1: In What Ways Does Your Media Product Use, Develop or Challenge Forms and Conventions of Real Media Products

My magazine follows the forms and conventions of real media products in quite a few ways. While following these forms and conventions, I also tried to challenge them to make my magazine different to any other and something that is unique

Front Cover

When creating my front page i wanted to make it look different to any other magazine currently on the market. It has a digitial feel to it and I used bright colours to represent the electro scene.

1. The Masthead


The masthead of my magazine is in the top left hand corner which is typical of a music magazine. The font is in capitals and quite large to make it clear to the reader the name of the magazine, and it's likely it's the first thing they will see when they are scanning the shelf for a magazine. This is the same with magazines such as NME as you can see below:

The masthead for NME is in capital letters and in a large font which makes it stand out. This is what i thought about when creating my masthead, which meant i was following the forms and conventions of a music magazine. It is also on a black background which is similar to the masthead i have created.

Although i have followed the forms and conventions of a music magazine when creating my masthead, I also challenged them to make my magazine different and stand out to my target audience. I wanted to make my masthead have a digital look to it instead of the usual plain font you would see on a masthead such as NME. This is important to draw my readers in, as my target audience is people who listen to Electro/Techno/Trance and Drum and Bass.

I chose to have my masthead in a blue font as my house style is blue, green, black white and pink. I chose these colours as i feel they represent electro colours, and the type of colours of neon lights you would expect to see in a Trance club/scene.  I feel this challenges the forms and conventions of a music magazine as they usually stick to red, white and black colours for a masthead to go with the Indie/Rock feel of those types of magazines such as NME and KERRANG.

2. The Main Image

I have followed the forms and conventions of a music magazine by having one main image where the model is looking directly into the camera which addresses the reader. As you can see above on my front cover, I have the model looking directly into the camera and almost smiling but not at the same time to make the magazine seem inviting and mysterious at the same time to draw the reader in. This is similar to other music magazines such as KERRANG as you can see below:

I have challenged the forms and conventions of a music magazine front cover by using more live and spontaneous images on my front cover than posed. As you can see I have used a live image of my featured artist 'Elektricity' which gives the readers a taste of what type of artist my article is about. This is unusual for a music magazine as usually they have mostly posed images of the featured artists and sometimes only one live image.

 

Contents Page

                                                                         

For my contents page i used a picture from a live music event of a electro/techno event i have been to. I feel this challenges the forms and conventions of a music magazine as usually they don't have one big image that fills the whole page. I followed the forms and conventions of a music magazine by using smaller images on top of the main image as magazines like NME and KERRANG use small images on their contents pages. I decided not to have my subheadings in collumns like music magazines usually do, insetad i chose to make it look like the subheadings are going down in steps like a staircase to make it unique. I've made the text black or white all the way through so it's easy to read and doesn't blend in with the background. I have put numbers on the three different pictures which represent which page you will find the feature they belong to on. I have kept to the house colours of my magazine like NME which sticks to the house colours of red and black.

Double Page Spread

For my double paged spread i wanted to keep the electro/techno scene and i used a mixture of images of live acts and different coloured techno lights all which use the house colours of my magazine which are blue green and pink. Although bright colours and lights don't follow the forms and conventions of a usual music magazine, i kept the traditional look for an article by just having straight collumns of text. I chose to keep the text white to stand out from the black background which makes it easier to read. I put my qoute from the article in bright pink so it would stand out and draw the readers attention, even if they werent planning on reading the article they might be pulled in by the qoute so it's important for it to stand out. I kept the same font for my title as the masthead so it creates a house style and keeps with the electro/techno theme throughout the magazine. I think all the bright lights against the black background are effective, as the genre of my magazine is electro/techno i feel this will appeal to my target audience.