1. Devon McManus

2. 1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or
challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
The magazine I have created is similar to magazines
such as Rocksound and Kerrang! Therefore my
magazine includes many of the same conventions as
them as well as some that challenges conventions.
The masthead is in a big bold font, clearly visible at the
top of the page, like other professional magazines. The
colour was chosen as white to contrast with the dark
colours around the page so that it would stand out.
Many magazines of the rock genre include band images
as their cover stars, to develop this I included only one
member of a band playing live to represent the rock
culture as a connotation.
The colour scheme stays the same throughout my
magazine so that it avoids looking tacky. Similarly to
professional magazines, I have employed both light and
dark colours to highlight important information and to
make the magazine look appealing.
For the cover line, I decided to put the text on a Dutch
angle to make the cover look more interesting than the
standard layout. By using the two contrasting colours,
black and white, the cover line is able to make an
impact on the page without overpowering any of the
other features.

3. 1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or
challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
When creating my contents page, I thought that it
would use photographs to break up the information. By
doing this, the page does not seem to have excessive
amounts of text and also is aesthetically pleasing for
the reader.
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I utilized columns on my contents page to structure the
page. Similar professional magazines use columns so
the reader can easily locate what page they would like
to see.
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Additionally to this, I have included headings to make
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the location of certain pages much easier by listing
them under categories such as ‘Live Reviews.’
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I have tried to maintain a professional standard to the
magazine throughout by sticking to the same colour
scheme. Just like the main cover, I have chosen to have
the text in a white font so that it contrasts with the
dark colours and stands out from the page.
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Different fonts have been used over the page to
represent different parts of information, this is similar
to magazines just as Kerrang! Because they feature a lot
of content in the magazine and structure it so it is easy
to look through.

4. 1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or
challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Similar to other magazine, my
double page spread consists of
one full image on one side and
then information on the other.
The point of this is to put the
main focus on the band that is
being talked about in the
article, and to do this the band
have been displayed on the
whole left page. Columns have
been employed again as in
many articles because it
structures the page neatly so it
is easy to read. Unlike many
articles, mine includes only
one heading.
This is because the article all comes under one main focus, the rise of a new band. I also included
another picture challenges the conventions of other magazine which only use one to again break up
the text. The colours used apply to the colour scheme, and also one picture is in colour and the other in
black and white. Considering the black and white photograph is only there to break up the text, I have
decided to put it in black and white so that it isn’t the main focus of the page. The language used
relates to my target audience as I have used high frequency lexis to make sure it is understandable for a
wide audience.

5. 2. How does your media product / products represent particular
social groups?
My Magazine represents
many social groups. One of
these groups includes
Musicians. Rock musicians are
represented in my magazines
and loud, lively and dedicated
– as well as rock fans. This
can be seen in many of the
images in my magazines such
as this one
Mainly males are represented in my magazine because they appear to be most associated
with rock music. They also feature in all the bands included in my magazine were as
females aren’t specifically. This is because in the band index on my contents page, there
are some women members but generally not.
The age represented in my magazine is any age from 13 onwards. This is because my
magazine features heavily gigs. Concert goers are mainly teenagers so this represents
them well as in my article it talks about how good the crowds response was which puts
teenagers in a positive light.

6. 3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media
product and why?
I think the most appropriate
publisher for my magazine
would be Bauer Media Group.
They would be best to
distribute my magazine because
they publish other rock
magazines such as Kerrang!
Festivals would also be a great place to distribute my magazine.
Festivals such as Slam Dunk and Kerrang! Relentless Tour. These are
most appropriate because they are both rock festivals like the genre
of my magazine.
Furthermore events such as Vans Warped Tour, which is an
extreme sport and music festival, would be a suitable place to
distribute my magazine. The festival is very popular with rock
fans so therefore my magazine would sell there well.

7. 4. Who would the audience be for your media product?
When creating my magazine, I decided that the ideal audience would be for
teenagers. However, by looking at professional magazines that are similar to
my own such as Kerrang! Their audience is much older at the age of 22. This
shows my that a more appropriate age for my magazine would be late teens
and early twenties.
Furthermore, it appears that it is best my target audience being late teens because
then, being similar to kerrang!, it will have an audience highly interested in music and
they would be 5.5 times more likely to attend gigs. This is good for my magazine
because it features heavily gigs and lots of rock music and rock bands.

8. 4. Who would the audience be for your media product?
By establishing that the target audience most suitable would be late
teens, to develop this further I think the target stereotype for my
magazine would be Rockers and Emo’s. These are the best stereotypes
for my magazine because my magazine includes rock music which
Rockers and Emo’s are considered to be heavily influenced by.
In addition, people to follow other magazines
such as Rocksound and Kerrang! Would
appreciate my magazine because my magazine
features a lot of the same content.
Furthermore, people who are interested in
music like YouMeAtSix would like my magazine
because the bands are of a similar genre and
sound to YouMeAtSix.

9. 5. How did you attract/address your audience?
I employed
contrasting colours I attracted my target
and bold fonts to audience by using bright
attract my audiences colours and lots of
attention. images of live gigs that
From my research I would interest them.
found that my target
audience are very I made sure the price
interested in gigs, was suitable for my
therefore by adding a audience so that they
gig guide it would would be more likely to
appeal to them best. buy it.
By using the incentive
of a free music To appeal to my target
download, my specific audience I included
audience would be many bands on my
targeted when seeing front cover which
the genre of magazine would interest them if
and therefore this they could see a band
would appeal to them. they like.

10. 5. How did you attract/address your audience?
A description of
By using quotes what is in this weeks
from band issue and what was
members, this in last weeks will
would give an interest the reader
insight to what is in to know what to
the magazine and expect from the
interest the reader. magazine.
I included a band The design of the
index to promote magazine follows
bands that would the expected design
interest the reader. of a rock magazine.
Furthermore, with a This is automatically
reference to what recognisable as a
pages the bands are rock magazine by
on, the simple the design and
layout will avoid colours. This would
being complicated attract my target
for the reader. audience.

11. 5. How did you attract/address your audience?
By putting the
The font avoids the standard design and attracts
magazine logo on the
the audience for the rock music – the genre being
double page spread,
promoted.
this remind
follows the
designs of
other popular
rock magazines
such as
Rocksound.
Image of the
band on the Tour dates
double page being
spread would promoted
be aesthetically link to the
pleasing for the gig guide on the cover page. Both
audience to see. It also promotes bands provide information the target
which could interest the reader. audience would want to see.

12. 6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of
constructing this product?
When in the process of creating my magazine I learnt
how to use the internet in depth to do all the
research I needed before starting to design it. I was
able to find similar magazines and then information
on them that would help me create mine such as the
price and the frequency of production.
Furthermore, I learnt how to use Blogger effectively
to organise and keep up to date with work I had
completed and deadlines that needed to be met. I
was also able to use this website to look back on
work I had completed and if needed improve it.
I also learnt how to use a digital camera well so that
I could take good quality pictures that look
professional and not amateur. This was important
because I didn’t want my magazine to look poor due
to poor quality images.

13. 6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of
constructing this product?
Photoshop is a software I can now use to a decent
standard because of the process of creating my
magazine. I am now able to change the quality of
images and edit them to a way I consider better.
An example of this is these two images. The one on
the left being the original image and the one on
the right being the one feature on my magazine
after being edited.
I used Photoshop to create my magazine. The picture here is an example of me creating
my cover page on Photoshop. I now have a range of design skills due to Photoshop,
which are seen on my magazine cover. I was able to adjust images, add text, construct a
unique layout and make it look professional all due to
the software.
Quark is also a software I used
in the process of creating my
magazine. I was able to use it
to make columns to structure
my layout and so my text was
aligned properly.

14. 7. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you
have learnt in the progression from it to the full product
• Since creating my preliminary task I have no learnt a variety of skills due to the
creation of my main magazine. One of these skills include researching. I can now
find information that is appropriate and beneficial to my work as I found when
researching other similar magazines when planning my magazine.
• This is the next skill I learnt – planning. I have learnt how to plan my work so that I
can keep to deadlines and always know what needs to be done. I have also learnt
how to organise my work, this is because when I was creating my magazine I had to
organise my work to make sure I knew everything I had completed and what
wasn’t.
• Furthermore, I have developed my photography skills by taking images for my
magazine. I learnt how to use a camera best to achieve the best possible standard
so that when I was putting the picture on my magazine, they looks professional.
• Finally, by using Photoshop, I was able to improve my design skills. I learnt about
the many different tools on the software that can achieve professional results. I can
now edit my work to a better standard than I originally could when doing my
preliminary task.