Choice of Colour

For my main task the choice of Colour was extremely important for the design on my pages. From trial and error, I knew that splashing any colour onto a page does not make it successful for the reasons that  it looks unprofessional, untidy and somewhat confusing. The main choice of colours I went for were light blue and white.

Dark colours tend to make areas appear smaller, have a more dramatic effect and can add punch to decorating style.

Bright colours , tend to brighten an area, making it appear more open and roomy.

the most important part of choosing colours is do I like it? Does it make me feel comfortable with the design?

Choice of Font

For my main task, The choice of font was very important.It makes or breaks the whole design in my opinion. It had to suit the design of the page. For my task, I used only one font on the front cover because Typically the human eye likes simple looks. I tend to personally get lost when I see more than two fonts on the page so usual I skip to the next page. Also, Many fonts distract the reader and as a result it looks unprofessional. 

This is a good example.
In this VIBE magazine, I can only spot two fonts. The title of the magazine is a different font to the subheadings and text. I notice here that the bigger text including the title is yellow. The layout of the page is quiet neat. The position of the text are well placed and is inviting for the reader.  




The font of my title is the same as every other word on the page. This is because it looks neat and tidy and therefore, attracts the reader. The sizes of the text are mostly different. Using common sense, The more important headlines and stories are much bigger.

Final Music Magazine Product

These are some of the pictures that I had taken to form the basis of my front cover and my double page spread.

Name for Music Magazine.

For my music magazine I wanted to come up with a title that is attractive and eye catchy. As my magazine is a mainstream magazine I couldn't come up with a name that is specific to a genre of music so I had to make up a title that is attractive to a wide range of music fans. The title names that I had in mind are;

• Style 
• Mainstream 
• Music 
• Beats 
• Rhythm 
• Bass
• Tunes 

I recorded my results and I let my colleagues decide on which name they prefer. 

here are my results.

As you can see, many people voted on which name they preferred the most. Mainstream received the most votes while Tunes received the least.

This didn't change my decision as Mainstream was my favourite from the beginning. 

I have decided to call my magazine 'Mainstream'  

Uses and gratifications theory

Today we learned about the Uses and gratifications theory. What is the Uses and gratifications theory?. The Uses and Gratifications Theory is a popular approach to understanding mass communication.  In this lesson we had to answer 5 questions. To help me answer them i used wikipedia as it is a very useful free encyclopedia. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uses_and_gratifications_theory). The questions we had to answer are;

• What information is provided about the music artist/band itself?

The information provided about the music/band will be events, upcoming tours, new albums, life stories about the band members, etc.

• What sense of personal identity has the reader with the magazine and music forms that it promotes?

The personal identity my magazine will promote with the reader will create a sense of self belonging to there preferred genre of music.

Interview Magazine: Lady Gaga

Interview with Lady Gaga.

INTERVIEW: Your album The Fame came out last year, but, inarguably, 2009 has been the year of Gaga. How are you feeling?

LADY GAGA: It's been a life-changing year for me creatively as a musician and a performance artist. I walk away from the Fame Ball humbled by my little monsters-my fans-and proud of the Haus for all its successes amidst the adversity of the industry. We killed it.

INTERVIEW: You got two tattoos in Japan. What's the one on your inner arm that you got in Osaka?

LADY GAGA: That one commemorates my favorite writer, Rainer Maria Rilke, a poet and romantic philosopher. In German he writes, "Confess to yourself in the deepest hour of the night whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write. Dig deep into your heart, where the answer spreads its roots in your being, and ask yourself solemnly, Must I write?"

INTERVIEW: What about the second love tattoo on your shoulder, the one you got in Tokyo?

LADY GAGA: That was to celebrate the Haus's collaboration with legendary Japanese photographer Araki. I was bound by Araki's personal bondage artist, by several ropes and Japanese knots, and through a visceral bondage and sexual-torture experience, Araki photographed me, using a series of several cameras. He did not photograph my image; he photographed my soul. We spent the night with Araki and his friends at a members' only bar he's owned for more than 20 years, where he displays his work. Here, he painted me and took Polaroids through the night. I was honored to be the first American woman he's photographed, and only the second pop artist, in the company of Björk. He signed the Polaroids "Tokyo Love," and the Haus got tattoos of his marking in celebration.

INTERVIEW: Lady Gaga fans are some of the most obsessive out there right now. How do you relate to them?

LADY GAGA: I love my little monsters. Now I live and create only for them.

This interview is with Lady Gaga about her album 'Fame'. 

The first subject interviewer talks about is Lady Gaga's feelings to her rise to fame.  He/She compliments her power, 'The year of GAGA', this symbolises her talent by implying that she has stolen the year and have had a massive impact on the public eye  and her music production. The use of language here is simple but powerful, words like inarguably suggests that there is no doubt that she was the star of the year, recognisable around the world. 

Gaga replied positively straight away that it had been a life changing year for her and her career. 

Then the interviewer goes on to question Lady Gaga about her tattoos, she asked her what the tattoo represents. 

Gaga replied that it represents her favourite writer, Rainer Maria Rilkem. She quotes one of her lines written in German', this could have been key to her inspiration and success. 

target audience

My target audience for my general music magazine would be for both male and female from the age of 14 -20. As I have chosen to do a general music magazine so I won’t stick to a specific genre of music. This is good as it would appeal to a wide verity of music fans and go on to be more successful than other magazines that limit them self’s to one genre of music. The music genres I will include in my magazine are; Pop rock, crossover jazz, indie rock and Hip hop. I chose these genres as they interest my taste in music. Also, I will base my own fictional singer - song writers on famous singer - song writers such as, Jason Mraz, James Blunt, Jamie Cullum, Jay Z.
I think this would draw the attention of many young music fans of those genres.  

My Ideal Reader

This is Oliver Macknight

 He is 23, and lives in North London, he was born in Brisbane, Australia and is currently studying Sports Science in Loughborough University. He is quite fashionable in the way he dresses.

He shops in high street fashion shop such as, H&M, Top Shop, Hollister, River island, ect. He enjoys films like the American Pie series, Eurotrip, The Hangover, Tropic Thunder, The Dark Knight. Also, he watches programs like Friends, Scrubs, Family Guy and American Dad. His hobbies consist of Rugby and football. He listens to Pop jazz, Indie Rock, Pop rock, Alternative Rock, Blue eyed soal. The radio stations he listens to are XFM, Kiss 100 and Radio 1.

Uses and gratifications theory

Today we learned about the Uses and gratifications theory. What is the Uses and gratifications theory?. The Uses and Gratifications Theory is a popular approach to understanding mass communication.  In this lesson we had to answer 5 questions. To help me answer them i used wikipedia as it is a very useful free encyclopedia. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uses_and_gratifications_theory). The questions we had to answer are;

1)What information is provided about the school/college?
2)What sense of personal identity has the reader with the magazine and sort of school it provides?
3)How does your school magazine promote a sense of belonging as part of a community of readers?
5)What form of entertainment does the magazine provide for the reader?
6)What from does entertainment take and how does it create from the reader?

To begin my main task I researched exciting popular music magazines and identified the use of colour, the masthead, the fonts used, the style, The target audience.

 Kerrang Magazine:

The target audience for this magazine would be mid teens.I think both male and females who have an interest in rock/new prog would have interest in this magazine. This particular magazine is advertising a rock band named after the lead singer, Biffy Clyro, Who, by the name on the cover, is what this magazine is mainly about . As shown on the magazine, he is the main picture as he is the most popular member of the band. There are two dominant colours presented, white and black. Although they are quite dull colours, the magazine itself is moderately bright. The fonts used are nothing special but are big, simple and clear. The use of language is quite serious. eg.' UNFOLD THE PUZZLE OF LIFE,' this is in no way humorous but gets the reader interested. Also this magazine offers the reader a free poster and doesn't hesitate to advertise that clearly. this magazine is mainly pictures and lacks in text, however it gets it point across to the reader of what it consists of. At the bottom left hand side it noticeably says 'PLUS!', this is eye catchy and  attracts the reader toward that area which leads them to find out what other bands are included in the magazine.



Vibe magazine:
The target audience for this magazine would be again, mid teen both male and female who are interested in hip hop. the dominant colours shown are blue, grey and pink. these make the magazine vibrant and without tedium. however, There is only 1 font used but in a vary of sizes and colours. The only picture shown is kanye west's face. this is interesting because by looks of it, the photographer has made him look scruffy and tired. I recognised this as he looks like he hasn't shaved or hasn't neatened his facial hair for a while and his hair looks rough . Also, his facial expression looks depressive and fed up. the caption to the left of it describes why he looks like this , 'The truth hurts KANYE WEST'. The fonts used are neither serious or humorous but informal. this magazine is mainly text as there is only 1 picture. 

whsmith

For our homework assignment, we were asked to visit a shop that sells magazines and analyse how they present them to the buyers,E.g where they placed, which shelf, where in the shop are they ect .ect
The shop I visited was WHSmiths, This provided me with a very wide range of all different kinds of magazines.
what I first noticed was where in the magazine section they were placed. Firstly there were magazines for little children such as 'Pokemon' and 'Disney Adventures'. Most of there magazines had a free toy inside to attract the children.

 After the children's magazines there were game magazines such as 'Gamer', PSM3, X-Box 360, 'PC Gamer', Some of these magazines included a free CD for a free demo of a new upcoming game or a trailer for a new game.This genre of magazine is aimed at a gamer audience, probably mostly teenage boys.

After the gamer section was what I assumed to be leisure/hobbies. I noticed that there were allot of boating magazines such as 'Classic Boat' and 'Motor Boat'. I couldn't figure out why they displayed why they decided to display such a vast amount of boating magazines but I assume maybe because its almost the Christmas holidays and many people like to go away for the time. Also, in this section was fishing magazines. This is clever as it was mixed in with the boating magazines. If you enjoy sailing, you are likely to take pleasure in fishing. This is a good way to sell many magazines at once.

Following the leisure/hobbies were magazines for an male adult audience. These included 'Nuts', 'FHM' and 'Zoo'. I was confused as to why it was placed in between leisure/hobbies and Music magazines.

 Past the leisure/hobbies magazines was a huge amount of music magazines. these included magazines such as 'Vibe', 'Classic FM music', 'Classic Rock', 'Clash', 'Kerrang'. The popular magazines such as 'Vibe' and 'Clash were displayed at the front, as they are most likely to be sold the most.

In my opinion, I didn't like how they ordered there magazines. They were quite randomly placed. From the genres above and adding a few others, the order I would have placed them would be :

1) leisure/hobbies magazines
2) Mens magazines, Sports magazines, male Adult magazines
3) Children's magazines
4) Mother/ New mother (Pregnancy)/ glossy
5) Gamer magazines
6) Music magazines

I think this would be a better magazine layout than the one I saw for the reasons that;

• I put Men's magazines together as separating them could loose sales. If they are all together it might increase a males interest and lead to another magazine purchase.
• I placed the children's magazines in between men's magazines and mother/woman magazines as there could be a family looking for a child magazine, the surrounding magazines could catch an eye of the mother and/or father.
• I positioned gamer and music magazines together as they would both attract the same kind of audience, teenagers. Most teenagers are into games consol's and music so placing them together would increase sales of both genres. 

My Final design - Contents page

My Final design - Front cover

Connotation and Denotation

today's lesson helped me to be aware of how denotaion highlights narrative and representational issues. I now also understand the difference between denotation and connotation.


Connotation:
 It is the second level of analysis which is identifying what the denotation of an picture represents .Connotation is linked to the cultural experience readers bring to it. Connotation is where we the readers add our own information so that we can recognize what the image is signifying.


Denotation:
The simplest meaning of and image. Denotating is identifying only what you see in the picture. Denotation only refers to what is actually reproduced in the text. whilst denotating an image we cannot say what the picture may symbolize as denotaion is the first level of analysis, consequently, in denotational terms if we cannot see anything else, we only imagine that it is there.

Identifying the ideal reader.

In todays lesson, we studied several magazine covers and stereotyped the type of readers we assume read them. The magazine covers we studied were, Mens Fitness, Junior, digital SLR photography We answered questions like, 'What breakfast do you think the reader eats?' and, 'Do they have a car' etc. the questions were based on the readers lifestyle. We based our answers on what we think the reader is like such as, For the 'Mens Fitness' we assume they would eat healthy/organic food.

Also, we were given a task to come up with 2 other questions that relate to our age audience. The questions I came up with were 'has he got a degree', and, 'What brand of clothes do they wear'.

An ideal reader for this magazine would be a middle aged woman/ mother. She would probably be eating cereals such as Special K for breakfast as they would be trying to loose weight from their pregnancy. they would also drive a people carrier as they may have more kids already and it is a family car. the woman reading this magazine would probably live in a 4 bedroom house, and in her free time would watch family shows and possibly cartons/l to entertain her kids. She would also want her family eat healthy and organic food, and most probably choose family holiday resorts to go over the summer.


This lesson helped me understand what type of reader I want to buy my magazine.

Front Cover Draft

Today I drew a draft of my magazine front cover and contents page. I used my research of other magazines to help me with the layout and what is most attractive to our age audience. I made the title of the magazine bold and eye catching to grasp the reader’s attention. Unlike my title ideas I decided to change around a few things like, I added an exclamation mark and moved the ‘A’ into the star.  I chose do decorate the page with flashy advertisements of what would be in the actual magazine such as ‘BANG’ this is just a replacement of what could be there. I wrote ‘bang’ as this particular subheading would have something special inside the magazine such as, prizes, vouchers, competitions Ect. Also I wrote some things that would draw the target audience to read it, E.g. ‘GOSSIP’, obviously on the actual magazine I wouldn’t write that, I would write the main subject of the gossip. This could include such things as; new teachers, facilities, or just general gossip within the students. The main picture I drew was the student in the centre of the page; I chose to draw a student as it is a student magazine but also because it is the biggest picture drawn and could be a focus for student buyers.

This is my draft of my contents page, like my front cover, I researched contents pages for a younger audience. There were several very impressive contents pages that I saw and will defiantly help me towards my final piece. For my draft I used the same title that’s on my front cover, joint with the word ‘contents’ preferably in a different font. I put all the sections into one area of the page as it helps the reader see everything inside the magazine. I wrote down 6 sections of the contents, however might well increase or decrease. I cleared a space for a photo maybe of a student. 

As this is only a draft i expect alot to change and improve.

Collage magazine questionnaire

Collage magazine questionnaire:

Circle the answer:

o   How old are you?    10-15    16-20    21-25    26-30    30+

o   What is your gender?     Male     or    Female

o   What courses are you studying?   ………………………………………………

o   List 3 of your favorite hobbies:  ……………………………………………….

o   How often do you read magazines?

               1-3 times a week   

 4-6 times a week

 6+

o   What genre of music do you listen to?

R & B

Rock

Pop

Classical

Jazz

Grime

Indie

Urban

Dance

Country

Blues

o   List 4 things you would like to see in this magazine for A-star such as, competitions, Trips, new teachers, new courses, new facilities, when you can use the gym, library, cantine, new sports, school gossip, Etc. Etc.

1)      ………………………………..

2)      ………………………………..

3)      ………………………………..

4)      ………………………………..

5)      ………………………………..

o    Rate the appearance of the front cover out of 10, 10 being the highest

………

o   Rate the appearance of the contence page out of 10, ten being the highest

……...

o   Rate this questionnaire out of ten, ten being the highest.

……….

o   Any other comments?

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

                                   

stereotype: A stereotype or "stereotypes" is a commonly held public belief about specific social groups or types of individuals. The concepts of "stereotype" and 'prejudice'  are often confused with many other different meanings. Stereotypes are simplified conceptions of groups based on some prior assumptions. E.g, All blonds are slow, All emos cut them selves, All Asians are smart.

archetype: An archetype is an original model of a person, ideal example, or a prototype upon which others are copied, patterned, or emulated; a symbol recognized by everyone. E.g the Nike tick, in most advertisements we do not need the words 'Nike' to recognise what it is advertising

Media institutions use stereotypes because the audience will intently relate to them and this is called visual shortcut.

gender and media representation:

Gender is possibly the basic group we use for categorization individuals, and it is a key subject when discussing representation. necessary elements of our own identity, and the identities we assume other people to have, come from concepts of gender, what does it mean to be a male or a female? Many objects, not just people, are represented by the media as being particularly masculine or feminine, particularly in advertising and we grow up with an awareness of what make up 'appropriate' characteristics.

Research Film Posters

In this lesson I have decided to research Film posters for existing teenage movies. Firstly, I had to think of 3 movies with appropriate posters to post to my blog. Once I thought about the 3 films to research, i had to think about how the teenager is presented, how the image is used on the film poster and what comments i have about the layout and design.

 

'Juno' is a typical teenage movie about a girl of 16 who become pregnant. This poster includes 2 teenagers, a male and female. The presentation of these 2 teenagers are quite obvious, the male looks clueless and lost whereas the female looks dominant and sophisticated. The stereotypical view on this film is about the pregnant girl. this is becasue there is an increase of teenage mothers in modern day life.

This a great example of a teenage film. The title poster says it all. In this poster the teenager shown is to be a popular, good looking, Fashionable and confident teenager. In this poster the only picture shown in the teenager. This could tell the viewer that the whole film is based around this teenager. My comments about this poster is that it is very simple but very clear. The tagline in this film is shown at the very top of the poster, it says 'who says you are only young once?'.



Star Logo Reaserch

I have decided to research design titles which have stars in there logo to help me with designing my own. Firstly I looked all over the web to find design title that have stars included into there names. I chose three that i found as i think they are attractive to there target audience. As i chose them for there stars i will only be focusing on them.

I liked this design as it includes well placed stars in the name and in its setting. This particular is aimed at young, singing female audience. the colours of the stars are well chosen and are well suited to its title. This particular design encouraged me to add the stars to the surrounding name                                   

In this design they based the whole title around there star. I like how the font mixed well with the shape and colour of the star. It seems they made the design as if the was moving, this is also because the whole title is based on a racing school.

Titles Ideas

I have started to design my title. For my Frist design i didn't have Photo shop on my home PC, Therefor i used the 'Paint' application. Firstly, I looked all over the web for design ideas and Fonts. I looked through many websites such as, http://www.1001freefonts.com/ and http://www.urbanfonts.com/.

But then i came across http://www.dafont.com/. This was much easier and faster. You simply select a font and write whatever it is you want to write. There was hundreds to choose from but this particular font caught my eye. I wasn't sure if it would be appropriate for my magazine but after much thought i choose to work on it.



This is my first design, I went for an 'Urban' look. I kept the letters and the star black as bright and vibrant coloring wouldn’t suite it. I choose this font as it blends well with the star. I didn't design the star to be anything exciting as i think it looks better and mixes well with the font.


For this design i went for a 'Stamp' look. As if a teacher has stamped a grade onto a students paper. i thought this would well suit the title,'A-star' as it is catchy and believable. The chose to use a font as stamp like as possible. i chose to use the colour red as it mixes in well with the style of the title.

For this design i tryed to make it look trendy and modern. i can imagine this as a good magazine title as it is big, bold and colourful. I used the colour red as it is bright and is suitable for the font.

Photo Shop Introduction

In today’s lesson I was introduced to Photoshop. First of all we were told to choose a picture from our folder and to upload it onto Photoshop. We were then told to experiment with all the unfamiliar tools to see how confident we were with Photoshop. After having a little play- around with all the tools we were then given a lesson on how to give our chosen picture weird and wonderful effects and colors. We were taught about how to move things around, how to color them, rotate them etc.
Today’s lesson was very productive and will help me a great deal in photo shopping pictures.

Magazine Cover Reaserch

To begin my preliminary work, first if all I searched online to find out how other popular magazine producers displayed there magazines.This would drive in the right direction to creating my own magazine cover for a school/collage. I examined the font, Style, Contexts and colors and how the convey a magazine cover.
 In conclusion to this, I looked at how different magazines are aimed a different people and genders. For example the way that Console magazines are aimed at gamers and mostly males.

This is a typical example of a 'girly' magazine. This magazine purpose would be to inform woman about this years cloth fashion, how to look better, how to increase your confidence ect. Notice how it is very bright and colourfull. The most noticable colours are pink and white. We accosiate pink as a very feminine colour. All the subheadings that are dissplayed are related to a womans life. For example, in bright pink on the left hand side, it says "43 things every confident woman knows", this is aimed at a female audience.

The most obvious picture shown is a woman. This also tell buyers that this is magazine is for woman.The fonts shown are very big and bright, this is to attract the target audience. The title of the magazine "Glamour" is very clearly shown at the top of the magazine. The first time I saw the magazine, the title and the woman as the first thing that caught my eye as they use most of the space available.

In contrast to the "Glamour" magazine, i have chosen to study a games magazine. This targets a younger, more teenage audience. The purpose of this magazine is to inform teenagers about the latests games, gaming eqiupment, soon coming games ect. This particulare magazine is advatising a new realised game, "Medal of Honor". The chosen colours in this magazine are quite dark. However, they use bright yellow on the title to catch the readers eye. I think the reason they chose dark colours to promote this game is because it is a combat/war type of game. Dark colours suite this genre. the first this i notice about this magazine is the man holding a huge gun. this is also the main picture of the magaizine. This is a very good picture to use for this particular front cover magazine as it attracts a gamers eye. The font used for the title is very big and very clear.

These magazines have helped me towards creating my own magazine cover. It has told me that the fonts, styles, images, colours and contexts should all suite the genre on the magazine and be appropriate for the target audience.