Photo shoot preparation

I went down to Richmond lower school to have a scout around and look for plcaes where I could take shot for my magazine. I took pictures of diffrent areas where I could try and imagine my character being in these areas.

I think that this would be the perfect location for my photoshoot as the school is full of character and reflects the feeling of the magazine I want to create.

I have drawn some quick drawings which I will use on the photoshoot for where I want my character to be. This will allow me to make the photoshoot quicker as I have pre-planned shots to take therefore allowing my subject to spend less time waiting and for me to get quicker results.

These are a couple of ideas I have for my magazine for taking shots they all relate to the photos above. I plan on taking more photos than I think I will need as if some turn out to be rubbish then I will need reserve images.

Planning my photoshoot

I have looked on the internet for suitable locations for my photoshoot for my frontcover and double page spread. I have decided that I think I will be using Richmond Lower school on the banks of the river swale in North Yorkshire. I have looked at some images on the internet and visited the school webiste and it looks like a suitable locations for the kind of shots I want. I will go and have a quick scout of the location before I go for the final photoshoot taking a few images and so that I can see where would be the best places for me to take photos.

Here are a few of the images I have found on the internet of the school site which I am going to scout.

This is the link to the school website

http://www.richmondschool.net/

For my photoshoot I will be using a Canon EOS digital and a small tripod and possibly a large one for the shots. This will allow for high quality images as well as ease of use and the amount of images available to save on the memory card. I have not yet decided wether to be in the photos and use the self timer and the tripod to set up the shots or to take the photos manualy and have someone else as the subject focus.by using a digital camera it will also allow me to look at my images immediately after taking them, combined with having a large memory card this means I can take lots of photos so I have lots to play around with. this has huge advantages over using a conventional film camera as you only have a small limited number of photos per film and you cant check the shot after you've taken it. However the quality of the image on a  digital camera is only as good as the amount of megapixels it has but the Canon camera I will be using has 10MP so it should be adequate for the task in hand.

Mock Ups

 Images below are just some quick sketch ideas I think I could use for my front cover of my magazine as well as the contents page. I sketched these with a pencil and a pen then I scanned them into my laptop, then opened them up in powerpoint put labels on them ad saved them as .jpg files.

This font cover design above would all be set up as though its taken on a fridge using magnetic letters to create the title, then polaroids to show the images and info on the side. I think that the fridge is a good idea however im not sure if this particular image would particularly attract enough customers. Also it does not have enough "stuff" on it and so is not very interesting.

This front cover above would be arranged on top of some wooden floorboards or could be bare brick with items arranged on top such as the ticket stub and guitar. I like this image as it reflects the "mash" from mash up as though the objects have just been thrown there all messy. This is quite a funky style that I think may attract a reader. Again I would use the magnetic fridge letters to create the title. The wooden floorboards would reflect the ruggedness and mess of things.

I like this idea as it is different and would definitely stand out as a contents page. It would be taken with the inside of the fridge door and some objects like the milk and ketchup left in it. Then I would photoshop things like the list and the post it. It is funky and weird and certainly brightens the contents page up.

This is my favorite contents page as it is full of "things" which makes it more interesting and fun again a wooden floorboard background with things spread out across it. The idea is to keep it all random and messy or "mashed up".

Brainstorm for Mash Up

I created  a mind map/brainstorm to help me along with ideas of how my magazine is going to work and the different things I need to focus on in each section. It has also allowed me to get down on paper some of my ideas for the magazine which I have decided to call Mash Up as in a mash up of everything thrown together however behind the scenes everything will be placed meticulously in its place for the overall effect I wish to achieve. I will be using this mind map throughout the creation of  my magazine to help me with ideas.

Publishing Companies

Publishing companies such as IPC media are key componants in having a successfull magazine as we can see from this quote I found on their website.


"IPC Media produces over 60 iconic media brands, with print alone reaching almost two thirds of UK women and 42% of UK men – almost 26 million UK adults – while our websites collectively reach over 20 million users every month."


Some of the magazines that they produce include Nuts, NME Country Life, Rugby World and many other well known magazines.For this sort of publishing company to take an intrest in your magazine you need somthing that will stand out from the crowd. They will help in pricing editing and generally inproving a magazine.They also help to market and advertise, distribute and print. So getting a major publishing coorporation on your side is extremeley inportant to creating  asuceffull magazine it can mean the diffrence between make or break.


http://www.ipcmedia.com/

The Survey and its results

This is what the survey looked like. I used a free online service called Quibblo (http://www.quibblo.com/) this  allowed me to create a simple survey and it gives the results in a graph instantly. As well as advertising it through Facebook I also sent out emails to my Friends and got people in my media class to take part as well. Using the website was a quick and easy way to get results for market research as well as being free.


The Results


Q1. If you were to buy a music magazine what genre would it be?



This was a very important question as if you don't know what the customer wants to be reading about then there is no point in creating a magazine. This question showed me that the winner by far was Indie. Most people that took my survey wanted to read this type of magazine and this has helped my to finally decided that I will be doing a indie/rock magazine as these were the most popular results.

Q2. In a music magazine what would you expect to read about?

These answers were key to allowing me to know what to include in my magazine and what to advertise what would be inside the magazine. I think that due to the high numbers on all of the categories I will try and include all of these in contents page as well as putting some on the cover. I think that the front cover of my magazine may feature a new and up and coming band as this is the selection which got the most votes. And I may also make the double page spread article on them as well.

Q3. I am thinking of doing a rock/indie magazine for my final project much like Kerrang etc please select which names you think would be appropriate?

For this question I thought up some names that i thought would be appropriate for the type of magazine that I was thinking of doing. The three names which stand out are Clash, Mash Up and BLARE! the problem with the name Clash is that there is a well known band called The Clash therefore people might not associate the name with the magazine meaning that it would make the magazine less unique. Therefore I have to choose between Mash Up and BLARE! and the only way to decide this is what the target audience is voting for which seems to be Mash Up so this will be the name that I will be using.

Q4. In a music magazine would you rather read:

This allowed me to determine what length of article people want to read in my magazine and this is helping me to understand how long the article will be on the double page spread. The results show that people want to read medium length articles with some images. This is what I ill try and deliver.

Q5. What do you think would make you buy a magazine?

These results tell me what thing I need to concentrate on when I am creating the magazine as it shows what attracts people when they are buying magazines allowing me to combine all the things that people are looking for in a magazine when they are browsing for one. I now know that i need to concentrate on these things when I am creating my magazine in decending order of importance:

1.Main image on the front cover

2. layout of front cover and Price

3. Content lots of images

4.Title of the magazine, Monthly, Weekly

5.content less images.

From these I will definitely be focusing my main efforts on the front cover which is what seems to be attracting people to buying it and then work my way through the rest of the suggestions.

Overall I am extremely pleased with the results of the survey and I am very glad that I decided to do one. the fact that i did it online and used facebook to advertise it allowed me to tap into my target audience and find out what they were thinking. By keeping the whole thing shot and sweet, simple to understand and answer, I think it meant that people were more willing to get involved as it required less effort for them. It was a very effective way of carrying out market research and has helped me to make some difficult decisions such as the name of my magazine and genre.

Survey

I have created a survey to help me see what my target audience are looking for in a magazine


http://www.quibblo.com/quiz/esHos4Y/AS-Media-Magazine-Questionairre


This is the link to the survey!


I have also used Facebook to help advertise my survey so that I can get more people to allow me to have more accurate market research. I created a Facebook 'event' then invited all of my friends so that they can tell me if they are going to be doing the survey.

By using facebook this is a very easy way to accumulate market research as it involves less effort for me and for the potential customers, they don't even have to move form their computer. However because it is so easy to just click on as many or little answers as you want this could allow them to just choose whichever is easiest. I have tried to overcome this by only putting on a smaller amount of questions which I could so that the customer does not get bored when filling in their answers.

Mood board...inspiration.

I created this mood board as an inspiration for my music magazine.


The mood and genre of the board represents the idea of rebellion and rock. The UK element is very important and all the images represent a very patriotic attitude. The flame and fire represents the detruction and anarchy of the overall mood board along with the Banksy images that reflect this idea of freedom and creativity.The ransom lettering is a style I am going to use for my magazine as it is messy, funky and stands out. It is different and grabs the attention of the audience; drawing them in. The vinyl emulates the retro and vintage feel I want my magazine to have. It is all about the classic, cool and challenging convention. I want my magazine to be a magazine that bring iconic bands to the forefront. I want my magazine to be known for discovering new talent. I have used a black and white image and will use this style in my magazine as it allows you to focus more on the subject and thier actions rather than being distracted by the colour in the image. It also contrinbutes to the vintage feel.Banksy = freedom and liberation for the nation. This is going to reflect the ideas and ideology I want my magazine to have.

Mood Boards

These are the proper final mood boards. These images reflect what I want the genre of my magazine to be. the first one I simple but shows the blend of thr urban enviroment we are surrounded by and how rock can integrate into it particularly with the drum kit in the middle of the road and the arctic monkeys poster I placed on the road. Also the large microphone on the right gives off connotations of using music as a form of free speech. However all of these images work well togather and this is the sort of style I want to acheive when I create my final magazine. These are all images taken off the internet and I have then photoshopped them into a base image, the one of the empty street, using the lasso tool with the feather set accordingley to the size of the image so that I dont get hard lines on the edge of  each image allowing them to blend in. I think the black and white in this mood board was really effective however in my magazine especially on the fornt cover I will need to include colour as this will be more eye catching!

The second mood board I have created is american themed with a route 66 sign, american flag, american eagle etc. My favorite thing about this mood board is that it all sort of melts into one and you get that feeling of rugged american traveling the highways in the hot sun! living the good life. Although I dont think this is what I will theme my final magazine on, if I was to do two this would be my second choice, I would probably feature an artist like madonna in her earlier years as a musician. I created this using the opacity tool to help subtly blend pictures together. Both mood boards were yet again created on photoshop which I am growing to like more and more every time I use it!

Prelimenary Task

Research: VIBE magazine contents page analysis

The contents pages from VIBE seem to differ greatly from the other two music magazines, which I have analysed. These contents pages that I have selected are very simplistic and each has a single image on it of a well-known artist. This image will influence the reader greatly because it’s a large image and the only one then people are going to be judging this edition on the artist and the photo of that artist because it is so dominating. For example if I picked up a magazine like VIBE, turned to the contents page and saw a picture of Tinie Tempah I would probably buy that magazine and read it, or at least take a further look at the contents page and flick throughout the magazine to see what it has to offer. However if that single contents page image was of Pavarotti then I would put that magazine down straight away and not bother looking at the rest because I would instantly assume that the rest of the magazine would be about him or people like him, who I’m not interested in. so it is very important that the contents page image or images are right because they need to be correct for the age group you are selling to, the genre of artist must be right for the consumer and the way the photo is taken, a suggestive photo with Byonce is more likely to sell if she’s in a  tight leotard than if she’s sat on her sofa in trackies and a hoodie, on the other hand you wouldn’t put a photo like that in ‘Good Housekeeping’ the photo has got to be right and appropriate for the audience you are trying to appeal to. All of these pages have the title ‘contents’ large at the top but the word has been split to make I more interesting, because its not just a simple boring ‘contents’ then this may stop the reader if they are just flicking through the magazine as it big, its bold and it is of an interesting and different shape. So the reader will stop, look at the word because its different and then they will hopefully end up looking at the rest of the contents page. The actual writing on the contents page differs on each of these examples although three of them have page numbers and a short title in bold with a slightly longer description in a smaller font beneath. This allows the reader to identify what looks to be an interesting article and then read a, little more in depth into it and go to the page. These pages also have a small caption on them somewhere usually naming the artist on the page, the photographer and sometimes the location. I like these contents pages however when I do mine I want to keep it simple like these but also include a little more content in it to show the reader that my magazine will be packed with stuff.

Research: Kerrang magazine contents page analysis

These contents pages are from the music magazine Kerrang. This is  amore indie style of magazine and at a first glance 3 of the contents pages seem rather cluttered. The easiest one to read and simplest is the contents page featuring Billie Joe Armstrong. A simple contents page like this can mean that the reader will look at it, and because it is of simple layout and easy to read, will be bothered to read it, whereas if I looked at some of the other contents pages, because they are so messy and full of ‘stuff’, I would be less inclined to read them and find out what articles in the magazine I might find interesting. Therefore with a simple and structured layout, instead of haphazard, you can influence what the reader reads. The contents page is definitely important because after someone has seen the front cover in the shop then they will often pick it up and turn to the contents page to see A) what page he feature article is on, from the front cover, for a sneaky browse in the shop B)to see if there is anything else into the magazine which they may find interesting and therefore make it worthwhile buying the magazine. Two of the magazines I have looked at also feature a quote on the contents page. This is often a controversial quote so that the reader will look at it and wonder why the artist might have said that. Three o the contents pages also trait their main titles with a box of colour behind them, this helps the text to stand out and show that its more important and catches the readers eye. The size and placement of photos seems to differ, with one contents page only having one large photo and others having a few different photos. I personally think that a contents page that is simple, with only the one photo on is more effective and having lots of little or mediums sized photos can be distracting , however at the same time it allows people to recognize an artist from an image and they don’t have to read the name. It means a reader can quickly scan the page and tell what well known artists will be in the magazine.

Research: Q Magazine Contents Page Analysis

To analyse contents pages I’m going to be using the same three different music magazines that I analysed for front covers to keep some continuity, within the same genres. Each of these contents pages carries on with the same colour scheme of red white and black. This is the same colour scheme used througout all of the Q magazines and helps to give it an identity. The same Q is on all the contents pages; on the majority of its contents pages the Q is in the top left hand corner of the page however on the bottom image the Q is centre at the top. This tells the reader that there must be a reason why this is different to all the other contents pages where the Q is in the same spot on each one yet on this contents page the Q is larger, grey and in the centre. Perhaps this means that this is a special edition of the magazine, maybe there is a unique extra long article about a certain artist or maybe it’s an anniversary or festive edition for Christmas or Easter. Such as simple thing as changing the size and location of a logo by a few centimeters can make such a big difference. And, even as not a regular reader of the magazine I have noticed this imagine what this might mean for the devotees and what the implications of this small but powerful action is. The actual writing consists of maybe one to six words then a small more in depth description of the feature articles beneath ranging from five to twenty five words. This allows the reader at a quick glance to see if they like the look of an article with the larger more bold letters, this is often an interesting or controversial statement, and then the description beneath highlights what the article is actually about. The page numbers for all of these is before the writing, this is a little different to some magazines who logically put the number at the end of the short title so that the reader can look at what the article is about then see the page number straight away and go to it. However by doing this it’s a little different to other magazines making it stand out and make it more interesting instead of your usual contents page. All of these contents pages have one main photograph, which is larger than the rest. Often that’s related to the artist featured on the front cover. For example the contents page with Razorlight on the main photo is of the creation and construction of the front cover image with the artist stood in the rain in a studio. One of the contents pages only has one photo on it in contrast to another of the contents pages, which has some of the artists; cut out on it that has 6 different smaller images. I personally prefer the contents page with only one photo on it.  I think that when you have lots of photos on a contents page it distracts the reader from the content of the page, the writing, and can sidetrack them from the whole aim of the page and you end up loosing the function of the contents page. On the other hand some people prefer them with pictures as they can identify artists from them. And, like on the contents page with many pictures they haven’t got a description for each picture, its just the picture of the artist with a large page number next to them, so the reader can look at the picture and go “hey look that’s Madonna I wonder what she’s been up to, page 50”. Sometimes the contents pages can also have a controversial comment/quote from an artist for example “I fart in your direction” quoted from Nick Valensi of The Strokes and pg12. Someone can see that and it’ll make them wonder why someone would say that so they turn to that page.

Magazine Remake

For my final exam as I am designing and creating a music magazine. I decided to remake the front cover of a magazine that was music related. So I chose to copy the front cover of an issue of Kerrang a this is the sort of interesting dynamic magazine cover I wish to achieve myself as a finished product.


First I went on google images and selected a suitable and relevant Kerrang cover. Then I decided that although I would keep the same layout as the original magazine. I would change all the words and the images used. This would test my skill in keeping with the genre of the magazine. S
o any of the images I used were off the Internet however everything was created from scratch nothing was copied form the original.


I started by manipulating the main image of the arctic monkeys by using the brightness/contrast slider to give it that unique look. Then I created the title using a simple font with roughly the same dimensions as the originals then using the line tool and the paint tool to give the letters their almost unfinished look. This also added the cracked lines across it. I then inserted the text in the centre of the magazine and chose a similar font to the original and placing the black boxes behind them in another layer.
Every aspect on that page has a different layer, this allows me to skip between items on the page easily and also stops me form accidentally deleting something or editing the wrong object. Then I put in the other pictures such as the posters and the Arctic Monkeys album poster and placed the white boxes behind them, using the free transform option to alter the sizes and orientation of each image giving the front of the magazine that sort messy thrown together look. Then I used the paint tool and different paint brushes to give the "poster special" writing that painted outline. I placed in the coloured boxes behind the text in the bottom right using the text option. I also placed shadow on each one to give them the 3D effect making them stand out to the reader a bit more.


The artist I chose to use as the main featuring article on the front cover as well as using an image of them were the Arctic Monkeys as these are a band which I like as well as them being in keeping with the feel and style of the magazine. Images of them and their albums were also readily available off the Internet. all of the band names featured on the front of the magazine are real nothing is made up as I wanted to keep the authenticity of the magazine even though it was a remake. Then I finished off the top of the page with the "futureheads" stripe at the top and using the text stretch option on the words to make them fit exactly into the boxes

As you can see these front covers are very similar and effective even the one which created in a few hours on photoshop. I think I did a good job and that my photoshop skills are up to the job or creating a music magazine such as working with many layers. This task has allowed me to assess my ability with photoshop and to select appropriate material to fit the genre of the magazine. The only problem I can see with my version of the magazine is the fact that the original image isn't exactly as wide as the original making the magazine look a bit stretched however that could not be helped as this was an image I got off the Internet. Overall this was a real confidence booster as I created the whole thing from scratch!

Research: VIBE magazine front cover analysis

Another music magazine that this time deals in hip hop and rap artists is VIBE. VIBE’s front c covers seem to differ nearly every time. However the main image on the front cover is always either a close up head or head and shoulders. This is an important thing to notice for this magazine as having a head and shoulders allows the artists hands and arms to be in the shop which then allows them to represent themselves in a way in which they want to look. For example the front cover with Eminem on is a head and shoulders shot, this has him looking at the camera with his arms folded. Now the shot is close enough for his facial expression to have some effect on the reader but also his stance with his arms folded show us that he is confident and he is also looking directly at the camera also showing that he is confident and not afraid to look directly at the reader. Both images with Usher and Drake the artists have their head at an angle. This keeps their image from being uniform and shows that they can be different and out of the ordinary from the rest of society. Both are looking directly at the camera displaying attitude and defiance to show their confidence. Usher is also using his hands and at a first glance looks like he’s swearing and because this looks like a controversial image at first glance then this may attract the reader as to why the artist would do this. Also it shows that the artist is not afraid from being a bit rebellious and do something a bit ‘naughty’. All of these magazine also have colour schemes this allows for continuity and also if you want something to really stand out then you can change the colour of that word because then it will be noticed, for example the front cover featuring Usher the coulours are blue, yellow, black and white. Then there is one word in red large its “swagger” this can explain a lot to the reader all about Usher and the pose on the front cover meaning that the reader can get the gist of what part of this edition is going to like. I think that I would like to look at using a style more like vibe for my magazine as it is more simple than Kerrang and this allows the reader to pick things out easier and in my opinion looks a lot better.