1. SHAUN LIDDLE
AS MEDIA STUDIES EVALUATION
It is made quite clear throughout my music magazine that the
specific audience targeted are teenagers. The age boundary in which
my magazine is aimed at is 13 years – 19 years. I have chosen this age
as many teenagers read my style model music magazines such as
‘NME’ and ‘Kerrang!’ Another reason in which I have chosen this age
category is because I could not imagine people of an older age
reading my media product, due to the fact that music and magazines
now a day does not favour in the hands of older people, and they
would much rather read a book of some kind.
As I set out to produce my music magazine I knew from the very
first second that it would be aimed at a teenage audience.
Audience profiles in which I can imagine my audience would be are:
• Name: Les Gotham
• Age: 15
• Favourite shop: Primark
• Name: Kelly Hogg
• Age: 18
• Favourite Shop: River Island
• Name: James Crook
• Age: 16
• Favourite Shop: Topman

2. Whilst conducting audience research I specifically targeted people
who looked between the ages of 13-19 years. The majority of people I
asked within this age band favoured my music magazine. I asked the
audience some questions about their likes and dislikes of my magazine.
I asked questions such as:
• Do you like the colour scheme on my magazine?
• What grabs your attention when you first look at my media
product?
• Does my magazine look like a magazine you would usually
find in newsagents?
This helped me a great deal in production as I knew I was doing
things correctly from the audience’s positive responses. Certain
aspects of my magazine which the desired audience approved of I
kept within my magazine, and some things they advised me to
improve, I improved it as I want the magazine to suit the audience’s
standards.
The magazine attracts the teenage audience as I have used a
teenage model.
Model: Natalie Harber
Age: 16
Interests: Reading magazines

3. My model particularly relates to the rock music magazine, as her
favourite genre of music is rock. As rock is a niche genre, I needed to
attract my audience in every way possible, as it would be competing
against certain popular media products such as pop magazines. My
music magazine isn’t particularly expensive therefore the working class
audience will be to afford it. I could not imagine middle class
teenagers reading my music magazine as it specifically relates to music
and people. Although some middle class individuals may read this, the
primary audience is working class teenagers.
My magazine is aimed towards females and males so it has a
larger desired audience. From certain aspects of my magazine the
audience can clearly se that is aimed at mixed gender. I have
avoided using boyish/girly colours such as blue or pink, and stuck with
colours like red and black, which relate to the genre and both of the
sexes.
I feel that teenagers would like to read the story in my magazine
as it revolves around a teenager who has shot to fame by a video on
You Tube. As some teenagers dream about getting a chance in fame
they would wish to read the story about my character ‘Natalie
Followill’. This compares to the theories of Blumler and Katz 1974, as the
audience are active with my media product.
Competitions are made clear on the front cover such as ‘WIN
TOP 20 ALBUMS OF 2010’ which will attract the desired working class
audience as they cant afford to buy things such as albums themselves.
My magazine also includes a free song downloads bar which the
audience will be interested in which leads them away from illegal
downloading. The competitions make the audience involved with my
magazine as they feel the need to compete with other people in the
same situation, therefore adds aspects of excitement within my media
product.

4. If my magazine were to be sold in newsagents or supermarkets it
would compete against those such as ‘NME’ and ‘Kerrang!’ As these
are two massive music magazines my product would have to stand out
enormously. The price is a massive aspect when it comes to competing
against other music magazines, because of this I have made my
magazine price come in between £2.00 and £3.00, this is also the price
boundaries in which the music magazines NME and Kerrang!, come
under.
Another feature in which my magazine challenges forms and
conventions of real media products is by the competitions. Even on the
content of my front cover the magazine clearly shows that within the
magazine it has three competitions. If you look at magazines such as
NME and Kerrang!, they have some competitions but not a varied
amount, therefore this would make the audience chose my music
magazine over these specific two. My music magazine includes the
two colours red and black in which give connotations of blood and
death, therefore relate to the rock genre. Magazines like my style
models Kerrang use red and black to suit their genre of rock.
My magazine primarily aims at a working class audience. When
conducting my audience research I targeted working class individuals
as I knew from the beginning of my project this would be the audience
which would be interested in my product. From past research I have
learnt that many working class individuals read music magazines as
they are surrounded in a life of media. The secondary audience would
be middle class, even though some middle class teenagers read music
magazines, they do not read them as much as the working class
society does.
My music magazine does not necessarily represent any
stereotypical groups as all groups are interested in different music. If I
were to choose a group, which would be interested in my music

5. magazine, it would be those in which have favourite music genres of
rock.
An institution in which I would want to have for my magazine is
IPC media groups. The company own music magazines such as NME
and Guitar and Bass. I feel that this company would distribute my music
magazine as my style model is NME, and IPC media publish this
magazine. The company would therefore be interested in my
magazine, as they are interested in magazines such as NME.
Throughout producing my music magazine I feel that I have
learnt about many new aspects of media. First of all I feel confident
while using Photoshop compared to when I first started out using it. I am
comfortable with working with the tools on Photoshop, as throughout
the past year I have got used to certain tools in which I didn’t know
about before.
My writing skills have improved over the production of my music
magazine as the style models have helped me understand how a
music magazine should be written thus my writing skills have widely
developed. BlogSpot has been a massive new learning achievement
for me, as before AS Media I knew nothing about it. I have learnt how
to post work in different ways to entertain the audience for example:
Slide Share - a programme in which I can post my work through
presentations, therefore include illustrations to how every fraction of
detail.
Windows Movie Maker – I can now make videos which show rolling
titles to describe how I have worked over the past year, I used videos
especially for my project evaluation, and they can also be used to
show the production of my media work in detail.
At the start of the year I produced a practice ‘School Magazine’
which prepared me for my actual media project. I produced a front
cover for this task which helped me produce my actual music
magazine. This helped me an awful lot as it helped me develop skills

6. including the layout of magazine front covers and how to use different
colour pallets for representation of certain genres, within the
technology of Photoshop.
I have also developed skills in presenting work with pie charts to
show audience research, rather than just writing the results, they are
shown to the audience by illustrations and statistics. I have also gained
skills in photography as this year I got the chance to take photos
individually. I have found that to make a perfect photo I need to
concentrate on other things than the positioning of model, such as the
set and the lighting. Other improvements in learning include how to use
different colour pallets in order for the project to relate to the specific
genre. Colours such as red and black go together to give connotations
of blood and death, therefore this relates to the rock genre of my
magazine.
Overall my progression throughout AS Level Media Studies has
been huge as I am now confident with new ways in which to produce
and present work in ways which I have never done before.