Research for double page spread

For my double page spread i have decided to write an article on a beginners guide to guitar. i am going to include the basics like how to tune a guitar, how to hold a plectrum and finally some beginner chords. i did not really need to do much research as i am a guitar player and know alot about guitars but i asked a total of 10 people that play the guitar 1.when you where starting to play guitar what would you have liked to have seen advertised in a magazine to help you and give you advice with playing?

Here are my results

1. Chord instructions -5
2.How to use a guitar tuner-1
3. How to hold a plectum - 4

I seen this and added it into my double page spred as beginners will find this advice helpful and effective. Here are some screenshots of my work in procress;

Detailed decisions

For task 11 i was asked to make detailed decisions on a number of different things including;

Front cover image.

For my front cover image i decided to take a range of photographs with the same model then decide out of the two which was more suitable. The first image was of a male sitting on an amplifier surrounded by a guitar whilst playing one the other a straight close up shot with the model posing with the guitar. The first image was not effective as it did not meet the codes and conventions of a magazine as he was not looking at the camera. The second image was ideal because it meets the codes and conventions and it is suited to the magazine genre and shows this to the audience as he is playing a guitar it also gives the auidence direct address.

Here are the two different images i taken;














Coverlines for my Front Cover

For my coverlines i used text that was relevant to the genre of music and guitars. I used coverlines that would appeal to me and i also asked other peoples opinions who are into music and guitars if it would appeal to them. In my questionnaire i asked people what free gifts they enjoy from a magazine and the highest result was cds so i included this in my magazine as it s a high selling point and popular. My coverlines also offer variety i.e. interview, free cd,quiz and advice. The coverlines i have choosen are

Top 10 legends of rock

Beginners guide to guitar

How well do you know music

Free CD

Mellow .D. Melting Charts

10 minutes with Chris Martin.

Write the text for my contents page
The text i already wrote in my publication plan. the text contains a number of different articles including news,quizes and competitions etc. I also included features and regulars to make my magazine look professional. Here is a preview screenshot to show you the text for my contents page taken from my publication plan;











List all the images for contents

The images i will use are relevant to my coverlines and other regular articles becuase they all relate to guitar sand music. I have used a variety of different photographs featured mostly on my contents page.
The images include

Picture of a guitar chord
This is relating to my article beginners guide to guitar.

Pictue of an electric guitar
This relate to the article top 10 guitar legends

Picture of guitar chord books
This relates to my article 20% of any guitar chord book included withiin my regulars.

Picture of a male posing with a guitar
This relates to my article Mellow.D. Melting Charts


Decide on the article i am going to write and decide on the images i will use.
The article i have decided to write is a beginners guide to guitar as featured on my front cover. I decided to write this as i have knowlegde on guitar basics and find it interesting and intriging. The article will include lots of information on beginning to play the guitar i.e. How to use a guitar turner and How to hold a plectrum etc. This article is revelant to my magazine and will help beginner guitar players play popular chords and give them advice on guitars.
The images i will use are one main close up shot of the bottom of a guitar with somebody holding a plectrum. This is what i found whilst looking at magazines that the most popular articles contain one main relevant image and this image is relevant and gives the reader an insight to the article just by this one main image.

Here is all my ideas that i collected and wil be using for my music magazine on a screenshot;

Publication plan

After i recieved my twenty questionnaires and the results got collected. I had to start making a publication plan which would include all my ideas including

• The magazine title

After recieving the questionnaires i looked at the question what do you associate with the word acoustic? The results i recieved contained lots of variety including Hippy,Mellow and Stings. The most effective and revelant suggestion was strum. This sounds professional, realistic and straight to the point i.e. it could not be mistaken for another type of magazine for example strings could be a classical magazine so that was my final decision. Strum would also tell the audience immedietly what the magazine genre.

Positioning Statement

The positioning statement is a solo artist called Mellow.D. I created Mellow D Melting Charts as it sounds fun, interesting and will catch the readers eye as it is relevant to today i.e. the charts and it is inviting.

Frequency

When i recieved my questionnaire results the highest frequency was fortnightly so this helped me make my decision as it recieved the highest vote.

Price

The price that was most popular on my Questionnaire results was £2 to £3 so i reviewed other music magazines and decided on £2.30 as my price as many popular published magazines are sold at that price.

Distrubution

The places that will distrubute my magazine are music shops, supermarkets,concerts and newsagents as these places will advertise as they are popular and will be recognised the most by all types of people espically a newsagents or a supermarket.

Rationale

The approach of my magazine is to give fans a magazine which includes everything that they wants including interviews,free gifts,competitions,letters,quizes and reviews etc to give an offical insight to the music world and give the readers a chance to get involed in music and the magazine and also ask questions and share ideas and point of views i.e. the letters page and interviews etc.

Style

The style of my magazine is informal but essential for music lovers. My magazine will include humour and information with a friendly style as it is aimed at a teenage audience. The syntax will be short and long paragraphs asking questions and giving the audience information about different topic all related to guitars and music.

Feature Content

Mellow .D. Melting Charts

Top 10 legends - Who will take the topspot?

Beginners guide to guitar - Guitar players essential guide

How well do you know music? - Test your knowlegde

Free cd- Rock out to some of the best tunes.

10 minutes with Chris Martin.

Regular content

· Interviews - Taylor Swift
·New album success

· News – Band break up on the mend.
·Oasis maybe back for good
·
· Letters – Good/Bad Gigs etc. highs and lowes of the festival season

· 10 minutes with Chris Martin
·Coldplays frontman in the hot seat
·
· Kt Tunstall
Rocking Europe

·Competition – Win a Gibson Guitar of your choice.
·Take your pick!
·
· Reviews – Which is the best guitar
·Which is the best guitar?

· Quiz – How well do you know music?
·
· Album Reviews
Who is flying high in the chart showdown?

· guitar chord books
Get 20% off any guitar chord book
·

Upcoming gig

Are they coming to your area?

· New stuff
Brand new fashion order now.

· Texas
In demand

Housestyle

I did this within a couple of lessons and my questionnaire helped me with the frequency, price feature and regular content and the housestyle(colours).

Here is some screenshots of my publication plan with all my ideas;

Music magazine sketches

After i gathered all my results and started on my publication plan which contains all my ideas for my magazine front cover and contents page. I had to produce sketches of what i would like my front cover and contents page to include. This includes the layout, images, cover lines and the text for my front page and contents. Here are my sketches that i have hand drawn;

Audience Questionnaire

For my magazine i needed to conduct a Questionnaire to help me decide on the different conventions of my front cover including the title,feature articles,headline and stand line font and colour etc. I asked a variety of different ages so my results would not be bias as well as asking men and woman want they like about magazines,Their favourite Band/Singer,What they associate with the word acoustic and how much they prefer to pay for a magazine. With the results i received back i graphed them on Microsoft Excel and Word and seen the highest answers which i put in my publication plan to help me create a magazine which people will find effective and appealing. Here are some screenshots of my graphs to show you the highest results. My results are a little bias as there was more females than males but i have over looked that and used a variety of answers to decide on my Media product.











here are two videos to show you my auidence research and to show what people of my particluar social group want within a magazine.

Music Magazine Research

For my Evaluated work i was asked to research different types of music magazines to help me with my coursework. I was asked to find out a number of different things about the magazine including the

Price

• Issue size
• Feature articles
• Regular content
• Frequency

The first magazine i researched was a magazine called Q which focuses on bands and artistes from all over the world and which are new and old. Q is an English music magazine sold at a price of £3.90 monthly. The content includes new releases, music and concert reviews and interviews.
The first issue was first published in 1986 and the issue size is about 162 pages.

Here is an image of a previous issue;

The second magazine that i researched is another English magazine called NME which has been around since 1952. the price is £2.90 and includes content similar to Q magazine including posters, interviews, reviews and new releases. the magazine is out weekly and the issue size is about 70 pages.

Here is an image of a previous issue of the magazine;

The third magazine i researched is called Mojo which was first published in 1993 and costs £3.80 monthly. the content includes a free CD or DVD,reviews, interviews etc. the issue size is 170 pages.it is very popular because it looks more in depth and focus more on music legends than any other music magazine.

Here is an image of the magazine;

Evaluation

For my Media prelimiery work i was asked to design a front cover and contents page for a weekly school magazine. First of all i did some planning in which i made a list in my notes of all the titles my front page would include and then i decided on my magazine name and what imagesi would need for my front and contents page. The name of my magazine i named teamwork but spelt diiferetny like team wk to realte to young people as it is a popular way of spelling and writing. I used a variety of colour including pink ,red, black, yellow and green because these are popular eye catching colours and make my coverlines stand out. the images i used where also relevant as they matched the text i.e. healthy eating and i added an image of healthy pasta/noodles. The contents page had a simple layout with the same images used on my front cover. I choose two colours that i used on my front page which were red and black as they go well together are popular and look professional.

Designed front page and contents

Once i had created and photographed my sketches i used Quark Express and Adobe Photoshop to put the final piece together. I used a variety of different colours including Red Green Black Pink and Yellow. I used these colours because they are eye catching and popular. i also used a number of different fonts to make my magazine stand out and to highlight the different coverlines. I called my magazine team work in the end spelt in a text style because this relates to teenagers and students because it is used frequently by teenagers than adults. i used the images i taken around school and put relevant coverlines with them i.e. SALE INSIDE which has a picture of school books. the contents page contained the same images and colour. here are the pictures of my final design of my school magazine;

preliminary task - school magazine sketches

Before i could start creating my school magazine front cover and contents page, I was asked to create two handdrawn sketches to show what i hope my magazine will look like. Here are my sketches;

preliminary task - planning

Here are the images that i have taken around school during two of my Media lessons. I used a number of different locations around school including the Library, Dining area and the Break out area. The Library has lots of resources which helped me greatly. I used the computers and books to get the images i needed. The Dining area was really helpful because there is lots of posters advertising food and healthy eating some of these posters included pasta/noodles and fruit. Whilst i looking for locations i came across the break out area which has lockers placed there and this instantly gave me an idea to photograph the lockers as they are popular and essential to students. Here are the images i taken;

Codes and Conventions of a contents page

Codes and Conventions of a Contents Page(s)

· Editors letter (Editorial included with a picture of the editor and signature).
· Pictures of contents with page numbers.
· Magazine title is placed in the tip left hand corner.
· Main image is alongside smaller images.
· Subscriptions included.
· Date and Issue numbers shown.
· Index list.
· Headings to divide up contents.
· Consistent colour scheme, only a few colours used.
· Page numbers shown on the pictures anchor image to written contents.
· Laid out into around two or three columns.
· Plain/white backgrounds.
· Word “Contents” at the top of the page.
· Page number and then text arrangement.
· Text (one or two words, mainline – bold, slightly larger than the other text).
· Sub line – smaller text.
· Regular content – appears in every single issue of the magazine.
· Features – one off articles which appear only in the one issue.
· Same font used as on the front page.
· Bottom of page – page number, title, issue date, website.
· Contact details, website address.
· NME Magazine contents arrangement differs for bands index, as it is a weekly magazine, so band index is shown as band/artist title then page number – shows what page each artist review is on, makes it easier.