1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Magazines hold different conventions depending on their genre. All magazines are conventional because they have a masthead, selling line, main image, cover line, and barcode. Magazines would not be understood if they did not have all these functions telling and persuading there audience on why they should buy their magazine. Genres like ‘women’s magazines’ would conventionally use pink denotative colours, whereas a ‘rock’ magazine will use harsh and darker fonts and colours.

My coursework presents these conventions in my front cover; free gifts, a large masthead, and bright colours giving it a rock star, indie look. The contrast is harsh on the centre image making it stand out and my Photoshop development makes it look like its overlapping the text but it has been  erased giving it a  glow, against the text behind it.

Media products presented to us on shop shelves, in shops around the country our highly competitive. To create a magazine to appeal to a gap in the market, would be hard to find because the media has evolved so much that there is not a person whomb a product is not aimed at. My thoughts were to find a niche market to be intertextual to. Many males around the ages of 25-35 do not regularly buy magazines; I think this is because there is not a lot currently in the media, appealing to them and their interests. I have decided to use this age group as my demographic target audience. My house style was influenced by magazines such as classic rock and NME. These magazines target a younger audience than I intended, but looked stylish so I used this inspiration for my own.

The title ‘NEW MUSIC’ connotes how the magazine is updated, yet sophisticated in the fact it has not got a young slogan type name like ‘kerrang’, meaning it is relevant for my target audience.  The masthead positioned centre top follows the conventions of a music magazine. The only prop I was concerned with having within the shot was the instruments because it portrayed the individual’s part within the band.  The image shots I have used are quite natural I didn’t want to portray ‘anger, aggression or happiness’ because unlike magazine features it wasn’t a professional shoot it was real and happening, making it quite unconventional to look at and portray the reality of being in a band.

My magazine’s genre is indie/rock this is suggested throughout the magazine because of the; bands, style/look, fonts and darkness. The band in the images is RIVERS; they are all around 30 and have a particular indie/rock look.

In my contents page I used no particular features for different readers, I would have no regulars because it is a new magazine and none of the content would limit the amount of readers. The layout is portrait and uses Photoshop to make the writing glow and stand out. The name of the magazine has been moved into the image, not how it is originally, but altered to look a lot darker and connote seriousness.

The image was taken at a gig, and the effect of the smoke contrasts well with the colours and setting in the image. The microphone is shown within the image to portray Jakes role in the band.

In my double page spread, I used a background image to connote tension and drama, the image is effective because the black and pink are harsh against each other and the shadow of Jake, makes the whole image stand out without drawing to much away from the text. The title, RIVERS has a mix of different colours; I choose to do this by using the rivers own logo, and taking their pattern to stretch over, making it look more professional. Originally the ‘film strip’ image did not exist in other drafts, I used the images separately as a spotlight image. Fortunately I changed my ideas and approach because It didn’t fit in with the house style and wasn’t up to standard, after making a few changes I realised all these images co-ordinate together and could be put together, in another way.  The double page spread is a representation of the bands lifestyle and colourful experiences. I have also used conventional features like drop caps and pull quotes to add to the overall effect of the peice.