Font Choices

FOR MY MAGAZINE, I CHOSE ONE CONSISTENT FONT:
Helvetica.
there are many variations of it in my magazine, for example:

 this is an example of my use of a helvetica, bold and oblique, slanted to the angle of 24 degrees clockwise. this is a rendition of a popular clothing design brand and band logo( Supreme and Your Demise) which people will recognise.

 

another example is my titles were Helvetica Bold. i used this as it isa common font in the design world as apart from its clarity, it also looks standard and professional

how i edited one of my photos.

first off i opened the photo in photoshop.. then i went into image > image mode > grayscale (as you cant use RGB colour with black and white) so i could convert it to a dominant grayscale.

next and finally i pressed CMD and L to access the levels to alter my photo, and set the levels to what i saw fit, which was: Black: 0, Gray: 1.38 and White: 183

this gave the desired effect i wanted for my photo which was to highlight the foreground and give it a more vintage feel.

how does your magazine represent particular social groups?

with my magazine, my social group i have represented is teenagers.

my use of language is a major factor in this. i have used a lot of informal language such as 'riffs', 'wicked', 'radical'  in my magazine which is a use of teenage vocabulary and slang of the present use of my audience. also, i have used vulgar language(but blanked out) for my teenage audience such as f**k, c**t and s**t,which i, myself as a teenager use frequently and my audience used it as well as the artists they listen to. this helps them connect with the article and writer so they are most intrigued.

i also represented the alternative dress+fashion sense by including people of my audiences age and fashion sense. if they see people who dress similar to them they will be interested in the article the person is in. similar fashion senses represent my audience.

what new technologies have you learnt and used in this magazine

in this magazine i learned and harness the new technologies granted to me by the Mac: Abode InDesign and Adobe PhotoShop


with InDesign i learned about many new tools:

Bleed
the bleed tool allows you to go over the magazines margin, which means it will let you go over with pictures which gives 5mm less constriction, something professional magazines use a lot to make it flow more natural on the pages. This allows the picture not to cut off and leave small white gaps as it continues off of the page.

Inset Spacing
the inset spacing tool allows you to make sure the text you put in the box does not touch the edges, a more professional look for the magazine. if the text is spaced in equally in all boxes it gives out a much neater and composed look to the text and stops it flowing over at the side

De-hyphenate
the de-hyphenate tool allows you to remove all unnecessary hyphens(long words that have prefixes and flow over the side of the box do this) which makes all words look a lot less messy. after looking into Front, NME and Esquire i had noticed they only use hyphens in words that are double barreled and de-hyphenate everything else, so i did this too.

Drop Text
This allows text to flow from one box to another. this is used by magazine designers to make sure the text keeps flowing naturally and doesn't look broken down. When writing an article it needs to flow mid sentence into the next box so the reader follows the text into the next box and doesn't just stop reading, it helps keep their attention focused on the articles.


Page Break
the page break tool is used combined with the drop text tool to keep the presentation of the text professional so you can align the text as desired. i used this tool to make sure two of my columns of text were aligned so they finished at the same point. this made my magazine look more like NME magazine which makes sure its text looks neat and is easy to read in columns.


PHOTOSHOP:

image mode
image mode allows you to change the photo to a more printable colour set(CMYK + GRAYSCALE) which is useful asit is required that you change from RGB to CMYK or GRAYSCALE. but i also used the image mode 'GRAYSCALE' for the effect of black and white in my photos, as you cannot change CMYK colour photos to black and white so choosing a gray scale would help to emphasize a black and white effect with more boundaries to influence.

levels

the levels tool edits the amount of black, white and grey in the picture. i used this in combination with grayscale to give a stronger black on my photos for effects to make my photos look more appealing and professional, also if the blacks fade away the background it can allow a focus on the centre or main object in the image, so people will actually notice what is in the picture.

An example of the levels tool being used. it has put more grey emphasis on the people in the picture so they are more noticed that in the original black and white picture.

content aware fill
i used the content aware fill tool because it can erase people/undesired object by replacing it with content similar to the surrounding of the area. i used this on my front cover to remove undesired areas, such as overlapping branches(which i did not recognise before entering the photo onto the cover) which would of given a more DIY, unprofessional photographic affect which would not appeal to my audience as there is already a market for unprofessional


BLOGS
By using www.blogger.com i have been able to show my progress with my College magazine and my Music magazine. I was able to post photos, videos and document attachments to my posts to show photo choices, screenshots of progress, a video explaining my technologies used and even though i did not use a document attachment i could use it to post my base draft texts. This technology was aware to me before but i have learned how to maximise its effect and use it to track my progress and evaluate my coursework.

This is the upload screen for Blogger. I have used this technology to upload attachments other than text to my blog so i can show my progress easier, i can also upload screenshots of this Mac to show processes of how i perform tasks, and constructed my final product.

SURVEYMONKEY
another technology i learned of is surveys. the technology i used was a website called  www.surveymonkey.com. this website allowed me to ask people, via facebook. this meant that people on my facebook friends could answer my survey and helped me decide what my audience(people aged 16-23) wanted to see(genres, articles, colours) and allowed me to plan via graphs. here is an example of a graph i took a screenshot of for my blog.

above: a graph from SurveyMonkey showing the percentage of people who liked each genre. i chose to base my magazine on the top 3 genres: metal, hardcore and pop-punk
i used this technology to make the ease of appealing to my audience as i can find out what my audience want in the magazine via SurveyMonkey.

FACEBOOK
Facebook was another technology i used in conjunction with SurveyMonkey as it allowed me to get 20 survey responses from people in the age range i wanted (16-23) of both male and female. the technology of social networking websites allowed me to survey people of a certain age group, similar interests and other connecting factors.
MAC 
another technology that i learnt about was the Mac. it has many applications of software that i used (InDesign, PhotoShop, etc) for my project. It has a function of selective screengrabbing, by using cmd shift 4, you can select what parts of the screen you want to screengrab and then they become a picture file. useful for when you are explaining the processes of how you constructed the product,

Front covers of other magazines analysis

This is Front magazine. it is a lads magazine with music related subjects. it is aimed at purely male audience of 18-25

it uses the appeal of its 18-30's male audience sexual desires by including an exposed woman on the cover who is fairly attractive. many sexual references are made on the front covers. 'get paid & get laid' and 'i shagged a pirate' which appeal to the sexual imaginations and intrigues them. the vulgar language suggests they are of a a working class background. the colours used are black, white, pink, red and blue. these are either manly or sexualized colours. the layout is simple and easy to read as they believe that the most attention will 

be paid to the pictures not the writing unless its easy to read

Front magazine use bright colours and sexy pictures of women to attract their audience which is young adult men (18-30) as the font and picture draws them towards the magazine and convinces them to buy it as its in their interests. .

this has taken influence on my magazine as i have used the idea of simple and easy fonts to keep my young audience's attentions on the article.

 This is NME magazine. It is an 'indie' genre magazine made for a predominantly straight white male audience aged 18-30.

The cover uses a white background with two standing out + recognizable famous figures to draw the attention of its readers. the contrast of white on black allows the focus on the people.

The logo is recognisable and would be the next object in the route of the eye which would instantly let fans of NME know that this is an official NME magazine.

There is a headnote is a large yellow + white bold font which attract the eye to read that after the logo.

The headnote is short and snappy which instantly grabs their attention to read on.

The main article overlaps the picture and is the next on the route of the eye. the fonts are red + white which stand out on the black jackets of the people in the picture so it is easily read. it has the largest font which puts the main article at the biggest attraction to the reader, making it the most important figurehead of attracting the reader. They also have a pull quote from the actual article which says 'I was worried the Monkeys would think i was having an affair' the choices of the words 'worried' and 'affair' grab the readers attention as they are exciting verbs.

There are 4 side articles which use bold, red fonts to catch your eye after the main article. they use adjectives like 'special' and 'exclusive' to keep the reader's interest. also, a slight use of over dramatics 'Vs' which makes it sound like there is something dramatic going on which would intrigue the reader.

The magazine appeals to its target audience by using large fonts and short sentences to keep them interested as most male orientated magazine are not 50/50 on text and picture output, they go for a more 60/40 style so short sentences are used to make them read the articles and catch their eyes..

This is Rocksound magazine. It is an 'alternative' magazine aimed at predominantly straight, white males of 18-30

(This is a spanish print of it, but i cannot find the original UK print so i will translate from it)

The cover uses a photo of a famous iconic singer looking up with a shallow depth of field photo. this photo allows the focus of the reader's eye to stay on the 3/4 body photo of the famous person pictured here(Oli Sykes of Bring Me The Horizon).

The logo is the next object in the route of the eye. even though it is partially overlapped by the photo, it is still easily recognizable by fans due to its commonplace white font with a red outline. unlike other magazines, the whole logo is in lower case. This is against conventions but it is used to make an easier recognized logo.

The title is the next thing the reader will notice. the title overlaps the lower body of the famous person in the photo.  The title says 'Bring Me The Horizon' in a messy scribbled font(which they use for their own logo, recognized by fans) with a red and white colour fil. This is to represent the English flag, as the band hail from Sheffield, England. It promotes their Nationality and will attract an English audience. Below the title, there is a subtitle saying 'Suicidal Tendencies'. This is a reference to the connection between the band's album 'Suicide Season'  and the famous Punk band 'Suicidal Tendencies'.  The word 'Suicidal' is a rather strong, dramatic word which would interest the male audience.

After this, a few bands included in the magazine are listed on the upper left of this title. They are some of the bands included in this magazine. Using simply the band names in red + white fonts(to contrast with the background) suggests this is a male audience due to the short sentences or just one word descriptions of the content inside. There is also a smaller picture below the band name 'Staind' which suggests they are a popular band and people will be attracted to read on if they recognise the picture.

On the right side of the main picture in the right third there is a diamond shaped white box with PUNK written in large letters with the bands 'Lagwagon', 'Cripple Bastards' and 'H20' listed underneath. This suggests that these 3 bands are of the Punk genre and people who like that genre should read on. the articles are not described which could be used to attract the reader to look into these as they do not know what could be included inside, although this could have a reverse effect not giving any interest at all.

There is a headnote which says 'compilation with free download' and lists the bands included.  The use of a free giveaway entices the reader to buy the magazine to not only read but get a free CD download included.

finally,  the bottom third has an 'also' tag which lists bands included in the magazine. this is for people who want to read about specific bands in the magazine and can see if they were included.

Rocksound magazine appeals to its target audience with short sentences, a simple design and the use of darker style imagery as this is what appears on  album covers.

youtube link.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-17JVA6uFc


this is my two minute talk about my magazine and the reasons behind parts of its design.

who would be the audience for your magazine?

These two people: Suzy and Jimmy are two examples of my audience.

Suzy
most of the female audience for my magazine are similar to Suzy.
the female audience are of between 15-21
they are of alternative dress and fashion styles.
many have piercings in their facial area, and stretched ears are commonplace.
most have dyed hair (usually red/peroxide blond)
most have a music taste comprising of metal/hardcore and pop-punk, with some hip-hop.
they go to a lot of local and national gigs.
i have reflected this audience by adding metal/hardcore and pop-punk gig coverage with a lot of local and national gigs to appeal to them. i used darker alternative colours and commonplace band styled logos(for my front cover) and a fashion label style font for band names(helvetica bold in a red box) which is of supreme(a clothing label.

Jimmy
most of the male audience is described by Jimmy.
usually between ages 15-25
they are of an alternative/well dressed fashion.
usually have facial hair.
not many have facial piercing but a lot of the males in my audience stretch their ears as a body modification.
their music tastes consist of death metal and hardcore and hip-hop(major underground 90's American)
they generally frequent many local and national gigs.

i have reflected this audience via text based around clothing brand logos. and i cover local and national gigs. i used the colours of artists that they would recognise(blacks, reds, whites). also the people in bands that i have photographed are fitting of the male audience so it would appeal to them as they can aspire to be them.

How did you attract/address your audience?

I attracted and address my audience by using models of my band for the front page, of a similar age and dress style(alternative and metal clothing).  This makes it appeal to my audience as the can relate to and look up to the models their age, dressing like them but in bands. The audience can relate to the models if they dress similar(same fashion) and music sense, it can inspire them to dress like the bands shown.

I used the colours gray, dark red, black and white in my magazine as during my research of heavier genre magazines(Kerrang, Terrorizer, Rocksound) and a common theme of colours is black, white and dark colours. They are predominantly black. This is reflected in my magazine in the fact i have a heavier genre than these magazines, i use the predominant black white and grey with a dark red for emphasis on this genre.


I used a simple, consistent easy-to read font(Helvetica bold) as it is a common place font in music magazines(convention of most) for its simplicity. This makes the magazine more appealing to my audience as they are predominantly white male teenagers, and if they struggle to read the fonts, they will disregard my magazine.

The price for my magazine in £1.50. I believe that this is an appealing price as my target audience is predominantly teenagers(15-25) and for my survey, I found out that 80% of the surveyed were aged 15-19, and in my prior knowledge, people of that age are not very wealthy. Also, a result from my survey is that 54.50% of my surveyed audience would pay £1 - £1.50 and 45.50% would pay £1.50 - £2.00,  so i chose the common factor between these two: £1.50. Also, research into other music magazines, mine would be much cheaper(NME: £2.10, Kerrang: £2.20, Front £2.50) which would make my magazine appeal to other audiences, as price is a main factor in buying magazines in this generation.

I also used relevant bands and photos for my magazine. i took pictures of two popular bands, one of which is from nearby: Cruel Past. And another popular UK band: Your Demise. People would consider buying my magazine in my target audience as they recognise these famous bands and are intrigued to read the magazine for the information on them. My front cover photo is appealing to my target audience as it uses dark colours(the night) and the clothes are similar to what my audience would wear. Also the contents page and double page spread photos are all from famous bands live gigs, something which my target audience are extremely fond of going to, prior knowledge from my research.

what publishing company would be most suited to my magazine

With my magazine publication 'Homesick' a magazine for the review and promotion of metal and hardcore predominantly UK based bands, I believe that Bauer Media would be the best company. Bauer Media has taken on magazines such as Kerrang! Which have a very similar target audience to mine, as the genres cross over. I would choose this company as they are experienced in what they do and they already have a magazine similar to my own.

Bauer Media was formed in 1875 and has established a huge following for their music magazines they produce (Q magazine was the highest selling music magazine for over 5 years so far) and Kerrang! magazine had 52,272 sales last year. i believe this company would be the best publication company for me as they have had prior experience with a magazine in a similar genre and other music magazines so i would be comfortable with them publishing my magazine.

BBC worldwide uses new technologies such as high quality glass print presses and the internet based BBC iplayer. they appeal to mass audiences with a range of publications: Good Food, Radio Times, Top Gear, Gardeners World. The wide range shows their experience in publishing many other products worldwide, but i am focusing on the UK completely. So i would not choose BBC worldwide as i am only distributing in the UK, and also after my research they have little to no music publication experience, a main factor in my decision of publishing company.

Another publishing company i researched for a choice was Conde´ Nast Publications, founded in 1909 by Conde´ Montrose Nast.  I am unfamiliar with this publication company as i am not acquainted with their publications - such as Vogue, Teen Vogue and Glamour, also Vanity Fair. these are fashion magazines which are directly opposed to my kind of genre and audience(alternative metal and not really into that fashion style) they also produce lifestyle and hobby magazines - to most of my audience, music is their hobby, and they are teen/young adults so lifestyle isnt a concern. i am not choosing Conde´ Nast publications because they have no prior experience in any of the areas that my target audience would generally also appeal to.

double page spread, photo choices

This is the first of the images i have selected for my double page spread, as it shows the strong vocalist presence of the band pictured. i may edit this picture as i could allow more focus on the lead Singer than the background images.

The second image i have selected to maybe use is this image. it features many members of one the band involved in the gig, and the lighting enhances the effect of the photo, if i use this photo i will edit and tone down the light as it gives a strong presence to focus on the background.

Another image i may use is the guitarist as it is an action shot it gives the feel of excitement from the gig and catches the eye of the reader. if i used this,i would edit it and take the jacket of the stupid photographer invading my photo space.

This next photo i might choose to use for my double page spread. i selected this photo as it shows stage diving which is an interaction between stage and crowd. people will look at this picture if they went to the gig and it will catch their eye as they will try to spot themselves in the photo.

i selected this photo as it is a mid action shot of the vocalist. if i used this photo i would edit out the close cut mic in my photo path as it obstructs the view and looks unprofessional.

i have selected this photo as it is crowd on the stage. this in an interaction between the crowd and the band, and once again people will try to spot themselves in it. i would put this in small and in black and white so it isn't a main priority.

i have selected this photo as it is a mid action shot, and it depicts a band member. he is quite famous so if people see his face(which is clearly shown in this picture) they will look and see him and recognize  him from his band and if they like them they will read the article.

i selected this photo as it depicts the bass player who is famous and spotlights him in mid action, so it will grab the readers attention as they wonder what was going on.

i selected this photo as it depicts more than one of the band members in mid action, and i can edit out the mic stand and half bodies if needed. the crowd are in it too

 This next photo was selected for my photo project as it portray the lead singer from a new angle that people in the crowd recognised. this would appeal to my audience as people recognise the lead singer. if i used this photo i would edit out the microphone.

This photo i have selected would be used in my double page spread as it shows the lead singer, the bassist and the crowd in mid action and is eye catching to the crowd. i would not edit this photo as it looks better raw than tampered with.

i have selected this photo for my double page spread as it is another mid action shot and appeals to the audience as they are intrigued what is going on in this photo.

this photo has been selected as it is intriguing to the audience, and portrayed an interaction between crowd and lead singer. if i were to use this photo it would be a side photo for it and i would edit out the pillar and microphone

i have selected this photo as it is also a mid action shot and portrayed 3 of the band members so people would recognise the members and be intrigued at the article. if i used this photo i would edit out the mic and put it small and in b+w filter

i have selected this photo as it is a mid action shot and portrays the bassist and in magazine the bassist is usually ignored, its not a convention just a pattern. i would not edit this photo and keep it large.

final product of my contents page

this is my final, packaged contents page. i believe i have done a good job on this, as i have solved problems and based my magazine on an NME layout but gave it my own flair. the colours would not be ideal for a magazine of a lighter genre, but metal and hardcore are very dark and heavy so dark colours would be more appealing to the fans of these genres, my target audience.

i believe i could of improved this by making changed to the colour schemes shade of red, ans it might not actually be dark enough to blend. i also would of used more optimal pictures for this, if i had of had the resources and time but these were used with the materials i have.

i also would of researched more into magazine layouts instead of reflecting the ideas of NME but it was simplistic and effective.

problem with my contents page.

 This was the first draft of my contents page. i realized that it was almost colourless, so i decided to use the black and red swatches to make it a darker colour but more eye catching than paper white. i also realized that the top and bottom picture were unprofessional, and at the time it was all i could use as a placemark. after February 27th i managed to get a new photo and replaced it to look like this:

in my second draft, i had added much more detail news and reviews columns where i realized the fonts were unprofessional(the subtitle font, VT100) and were unable to be packaged. i solved this problem by changing the font to the constant font i have been using, Helvetica Bold. but the next problem was that the bottom image was unprofessional and needed cropping.

as i attempted to fit this picture on, but due to its dimensions, as in a previous problem it needed to be cropped, it had lost its rectangular properties and had become square. when i re-sized the picture using shift(to keep it in proportion) it did not fit the required dimensions to make the magazine look neat.

Once i realized this, i tried to make the image fit horizontally, and that did not work. so i tried to make it fit horizontally after this.

This was my attempt at making it the correct size. this is in proportion still, and proportionate pictures are professional, so if i was to take it out of proportion, image quality would go down and it would stretch. so i decided to use a picture from my double page spread and used a new article.

After i placed a new picture, and a new article, it fit well, and then i could leave it at this, as i have solved almost all of the problems i have encountered with my contents page.all the problems concerning image resizing and non professionalism have been encountered and dealt with.

however looking back at my project i realized that it needed my logo on the page so i decreased the size of the words contents as it was huge and added my logo. also there was a large space next too one of my pictures so i added the words 'EXCLUSIVE' to cover some ground.