Photos

For the picture I took of Anna, the lead singerof Faux Rouge, I placed her in a area which looked casual. I felt the concrete stairs were a good setting for these photos. I set my camera to black and white so as to add to the Rock theme. I felt this added to the idea of the lead singer being mysterious yet with an 'attitude'.

I decided that the lead singer should wear casual clothes and have her hair down to add to the effortless look. I wanted the pictures to show her natural beauty and wild hair, which fit in with the Rock theme. For the pictures I decided I didn't want them to be too girlie so I had her wear trainers, yet I made sure she wore a skirt so that she looked feminine. For some of the pictures I asked her to laugh, so that she would be liked by the reader. However as the magazine is a Rock magazine, I asked her to pose in some photos, looking straight at the camera and to look edgy. I felt by doing this the target audience would understand that the music produced by the artist was Rock.

When taking the pictures of Sweet Addiction, I took many of them outside when it was dark. I felt this added to the effect of the band, as many of their songs are about emotions. In some of the pictures the setting was just a white wall behind them, this focused the target audience on the band. In some of the pictures of Sweet Addiction I asked them to pose with Sweets, I did this as a play on their name and it added humour and a lightness to the photographs. I took the photos in black and white, this added to the dark Rock theme, which fits with their image.

In some of the photographs I asked them to stand strong and look confident so as to appeal to the target audience as Rock music is strong loud music. I asked the four members of the band to wear their own clothes which they felt fitted their personality, which mainly included skinny jeans and casual tops and jackets. The band are quite fashionable and as there are three boys this may appeal to the girls without alienating the boys.

Fonts

I looked through the different magazines and studied their chosen fonts. This enabled me to decide on my font for the front cover of my magazine. I shall develop the font so that it is bold and stands out to the reader. Although my magazine shall be a mixture of the styles from both NME and Kerrang magazine, its style will be closer to that of Kerrang. The font will have to be appropriate to the magazine'Raw'.

I thought about this title 'Raw' and this font, I feel this will work well for the magazine and appeal to the target audience, as there is aggression shown in the style of the font.


I was planning on using these fonts for my double page spread. I asked a few people who were my target audience and they stated that the white worked well on the red, as it made the double page spread bolder.

Here I looked at the double page spread of NME and compared it to my magazine, as both magazines target a teenage audience. The use of Font in NME is very laid back and has an informal style of writing which is similar to my magazine 'Raw'. However, I feel my magazines font stands out more than the NME magazine as the white and red work well together and the use of a bold font makes the article stand out to the reader.

Analysis of existing magazines

Analysis of an NME front cover

The front cover of this edition of NME has a dark background yet elements of colour are used. The colour orange is used to emphasise the main articles inside the magazine. NME is written in bright red to stand out to buyers. The bands that are inside the magazine are written in bold lettering, to appeal to the fans of these bands.

The language used on the front cover is basic and tells the reader exactly what they will read about inside NME, this may appeal to teenagers. In the background of NME there is a picture of the Arctic Monkeys as they are the focus of the main article. The Arctic Monkeys are quite a fresh new band, which will appeal to younger people. There is a noticeable lack of pictures on the front cover, only one of the Arctic Monkeys, this allows the picture to stand out and will excite Arctic Monkey fans. The magazine has a calm feel to it, as there is not much text on the front cover. The text is not too busy and attracts the reader to the different key articles inside the magazine.

NME's front cover has been designed to appeal to big music fans. As the music discussed in the magazine is obvious to the reader. The front cover is simple yet effective, the magazine is not too busy and allows the reader to focus on the main interviews and articles inside the magazine.

Analysis of NME contents page

The contents page is very simple. The main things inside the magazine are listed in alphabetical order down the side of the page. The colours used are mainly red and black which appear to be the magazine's signature colours. These colours will become memorable to people interested in music and they will be drawn to the magazine when displayed in shops. There is a small article on the contents page about a musician Jack White, who has many fans. Jack White will appeal to rock fans. The font used is quite small but the main article on the page 'Jack White's black Mass in London' is written in bold to appeal to the Jack White fans and make them want to read on.
The language used is very simple and easy to understand. There is one image on this page of Jack White, as he is the main topic of the page.

Analysis of double page spread in NME

Once again the colours used are red and black, the NME colours. The bands discussed on the page are written in a bold font. There are images of the bands on the page. This allows the reader to understand what genre of music they are, as many people have preferences. The language used is slightly humorous and allows the reader to feel entertained. The page is simple and draws the reader to their favourite bands and singers.

Analysis of Kerrang front cover

The front cover of Kerrang is dark as the magazine is a rock magazine. The main colours used are red, black and grey. Kerrang is written as though it is cracked which resembles noise. Which will appeal to rock fans. There are several images used, to show the different bands discussed in the magazine. Some of the writing is 'scribbled' , this appeals to the rock theme and the idea of 'rebelling'. The word rock is used on the front cover and the magazines main band of the week Biffy Clyro is written in bold writing. The page is slightly more crowded than NME, which creates a sense of busyness to show that there are lots of articles inside on popular Rock artists.

Analysis of Kerrang contents page

When looking at the contents page, it is obvious there is a lot of information about each page. There are pictures to illustrate each article. There is a short interview with the band Biffy Clyro, to appeal to Biffy Clyro fans. There are several images of the different bands inside the magazine. The colours used are still quite dark as the magazine focuses on Rock music. The simple and easy to understand contents information, will appeal to younger people, enabling them to find what they want to read.

Analyisis of double page spread.

The colours on both pages are quite dull. One of the pages, which is about Kerrang magazine and their poll has an image of blood. The magazine is quite raw to appeal to serious Rock fans. There is a success story of a girl who won a Kerrang competition, which appeals to the reader. The left page discusses people's trips to different gigs which the reader can relate to. The language is snappy, the word Rock is used several times to show the music genre the magazine is focusing on. The pages are trying to look messy, as though the articles have been placed on top of each other without much thought. This is in line with the rock theme and the laid back attitude of the magazine, again appealing to teenage boys and men.

Target audience

I focused my attention on the magazines Kerrang and NME. Kerrang is more of a rock style and NME is aimed at listeners of different types of indie music.

With both magazines the majority of readers fall between the ages of 15-44. 87.4% of Kerrang readers fall within this age range while a total of 90.6% of
NME readers are this age.

The weekly readership of Kerrang is made up of 290000 men and 127000 women. For the magazine NME the figures are 296000 men and 91000 women.

The percentage of people that read NME that are upper/middle class is a total of 64.43% and the percentage that are lower class are 35.31%. With Kerrang magazine the number of readers that are upper/middle class is 57.31% and the amount of people that are lower class is 42.7%.

AS Media CourseworkMai Task-Blog 1-Introduction

For this task I have been asked to create my very own music magazine. I shall be using Adobe Photoshop and InDesign. I will be designing and producing a front cover, contents page and double page spread for my music magazine. I have to design this magazine so that it will appeal to my target audience.

The genre of music I will be focusing on for my magazine is Rock however I will be looking at Indie magazines too. My target audience will be people who enjoy listening to new Rock music, mainly teenagers and young adult.

I made my own college magazine for the preliminary task. For this new music magazine, I must learn from mistakes I made when making the college magazine in order to make this music magazine better. http://evecostellosdcmediaas.blogspot.com/.