Organisation/Drafting & Planning: Artist Style & Location

I have decided that I would like my cover star to wear clothing that represents the genre of indie/rock. I have taken some images of me and my friend where we have carefully picked out clothes that we think would suit an indie/rock music magazine. We have chosen clothing such as flannel shirts, doc martins, dungarees and big denim jackets. I also took these images in my friends room by a blank wall which can easily be edited around on paint.net to get rid of any objects that are not needed. I love the idea of the images being black and white because it is very simple and I love simple things. Black and white also makes certain aspects stand out more such as the dark lipstick my friend is wearing.
For location, I like the idea of a blank wall just like in these images because, again, it is really simple and there isn't too much going on. A location like this makes certain things stand out, especially on a white background. If I chose not to have a black and white image colours such as red (which are in the original photos) can be easily seen in contrast to the white wall.
These images are not my final ones for my music magazine, just practice images for earlier drafts of my music magazine (e.g for my homework).

Drafting and Planning: Magazine Draft Layout

Here I have planned my own music magazine layout using Publisher. By planning and drafting my layout I can further develop my ideas and try different layouts over time until I need to create my final music magazine. I can also make sure I am certain on a specific layout that I am fond of so that I don't have to think about it for ages when it comes to doing my final music magazine cover. So far, I like my first draft because it's neat and has a clear layout and I know exactly where to put all of a magazines conventions on it.

Drafting and Planning: Self Assessment of Codes & Conventions Task

After my peer assessment of my codes & conventions task I have realized that I have not included a proper main cover line for the second M magazine and this is generally one of the most important things I needed to include.
I feel like I focused on all of the magazines properly except for the second M magazine as I found it easier to think of cover lines and stories for bands/artists that I already know whereas the second M magazine required me to think of a new name for the band and it was out of my normal comfort zone. I also feel like I got experience from thinking of a new name for the band as now I feel a little more comfortable with picking a name for the artist featured on my own music magazine.
My peer said that all of my other magazines looked realistic and to improve I need to write and discuss what I actually did to improve the magazine and what codes and conventions I added.
With this magazine I did not think thoroughly enough about the cover lines and main cover line, I just wrote the first think I could think of that I felt would fit with the artist's on the front. 

To improve my second M magazine cover I added a main cover line and aligned my quotes so that it looks more professional. I also made the main cover line blue so that it stands out against the other colours.
In preparation for my music magazine, I will look at back at this at what I should NOT do in my own magazine. I feel that this cover is a poor quality magazine cover and when making mine, will make sure it is ten times better. I know that for my music magazine I need to make sure I think in more depth about my main cover line and cover lines so that they are not boring or plain. On this cover I have put only one cover line, which would not attract an audience/reader. I also didn't put my cover line to the right or left which makes it look unprofessional. I also need to remember to put a price on my magazines which is a key code and convention. For my music magazine I will think more thoroughly about my artist and artist's on the cover because they have a certain style and I cannot have an image that looks Indie/Rock but the cover line is something that screams out about heavy metal. 

Organisation/Drafting/Planning

I have decide that I will definitely use a medium close up or a long shot of my cover star as it would suit my magazine and with using a range of shots and camera angles I can then decide which is the best one and I can edit a few on paint.net or Photoshop to help me further my skills for my final music magazine. 

I got these three layouts off of Google to help me design a layout for my music magazine. I like the first one more than the other two as it is full of different things and it is very creative. I like the idea of the 'featured article/band' being placed over the main image.

I like the second one because of the way it is unique and includes the idea of having other things on the front of the magazine that are less important just to show that they are in the magazine.

The third one is my least favourite as it is very simple and does not have as many ideas as the other two. I would use an idea like this if I wanted my magazine to be quite simple and plain.

Drafting & Planning: Fonts

These are some fonts that I have been looking at to use for my music magazine.
I like the first font because it is clear and big but I think it looks like it should feature in a newspaper rather than a music magazine so I will refrain from using it.
The second font is an example of one that I would most definitely not use although it is quite clear it could be used in certain types on magazines but not an Indie Rock music magazine because it is slightly messy and more film like as it is used for the Alice In Wonderland movie title.
I like the third font because it is simple and clear but I think it looks more like it should be used in a Style or Gossip magazine, for examples, OK Magazine. 
The fourth font is one of my favourites because its big, bold and very clear and it is easily readable. I also like it because it is all in capitals and all of the letters fit well together and follow the same style.
I like the fifth one because it is easily noticeable and looks like almost like a music font. I'm not sure if I would use this font because I think it would suit an album cover rather than a magazine cove.The font looks nice with the word 'Imagine' but I'm not sure this font would suit any other words as well as it does this one. 

Drafting & Planning: Codes and Conventions Task

Target Audience : Survey

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/BSP3ZCV

Organisation: Response to Blog Feedback

WWW: I included a good amount of Similar Products and have done some drafting. I also included Target Audience.

EBI: I need to think about organisation and how I am going to do it and then actually do it.

Overall, I think my work is okay.

Research into Similar Products: Double Page Spread Analysis

I have been researching ideas for a double page spread inside my music magazine and I came across this one from NME about Kurt Cobain. I adore this double page spread because it is filled with writing and images of Kurt Cobain. I also like the headline on the left because it is a smart idea and the writing is almost like paint which is very creative and I love it. I am definitely fond of the fact that there is writing, images and then more writing on the right hand side and I love the colour scheme it is so simple yet so wonderful. I would like to use colours like this or simple colours that would make my magazine look simple but amazing at the same time.

Research into Similar Products: Magazine Front Cover Analysis

I have decided that for my music magazine cover I would like to use a medium close up or a long shot as they are commonly used, especially in NME and Rolling Stone magazine. I like the idea of a medium close up as you can fit more than one person on a page or have one person take up the entire page. Although you can also fit more than one person on a page with a long shot too, the use of a long shot allows the reader to see much more of the cover star(s) and what is near their feet such as instruments or perhaps they are doing a pose with their legs and feet which are included in the shot. Medium close ups also allow a more personal approach which I like and doesn't show off too much of the cover star or what the story involves.

Research into Target Audience

Target Audience:

I have been looking at magazines such as Kerrang, NME, Rock Sound and Q. All four of these magazines are an inspiration for my own music magazine and I have looked at their typical target audiences for ideas of my own. 
All four have typical target audiences of teenagers and up (14+) and maybe even one or two years younger. All of them have this target audience because they all contain adult content or content that includes swearing or obscene words, even if they are something blanked out. Some of the magazines also include images that involve rude gestures, Kerrang being a big offender in this category. 

My magazine will have the same target audience as these 4 because I like the idea of my magazine appealing to teenagers and adults as I would like my magazine to be more mature and full of content that is more suitable for teenagers and adults. Looking at the concept of adult themes with swearing or rude gestures in images, I decided not to include either of these. I did not want rude gestures in my magazine because I felt that it would offend and my artist is not the kind of person who would do that. I also don't want any swearing in my article because my artist is not that kind of character.
I decided to look especially close at one cover of NME magazine featuring Kurt Cobain.

NME is targeted at the age range of 17-30 who are particularly fond of film and have a big passion for music.

This particular NME cover featuring Kurt Cobain will attract some older audiences whilst simultaneously attracting a younger audience too. This cover will attract an older audience, particularly people who were around when Kurt Cobain was and when Nirvana started off. As well as Kurt Cobain being on the cover, in the bottom left Bob Dylan is featured which would also attract an older audience.
This cover will also attract a younger audience as it features Alex Turner who many younger people listen too, typically from the age of 13/14.
I will keep this in mind when I come to create my own music magazine. I will make sure that I include bands that are more recent and some that are a little older as this would then attract a much wider audience, some who want to read about older bands and some that want to read about more recent bands.
For inspiration on this idea and my target audience I referred back to this post where I talked about what target audience I want my magazine to be aimed at. This previous post helped me create this current one as it gave me a guideline for my own target audience as I compared it to this NME magazine covers target audience.

Research/ Similar Products/Target Audience: Investigating Indie/Rock Music

I have decided that I am going to use Indie/Indie Rock/Rock music for my music magazine. I decided to research a little bit more into each of those music genres and typically they all are joined together as one most of the time.

The definition of "Indie Music"  simply means independent music and the most famous category of music which belong to the indie music docket is indie rock music. Usually, artists that are on very small record labels which are not known and are unsigned are associated with indie music as they are independent. 

Rock music has gained population over time and is now enjoyed by many around the globe. Indie Music Rock artists have been producing great music independently and the good thing about it is that they're still making money and they still have fans who love them and they are recognized around the globe. The only difference that Indie music has (because of other styles of music) is the fact that indie music receives little airplay in comparison to music made by all the signed artists around the globe.

In the mid 1980's, the term 'indie' began began to be used to describe music produced on post-punk labels rather than the labels themselves. In the US, the indie rock scene was prefigured by college rock that dominated radio college playlists. 

I like the theme of indie rock as it almost mixes too genres together to create something great. I am particularly looking at bands like Arctic Monkeys, Oasis, Tom Odell, Deaf Havana as these bands gives an insight into rock/indie music.


By researching Indie/Rock music I have widened my knowledge of Indie/Rock music and now know the different styles of artistes involved. My artist has an Indie/Rock style and from my research I have learnt how to style my artist and what facial expression my artist should have whilst I am photographing them. From researching this style of music I also decided that my artist would be a unique, 'indie' band/artist. This style of music is also appreciated by a target audience of 14 - 29 and above which is my target audience for my magazine, I learnt this fact from my research of NME and Q magazine's target audience which helped me decide that this would be my target audience due to the high interest of Indie/Rock music from this age range.

Drafting & Planning: Investigating Typography

This magazine cover features 6 different fonts used for the cover line. I decided that the worst font was D as it is too scriptive and messy. It is very unclear and it doesn't fit the style of an 'urban' and 'chic' magazine. I then decided that the next font, taking 5th position on the best to worst scale was C. C uses comic sans and it looks ridiculously silly, way too childlike and very patronizing as it has the connotation of immaturity.

Taking 4th place I think is A as it is a typical font for school essays not for an exciting magazine, it is a very simple font and wouldn't attract a reader.
I think in 3rd place is E because it is quite a clear font and the bold letters stand out but I also think they are too in your face. In 2nd place I think is B as it is very readable and clear but I am not fond of the first letters being bolder than the rest as it distracts from the rest of the cover line.

My favourite font is F because it is clear and very readable, it doesn't distract from the rest of the cover line and it isn't too silly for this type of magazine.
This exercise of  looking at typography will help me create and look at different fonts for my magazine. This task also allowed me to look at these fonts carefully and see that a lot of fonts are not the right font for certain magazines and some fonts are ideal. This has shown me that many fonts should just not be used in any magazine at all because they are childish, unreadable or just do not fit the style of certain magazines. I now understand that I need to look carefully at fonts and not choose fonts carelessly, I really need to analyse fonts and see if they fit my type of music magazine. 

Research into Similar Products: Double Page Spread Analysis

I also looked at NME magazine double spreads for inspiration and I loved this one in particular. The layout of this spread is something I really like because one side is just a photo and the other is full of exciting text and news. The image on the left is of two members of Mumford & Sons and the way they are positioned is natural as they are performing on stage and are in an exciting, gig-like position. The two secondary images on the right are also from gigs and this is quite consistent. On the right the text and boxes are positioned so that they are all separate and readable and all boxes are in different colours to show that they are not part of the big text in the center. In the middle of the text there is a quote that has been blown up from the article which may or may not interest a reader to read the article as they scan through the magazine.
The colours for the fonts are very unique and unusual for many magazines, especially NME magazine, pink is very unique. The pink, black, white and grey all compliment each other and fit nicely against the image on the left as readers are drawn to both sides. On the right there is a box full of other artists which may interest readers and it is also there to show that this magazine is full of other exciting things or that this is a perfect place for this box to be placed as it is conveniently talking about gigs.
The text includes the bands opinions and comments about the big festival that they are the "Main Event" at and readers/fans of the band would like this a lot as it's not about albums or anything typical. All of the themes on this spread are consistent throughout and are all perfectly placed in NME magazine. Finally, the font for the spread is quite big and bold which is good because it is clear and readable from a slight distance and in each box on the right the font is a bit bigger so that the title is clearer in the smaller space.