Quetionarre

In this post I will be explainging that I have created a questionarre to help me research on what my target audience will expect and what they enjoy within a magazine.

I had chosen a questionarre to add towards my research for my magazine to gain an in-depth unbiased knowlege into what the public expect to see within a music magaine, I had chosen to keep the questionare anonmyous to give me more and unbiased results so that I could gain a truthful in-depth results to help me improve my magazine to gain maximum attention for my target audeince.

To create the physical questionare I used microsoft word to use as a format to place the information for a physical copy of the questionarre. I then input the nine qestions I was to ask the public and then printed 15-20 copies out and gave them to the public to answer and give back to me.

Once I had the results I then used Microsoft Excell to input my results into and then created bar  charts to show easier what was the most popular choices within the nine questions I asked to the public.

Here are my results:

Focus Groups

In this post I show my proposal to other people within a small group consisting of five people who hear myslef explain who my magazine is catered too, what genre my magzine is aimed towards and what content will be included within my magazine such as articles, bands, imagary and so on.

The group then will give me visual feedback on what I have explained to them and offewr me any constuctive criticism on what I have proposed and explained to them.

One of the first points I noticed about the focus groups feedback is that they all decided that the name “Crunch” was better than “Spike” and that spike sounded too aggressive and that “Crunch” sounded a lot more appropriate and related to the genre of rock as quoted by Ellis Hilton “Crunch sounds less aggressive which will appeal to more people as an example” as an example of my feedback I have received. I was considering calling the magazine "Spike" as it sounded more aggressive and youthful which io thought may have had more of an appeal towards my target audience.

 

I agree with Ellis and the rest of the focus group that “Spike” did sound too aggressive, which could have alienated demographics within my target audience.

 

The second point I noticed from my focus group is that there were mixed reviews about my choice of colour for my magazine such as Siena Matkin had commented “The colours go well with the magazine” as opposed to the comment made by Hannah Herraghty “Colour seems masculine which is good if your target audience is predominantly male”.

 

I personally think that I will need to use less choice of colour than I proposed to the focus group so that I do not clutter the magazine in too many colours which may distract my target audience from reading so I will keep to three conventional colours of black, white and yellow as opposed to black, yellow, white, green and red as the three colours are defiantly gender neutral and therefore will appeal to more of my target audience as it allows less people to feel alienated to read my target magazine.

 

The third point that I noticed was that the focus group did like the idea of the images that linked with the double page spread of the magazine such as Emily commented “Cover and DPS link – good as it informs the reader they are the featured interview” meaning that this shows that I am following convention of a magazine.

 

I agree with Emily in that I feel that the main image should be linked with the highlighted article with the magazine, as that is typical convention for magazines in general.

 

The fourth point I noticed was that I was to make sure that the style of the magazine appealed to the socio-economic group that I am advertising my magazine too such as Siena Matkin commented “Make sure that the style of the magazine would attract 16-20 year olds (target audience). Make sure it is not expensive”

 

I agree with Siena Matkin in that I should consider every aspect of my magazine to appeal to my target audience in order to maximize interest for reader of my target audience and this also includes the price of the magazine.

 

What my focus group may not have considered was who my band/artist may be and how would that artist/band link towards my magazine? Would I require props? Would I require a dress code to follow convention of my magazines genre?

 

I personally consider that I will require a dress code is required to show what genre is being displayed for my main image and double page spread of my magazine to attract my target audience however I find props optional as I have seen very few magazine covers with main images with props within them so I think I will not be using props for the main cover of the magazine however I will need to consider musical props for my double page spread as while its still optional to obtain one in an image for my double page spread, it adds variety of imagery for my magazine.

 

I can use the feedback from my focus group to ensure that my magazine will be a complete success as it shows me that I am on target for following conventions of both magazines and music magazine genres and that shows me that my magazine will be a success as fulfilling conventions which fulfill my target audiences expectations.

Magazine Proposal

What Genre of magazine will you make and who will be your primary audience?  

 

I am going to create a music magazine for a primary audience who are interested within the genre of rock as that is a predecessor to many sub-genres that can appeal to a wide variety of people who are interested with the genre.  I will be choosing a unisex audience for my magazine, as the amount of rock bands there are within the audience do not cater to a specific gender and that my genre also appeals to fans of both genders. The age range for my target audience will be aimed towards 16-20 year olds as that is the target audience that will want to be more energetic with the genre of music I have chosen as they want to go out to multiple “gigs” and go and see the bands they read about in their blog. In terms of socio-economic groups my magazine will be aimed towards a C2 group who are skilled manual workers such as electricians and this magazine is also aimed towards the socio-economic group D who are semi-skilled and unskilled manual workers such as assembly line workers and refuse collectors. I chose these groups because these are the groups that are quite youthful and are willing to go out to gigs and music festivals and they are also the groups that are most interested in the genre of rock and its sub-genres.

 

Which Magazines exist that are similar to yours?

 

There are multiple magazines that exist similar to the genre I am going to create a magazine for such as Kerrang! Magazine, which is a magazine, centered on the genre of rock and its sub-genres, targeting multiple target audiences for its magazine with sell lines that appeal to multiple audiences with the use of multiple bands within the rock genre.  There is also Rock Magazine, which is similar to Kerrang! Magazine except it is magazine targeted for an older unisex audience of 25+ with the use of more cleaner font and calmer backgrounds that maybe deemed more mature for a more mature audience as opposed to Kerrang! Magazine which maybe deemed as a more energetic font and magazine for a younger audience. These magazine are useful to me as they provide a template into what the audience expectations from a rock genre focused magazine, they also show me conventions into what my magazine will require to fulfill audience expectations and will show me a conventional structure in which will help me understand my target audience as it will show what there expectations are to read within the genre of the magazine.

 

How will you research your magazine?

 

I will research my magazine by researching, who are the current most popular bands of the time within the genre or rock. I will also research reviews of some of the most popular singles and albums of the current time research about the language and vocabulary used with the review. I can also research about interviews with bands of the chosen genre to see what topics bands of the genre I research discuss about. I can research these by buying issues of Rock magazines and observe their layout and the topics they include within it. I can also research on the internet for examples of magazines within my chosen genre, I also will be using the use of questionnaires to find out what content my audience like and expect to see within a magazine. I have also chosen to use focus groups to gain feedback on what more people would like to expect to see within my magazine and also offer constructive criticism so that I can improve my magazine. I have chosen these methods of research with my target socio-economic groups in mind as that is my target audience I am selling my magazine towards so I can gain maximum attention of my target audience.

 

Where will you get your images from? What will they be of?

 

My Images I will obtain from using a camera and I will take mid shots and close up shots of models with appropriate clothes props and instrumental props to make the images fit within the convention of the genre to fulfill audience expectations, I can also obtain images of band logos and Album covers of multiple bands that fit within the genre for the magazine so that it also fulfills audience expectations.

 

What will be the name of your magazine? Why?

 

I will name my magazine “Crunch” as the name gives a meaning for a distinctive or dominant masthead of a magazine that also sounds energetic with a cheeky modern aggressive tone which helps to gain the attention of the age range of my primary target audience, and these conventions link in with my magazine because it fulfils the present audiences expectations.

 

How will you ensure your magazine looks both professional and original?

 

My magazine will because the title of my magazine has never been used before, the artist’s I will include will be original, as they will have never been heard before and therefore will add more uniqueness to my magazine. My Magazine will look more professional as I will include all the legal aspects that are conventional to see on a, magazine such as a barcode for example as well as following the conventions of a magazine such as the use of a masthead and the masthead will be a masthead of the main image which will be the band I will be using within my magazine, and I will also make my magazine follow a certain conventional style of colour so that no colours I will use will feel out of place or look odd which may cause the magazine to look unprofessional.

College magazine cover and contents page

As part of my assignment I must create a Cover and a contents page for a college magazine to demonstrate my knowledge of what common conventions we see in a general magazine as well as to learn how to use photoshop effectively to cease what will appear to be a genuine magazine for my chosen genre for a music magazine.

I also will explain how I created the magazine cover and contents page in the blog. I first created the magazine cover with the use of Abode Photoshop and I used Abode photoshop as it gives me a wide variety of options that allow me to create a magazine which will look more professional, I also used a model and with the models consent I took picture of the model to use for the cover of my magazine and I used a model as my main image of my college magazine because a common convention for a college magazine is to contain a main image of a college student or ex-student. I also took pictures of the college campus I was creating the magazine contents as it is also common convention to show an image in the contents that will not be of too much focus but also to show a representation of what the college will look like. I used the following tools to create my magazine within Abode Photoshop: The move tool: I used the move tool as it is a key component to use with Abode Photoshop as it allows me to move objects, text, pictures and shapes around into area where I want them to be placed, to use the move tool I simply just held the left mouse button down on the area I wanted to move then I moved the mouse to move the area I had chosen and moved it to its new position. The Elliptical and Rectangular Marquee tool: I used the tools to remove parts of an image that would detract from the quality of the look of the magazine in order to improve the image of the magazine I held down the left mouse button and dragged arose the area which I wanted to erase and then let go of the left mouse button, I then pressed the backspace button after the the selected area was covered to erase the unwanted area. The Lasso Tool: The Lasso too is the same as the Elliptical and Rectangular tool with the only difference is that with the lasso tool I could create custom areas instead of fixed shapes like the Elliptical and Rectangular tool. The Blur Tool: I used the blur tool on the main image on the magazine cover to make the magazine cover look more smooth, to use the tool after selecting the blur tool I held the left mouse button over the area I wanted to blur and then dragged the blur tool backwards and forwards to blur the area effectively. Horisontal Type Tool: I used the horizontal type tool to give essential information, main titles and subheadings into my magazine, to use this tool I simply just clicked the left mouse button over the area I wanted to give my information on and then used the keyboard to insert my information. The Rectangle Tool: I used the rectangle tool to input shapes and colors within these shapes to give my magazine some colour to make my magazine to look more appealing. To use this tool I held the left mouse button and dragged over the area I wanted to cover with the shape. After selecting the area I then input a colour into the shape (in this case both shapes were coloured yellow) to give my magazine more colour.

Expectations of a College Magazine

On The front cover I need to proceed to meet the following expectations of out target audience, in this instance it needs to meet the expectations of students from the age demographic of 16-18 year olds as that is the age demographic of most students attending British college. The front cover needs to be visually appealing for our target audience to draw them in and gain interest, to do this we need to create a colorful front cover as that is what our target audience expects to gain interest so we will use a juicy colorful background using a bright colour such as green or yellow. It is important to try and use “neutral” colours and not to stray off to more masculine or feminine colours such as blue or pink as that can alienate some of our demographic within our target audience as it can make them feel uncomfortable for picking up the magazine. Next we need to add in a model, the model will need to be above the background layer but not in front of any important text as we do not want to black important text for our target audience to read. The size of the picture of the model will need to take up most of the magazine cover in terms of a picture as the model can also visually draw our target audience in to reading the magazine. Also the model will need to be a college student or an ex-college student to fulfill audience expectations and it fills audience expectations because our audience would expect someone within the college to be on a college magazine. The college logo needs to be on the magazine as it shows who has created the magazine. The college logo could also be the main title of the magazine as it shows easily who created the magazine for our target audience and it also creates an image of what our audience would expect from this magazine, which is an image of college related topics and items as that is what the audience would expect from a college magazine. The font of the magazine will need to be a large chunky but formal for titles such as Franklin Gothic Medium so that it gains the attention of our target audience but also to make the magazine title readable so that our target audience can read the magazine, it also allows older readers to be able to read it without feeling discomfort as a more chunky but less formal text such as Bauhaus 93 could be viewed as childish and more appealing to a younger audience and also harder to read for an older audience. The tile will need to be in layer 2 or layer 4, as it will need to overlap all other images within the cover of the magazine. The required amount of titles would be 2-3 titles with following text for each paragraph at size 14, one of these titles should contain context to the main model image and can be at a bigger size of 16 than the other tries so that it will be the first title that the audience will read as the audience expectation would be that the biggest title will relate to the image of the model. For the text, the text will need to be at size 12, and this is to make sure that the text will not fill the magazine cover as that will create a visual eyesore for our target audience and therefore may draw away our target audience, also to keep the text as short as possible to one small paragraph of 3-4 line per title so that it will not fill the magazine cover with text. For the contents I will need to follow general expectations of what a contents will look like so that it will meet target audience expectations whilst also being informative and functional to my target audience. My background will need to be more of a calmer colour than the cover as there will be more text within the contents page than the cover with have, also we will still require that that background will need a neutral colour such as white so that the target audience will not feel discomfort reading the magazine and will also be functional as the reader can still read the magazine. As following expectation in a contents page I will require page reference numbers to articles throughout the magazine and this fulfills audience expectations because as provides and informative guide about what types of topics will be covered within the magazine, the font style will be the just like the text on the cover so that its easier for the target audience to adjust to reading the contents within each article on each page. The size of the contents will be size 12 as there will be much more text than there will be on the front cover as there will be more articles to cover. The text of the contents will be on layer 3 as the text will need o be above any images and background. The titles for each article must be at a larger text size than the size of the text to an article to show differentiation between articles visually so that it is easier for my target audience to read the contents page but also to create visual appeal so that a title to a certain article may gain more interest to certain demographics to our target audience than other articles, for example certain demographics within the target audience who are more interested in Media Studies may want to read articles relevant to Media Studies than someone who is Interested in law and may want to read articles related to Law. The colour of the text should be contrasting to the colour of the background so that it makes the text easier to read for the target audience. I need to include an image within the contents page so it keeps the attention to our target audience by making the contents page more visually appealing. The image should be on layer 1 or 2 as it is meant to be above the background layer but the image should not be on top of the text so that it makes the text easier to read. The image size should be at largest at the most 2/3 of the page as I do not need a large image and must be away fro the text so that it can contrast with the text, keeping the contents page organized and not cluttered and still visually appealing.

Mood Board

The purpopse of this mood board is to draw inspiration for my selected genre and sun-genres that I have chosen for my course work. Within my board I have chosen a variety of Rock such as Slipknot, Avenged Sevenfold and more. I chose bands as these bands have large fanbases which could easily support a niche magazine foir me usic genre magazine, and this is also the sma efor my sub-genres of heavy metal and metalcore I have chosen within my mood board as well.

Software Applications

To help me with the analysing and creating my magazine covers, contents and double spreads I will require the use of multiple software applicatiopns to accomplish these goals. 1) Prezzi

Prezzi is a more in depth, more detailed and more interactive version of Microsoft Powerpoint that will allow me to be more engaging with my audience as I show them what I am describing and informing them on my prtogress. It is also a cloud based software that means that the presentations I create on Prezi will be saved on a server somewhere else in the world meaning that i will have more storge space for other applications and assinments for my work within media studies. 2) Soundcloud

Soundcloud is an audio software application that allows users to use the software to upload audio files and embedded anywhere meaning that people can gain easy acess to an artists audio files to listen easily and quickly. Soundcloud can also be shared with social networking websites such as Facebook and Twitter to enabl;e an artist to reach his/her auidience easier and even quicker. 3) Animoto

Another cloud based software appliction, Animoto is a video creation service that allows me to create more presentations and projects without storage space beiung used meaning that I have more storage space to use on my drive to use for other projects within the use of media studies. 4) Slideshare

Slideahre is a file hosting serviced that allows me to upload files publicly or privately. The types of files I can upload in aid of showing my progress on Slideshare are Microspft Powerpoints, PDF's, Keynote and opendocument prenetations. These files can then be viewed on the website itself, on handheld devoices or embedded on other websites. 5) Survey Monkey

Survey monkey is another clou based softere application that allows me to create online surveys as an effective way to gain results is a short space of time. Survey monkey provides free, customizable surveys that include data analysis, sample selection, bias elimination, and data representation tools. 6) YouTube

Youtube is a software application that allows me to create video content and upload the video files quickly and effectively on a cloud drive allowing me to more storage space as well as a quick way to show video prentations for this blog for topics relevent for theis subject within media studies. 7) Da Font

Da font is a software application that allows me to use an even larger amount of types of font to use within my presentations to make the prenentations feel more engaging and interactive. 8) Powtoon

Powtoon is a cloud based software that allows me to create an anmimated prentation as a method of being more engaging for my audience on my prgoress on this project in media studies.