark, sharp, bold and impacting – heavy rock lifestyle

·         Sans serif – to the point – representing ‘rebellious’ nature of metal music and ‘no fear’ with dark colours – black, silver, grey, white, navy blue etc.

·         Stylised – lightning bolts, rough edges, graffiti etc.

Classical

Intended audience: Older audience, adults and some younger people who are interested in playing musical instruments. Typically a well-educated audience, with good musical knowledge.

Images:

·         Musical instruments, orchestras and famous musicians

·         Some classical singers

·         Sheet music themed images – notes, treble clef – relevant to genre

Colour Schemes:

·         Simplistic and sophisticated – black, white and blue for example

·         Elegant and clean looking, with simple graphics that are eye catching and calm – reflects nature of music

Coverlines and Stars/Celebrities Featured:

·         Information about orchestras, concerts, stage shows all using classical music

·         Interviews with musicians/singers

·         News about albums/recordings

·         Sheet music included and musical advice/tips

Fonts:           Serif fonts – stylised and sophisticated to blend with nature of adult intended audience, with more technical musical language.

·         Eye catching but not too bold or large and more old fashioned with theme of musical scores – appeal to older audiences.

More Experimental Photographs

These are other photographs that I took around the Southdowns College Site. I was taking photographs with the intention in mind that they would serve as a good background, central image to a College Magazine front cover, with the option of editing them once uploaded to a computer. I tried to use different camera angles and lighting to gather a range of different images, all focusing on the College activity and buildings, directly addressing the nature of a College magazine genre. For example, I took this photo of  (149) the view down the stairs of the Balcony Cafe at a downward angle, in order to give the image good, first-hand perspective of the college. It is also an image that uses the background of the College buildings to give different depths to the picture, making it seem realistic and eye-catching. The shadowing also gives the image an interesting perspective. If I was to edit and manipulate this photo, I would play around with the crop tool, making the central focus of the image the descending stairs and the building in the distance.

Analysing Existing Media (Textual)

After annotating the image of the front cover of 'Glamour Magazine', I decided to write an account of what I found from looking at the cover and the features that it uses. Each one is used for an effect, to draw intended audiences' attention and to sell the magazine successfully. Here is my written account of what I interpreted from the magazine cover.

The Connotations of:

The Title:

·         Masthead – Bold, vibrant sans serif large font

·         Catches attention easily – appeals to a younger target female audience

·         Partially covered by main central image – so well known and still recognisable – modernised feature

·         Vibrant blue – imitates the sea as it is an August/Summer issue

·         Catches attention – appeal s to all areas of target readers.

·         Become the magazine image’s logo and unique selling point

·         Main headline in centre of first-third – Most emphasis upon this coverline, as it the main focus of the issue.

Main Image:

·         A well known TV star and celebrity (Blake Lively) – draws attention to magazine

·         She is a role model for fashion – appealing to a young female audience, readers of the same age as the celebrity.

·         Attractive, glamorous image – readers can aspire to be like her.

·         Photo has direct eye contact with the audience – draws them to it

·         Women and teenage girls want to know the gossip about her and her TV show, Gossip Girl

·         She is dressed in a revealing, high-fashion and expensive dress – portrays focus on fashion of the magazine and directly links to magazine title and masthead; Glamour.

·         Image takes up whole of the centre-third – forming the main focal point of the cover

Colour Scheme:

·         Strict colour scheme – Rule of Three – black, vibrant yellow and blue

·         Reflects the idea of sun, sea and sand – Summer themed to suit issue date (August)

·         Vibrant, warm and cool colours that stand out and appeal by drawing attention

·         Slightly shadowed background – simplistic/professional and places emphasis on the model image and the vibrant text, giving it a sophisticated appeal to female readers

Font Types:

·         Same sans serif font used for all main story/cover lines

·         Stands out and can be read from afar – draws attention

·         Smaller and italic fonts are used for quotes and smaller strap lines alongside coverlines, to add information and engage potential readers

·         Drop shadowing used on some text to place emphasis upon it

Coverlines:

·         All relevant to a modern-day female audience – fashion, celebrity news, sex and love, dieting, real life stories and shopping

·         Numbers are used for main coverline to entice readers; ‘544 New Season Looks’

·         Famous names used to draw attention; ‘Katy Perry, Kylie’ etc.

·         Language/text used is casual, flirty and colloquial – all appeals to nature of female readers

·         Persuasive words used to draw attention; ‘all-new, real-life, new season looks, sexy stomach and bum plan’ etc.

·         Quotes used from real-life stories – catches attention with shock-tactics

Selling Points:

·         Plug/Puff: Number used to make it seem superior than other magazines of the same target audience and genre

·         E.g. ‘544 new looks’ and ‘glossy mag only £2’ – this draws attention and persuades readers as they can spend less money than some higher-rank fashion magazines e.g. Marie Claire, but still get a good quality and story-rich magazine, at an affordable price for a monthly issue.

·         Above masthead banner – ‘No 1 women’s magazine’ – This gives it status over other magazines and appeal to readers – persuasive selling point

·         Smaller, compact size magazine – ‘handbag’ size – convenient for female readers

·         Website featured with masthead- places attention to it – appeals to our modern-society and dependency on the internet and computers 

·         Barcode not on cover – gives more space for coverlines - appealing

Audience:

From analysing all the key features of the cover of this ‘Glamour’ magazine, I have inferred that the main target audience for this magazine is female and could range from teens (16,17,18 etc.) and range up to young women aged 20s for example. All the main features of this cover i have analysed seem to be aimed at appealing to a female audience, and it effectively does so as a result, as it is a widely popular magazine, and had been voted ‘Britain’s Number 1 Women’s magazine’. As a keen reader of this magazine myself, I can see how it appeals and why the editors have used the features in this particular cover example.

Analysing Existing Media

In order to gain some vital/useful background knowledge of successful existing media products, I scanned into my computer an image of a magazine front cover (Glamour Magazine, Summer 2009). Referring back to my Case Study of IPC Media, I decided to analyse the cover of a different media institution's magazine, and Glamour is published by 'Conde Nast Publications', so I chose this to analyse, as I am familiar with it and am a member of it's target audience of teenage/young adult women. By carrying out this research, I am able to see how a successful magazine cover is constructed and the features it uses to draw audience attention. To the right is the annotated image of the magazine cover >

Practical Experimentation - Photographs Edited in Photoshop

Photograph 1 - College Courtyard

<- As my first experiment with a photograph, I used this photo I took on the Southdowns College site. I found that it had a good perspective, looking down the pathway towards the college. I opened the file in Photoshop, using layers to edit it. Firstly, I experimented with the 'healing tool' to create a perfect blue sky, editing out clouds from the original image and then using the colour dropper to heal the image. I also used the 'levels tool' to adjust the colour intensity, making the grass a more vibrant green and the brick of the building stand out more. Lastly, I used the crop tool to cut out parts of the photo that weren't needed. By increasing the brightness of the colours, it makes the photo more engaging and more appealing for a magazine front cover.

Photograph 2 - College Balcony View

<- For a more simplistic image, I used subtle editing tools on Photoshop for my second image. This was a downwards view image taken with my camera at an angle. I chose this angle to give a wide angle, bird's eye view of the college courtyard, putting the viewer into the perspective of the photogragher, this gives a more realistic sense to the photo. I used the touch-up tools to edit out any imperfections in the picture on Photoshop. I also used the colour dropper tool to increase the shadowing of the trees to make the image more interesting. I also experimented with the brightness and contrast of the photo, making it appear brighter and therefore more appealing overall.

Case Study Document:

Here is the research task I carried out:

IPC Media Case Study

Samantha Ashman – Media Studies

IPC media has a diverse print/digital collection of magazines, offering something for everyone in terms of printed consumer publications. They sell over 350 million copies a year.

They focus on 3 main core audiences:

- Men

- Mass-market women

- Upmarket women

Types of magazine and target audiences has IPC been associated with:

Men’s Portfolio (IPC Inspire)

-       Consists of leisure brands in categories;

-       Country, Shooting, Equestrian, Marine, Sport, Men’s lifesyle, Music, Cycling, Decanter, Photography

-       Country Life

-       Horse & Hound

-       Rugby World

-       Nuts

-       Decanter

-       Mousebreaker

-       NME

Mass-Market Women’s collection (IPC Southbank)

Provides a magazine for every stage of a woman’s life.

-       Comprises of famous women’s weeklies in categories;

-       Fashion, Home Interest, Women’s lifestyle and Specialist (Wedding and Hair)

-       Look

-       Now

-       Chat

-       Woman

-       And TV Entertainment brands

-       What’s on TV

-       TV Times

-       TV & Satellite Week

-       And online – goodtoknow network

Upmarket women’s group (IPC Southbank)

-       Luxury fashion brands

-       Marie Claire

-       InStyle

-       And lifestyle brands

-       Ideal Home

-       Living etc

-       House to home

IPC Connect

Connect puts consumer magazines in key sectors:

Celebrity & Fashion, Lifestyle, Traditional, TV Entertainment and Real Life.

-       Now

-       Woman’s Own

-       TV Easy

-       Look

-       Pick Me Up

-       Chat

IPC Media’s Company History

International Publishing Corporation LTD was formed in 1963, after the merging of 3 UK leading magazine publishers (Newnes, Odham’s Press and Fleetway Publications) – Came together with the Mirror Group to form the IPC.

IPC Magazines was created 5 years later (1968).

The Field – Launched in 1853 and became the largest newspaper in Europe, with 24 pages.

8 more titles that are still publishing today were launched in late 1800s (Country Life, Horse & Hound, Yachting World, Amateur Gardening, Cycling Weekly, Shooting Times etc.)

First 4 traditional woman’s weekly magazines –

Woman’s Weekly launched in November 1911

Homes and Gardens – one of the first magazines to be published after WW1.

Woman’s Own – Launched in 1932

Woman launched in 1937

Wartime role played by IPC’s woman’s weeklies – keeping up hope and morale of Britain’s women and supplying information by Government wishes.

Surge in Music Scene –

Arrival of New Musical Express in 1952.

NME became the first major UK Title to get it’s own website – nme.com – destined to become Europe’s most popular music website.

IPC Magazines sold to Cinven for £860 million in 1998 (one of the largest sales in history). And IPC Connect, IPC Southbank, IPC Country are all formed in late 1990s.

The 2000s

IPC Magazines is renamed IPC Media in 2000

Time Inc. buys IPC Media for £1.15 Billion in Oct 2001 – biggest deal ever seen in UK

Nuts is launched in Jan 2004 – the world’s first men’s weekly magazine

Pick Me Up launched in Jan 2005

Tv Easy launched in April 2005 – Britain’s first compact paid-for Tv listings weekly - £10 million investment

Look launched in Feb 2007

January 2010 – IPC Media restructured around 3 key audience groups – Men, mass-market women and upmarket women.

Why IPC might be an appropriate publisher for a new music magazine:

IPC Media is a vast and highly successful publishing company that have continued to expand since its launch in 1963. They have continuously signed on new magazine titles to be published under their name, and they have all been successful in the UK.

They also publish the iconic music magazine, NME, which is the longest published and most respected music weekly magazine in the world. It also reaches over one million music fans a week, however, it is IPC’s only weekly music magazine, not leaving many choices for music fans.

Based on this information, I can see that IPC might be a good publishing option for a new music magazine title, as they have made NME so successful.

Also, IPC might be open to a new music publication, as although NME is hugely successful, it is only one of two existing publications they have (NME and Uncut), so they may be willing to expand their collection for music magazines, and take on a different take on a music magazine to widen their options and increase sales from a different target audience.

Types of Music/types of magazines IPC are likely to publish:

From research, I can see that IPC Media takes care of only two music magazines (One weekly & one monthly) and these are widely popular. NME is based on contemporary music, making it the most up to date music magazine, featuring all the latest music news. They also publish Uncut, which focuses on Rock music and Film, both new and old, cult and classic. This shows me that IPC may be open to a new music genre magazine, not focusing on Rock music or contemporary alone.

Bauer Media – Alternative Company

Bauer Media is Europe’s largest privately-owned publishing group. They own more than 80 influential media brands spanning a wide range of interests, which are in groups:

Women’s, Men’s Entertainment & Lifestyle, Equine, Gardening, Transport, Sport, B2B, Outdoor, Photography and Lifestyle. Including:

-       Heat

-       Grazia

-       Closer

-       Yours

-       Mother and Baby

-       Kerrang

-       Empire

-       FHM

Magazine heritage goes back to 1953, with launch of the Angling Times and the 1956 launch of Motor Cycle News, both still running today.

In 1994, they bought a small magazine called ‘For Him’ – which is now the core of the best-selling international brand FHM.

They also own multiple radio stations (Kiss Fm) and music channels like The Box.

Closer was launched in 2002 and Britain’s first glossy, Grazia, was launched in 2005.

Music Magazines owned by Bauer Media

Kerrang – Rock music on TV, radio, online and print.

Mojo – Heart and Soul of music

Q – Biggest selling music monthly magazine – World’s biggest music stars – references to politics, comedy, sport, film etc.

This shows me that they might be suitable to publish a new music magazine, filling a gap in the music magazine market, in order to gain more readers and therefore buyers, putting money into their company. Due to their evident interest in the music industry I think that a new magazine proposal would be welcomed by them.