1.

in what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and
conventions of real media products?

During the production of my music magazine AMF, I have tried to follow

the generic conventions of music magazines with a similar sub-genre to
mine; to do this I have been using Kerrang! magazine as a style model and
that is why many of the elements of my magazine are the same as or
similar to Kerrang!. To demonstrate how I have done this, I will now do a
quick overview/comparison of my magazine to an issue of Kerrang!. The
thing to remember though however, is that as the whole idea of my
magazine is to be independent/alternative and to get these connotations
across, my magazine’s mode of address will undoubtedly be different to
Kerrang! in some respects.

To start with my front cover then: (Issue: 1300)

The colour schemes of the two magazines’ are virtually the same with the
only difference being Kerrang! using blue instead of yellow for contrast.
They both contain the generic music magazine convention of a banner
conveying the main artists featured in the issue and have their main
article’s heading splashed across the centre of the page, with the only
difference being the colour choice which I changed from originally being
the same to add more contrast to the heading and the background image.

The masthead is roughly in the same place along with the barcode. The
barcode itself contains all the elements of the barcode that Kerrang!’s has
and apart from this the only really difference is that I have composed my
images differently and decided that I would not use an image for every
cover line as I believe my front page would appear too crowded this way.

Moving onto the contents page then:

To start with on both magazines there is a box which details how to

subscribe to the magazine, also there is some sort of contents list divided
into sub categories on both contents pages. There is a paragraph which
details the editors views on this issue of the magazine, there is a banner
that divides the contents page and finally both contents pages can clearly
be seen as having images with captions and page leads that are
photographic representations of the main features of the issue.

Finally for the splash page or double page spread of both magazines the
artists image is clearly shown as separate from the article, both articles
use a drop capital and use a colour scheme that contrasts to the back
ground. The headings of both articles overlap and are bigger than any
other text element on the page. Both articles have a short paragraph with
medium sized text which leads you into the article also called the lead of
the article, there is a by-line clearly displayed for the article image with
the only difference being the position of mine in relation to theirs and
finally quotes of some form have been used on both products.

So then you can clearly see that on the whole I have followed and applied
the generic conventions of music magazines for my intended sub-genre in
the production of my magazine.

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

My media product represents as a whole two main social groups in our society, the groups
that are represented are the subculture Indie Kids, which I have represented by featuring
indie rock bands in my magazine and the second social group I am representing is the

By Thomas Swallow

AS Media Studies: A: Block

Alternative Rockers which I have done by featuring alternative rock and general rock bands in
my magazine.

So the idea of the magazine is to represent alternative Indie lifestyles and

this can be seen through various elements of my magazine which include
the masthead, which has cracks in it, like much of the text seen on my
product, and the reason this represents these two lifestyles is that when
they are juxtaposed with a black background, which is an alternative and
underused colour in conventional lifestyles and the sell line “The void of
music is eternal” we get symbolic resemblance of non-conventionality and
the cracks in the text resembling this non-conventionality breaking
through into the conventional lifestyles of teenagers and young adults;
which are my target demographic.

Apart from this specific example on the whole most of my elements try to
represent some form of non-conventionality, whether it is through the
style of the element, its colour or any other mise-en-scene based elements
such as costume etc. which represents the element as being alternative
and different.

In the case of gender, I would say my magazine represents both genders

as equal, as the dominant ideology of men being of higher status and
importance in society is flouted in my magazine; as the female models are
portrayed as being just as important and in the case of the lead singer of
Bleeding Rose excelling to the top of her field. So, in my magazine both
genders are represented as equal; as both genders are represented
equally by the number of male/female models and the aspiration of
becoming like the ideal portrayals of self image aka successful and
accomplished in life, is connoted by the images in my magazine of both
genders.

Finally to conclude this video, I have represented ethnicity in my magazine

as well, but I have done so indirectly, as our society is a multi-ethnic
society and I have represented this in the various ethnic influences that
make up the diverse British music scene; which I am representing in my
magazine, by exploring music that is different to the mainstream music
available in the UK.

3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

My media product is a product that would be distributed nationally as the target demographic
is a target demographic that spans the nation aka one that is not confined to a specific area,
and to do this my magazine would have to be the product of a multinational conglomerate
such as Bauer or IPC and the reason for this would be directly due to the fact that as being a
product of a multinational conglomerate, the potential target demographic in theory could be
greatly expanded aka reach more people possible in different countries and the conglomerate
is also more than likely to be vertically integrated in it’s specific field and what this means is
that things such as distribution and production costs can be kept to a minimum, in order to
maximise profits, which is the main purpose of any product. Finally there is also the prospect
of my magazine becoming a cross media product this way, as for example a new music
channel might be created to represent the magazine; like Bauer has done for Kerrang!.

Whereas if my product would be distributed by an Indie company, there is less chance of the
target demographic expanding as it would only be able to reach certain areas and the concept
of a national magazine my be impossible in some cases due to financial and in turn
distributive resources available.

So due to the overwhelming advantages of my magazine being a product of a multinational

conglomerate, I am inclined to state that if a choice was given for the production and

By Thomas Swallow

AS Media Studies: A: Block

distribution of my magazine, it would be to have my magazine produced by a multinational
conglomerate. As my only possible concern would that the alternativeness and independence
of my magazine may be overshadowed by what some of my target demographic would
consider to be part of conventional society; however as Kerrang! is produced by Bauer, I don’t
believe this would be a problem as Kerrang! has been very successful this way in a similar
field to my magazine.

4. Who would be the audience for your media product?

The target audience for my magazine, is middle class people who are of the younger
generation aka teenagers and young adults who would be most likely students and
predominantly male. The aspect of these people though in particular I am targeting to form my
target audience, is their appreciation of the diversity of music available in the present day,
inside the UK. Another important aspect of my audience is to be individuals, to be alternative
and this is expressed in their habits such as listening to indie or alternative rock music which
my magazine is based around alongside general rock and other things such as their shopping
habits, for example buying converse trainers which you can get customised which obviously
then can show individuality.

But the most important reason behind this choice of target audience is that they want to have
fun and a social life such as going out to gigs and as they are most likely students aka part of
the underclass of society with a disposable income, this alongside buying my magazine is
possible for them.

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

The way in which I have constructed my media product into attracting and
targeting this audience has been through a variety of ways. To start with
the mode of address my magazine towards its reader is one that conveys
non-conformity and as my audience are students who stereotypical don’t
want to conform and want to be individuals this would be appealing
towards them which I know to be true due to me testing my products with
my target audience who have approved it. Moving onto my writing style I
have chosen a writing style that conforms to the conventions of
Kerrangs!’s writing style which is successful in targeting this specific
audience.

The way in which I have used my images also reflects the way in which I
targeted my target audience, as I have used images that portrait either
through the models themselves or in the objects portrayed t in them some
sort of individuality and non-conformity.

Colours which I have used also represent an attraction to this target

audience as I have tried to use contrasting colours which connote when
juxtaposed with their background the idea of standing out, of being
individual and of not conforming to those around us.

Throughout my magazine in particular in my images the mise-en-scene

elements I have used also in the process of attracting this target audience
as the settings I have chosen are often unusual and quite unique. The
costumes used tend to connote non-conformity and independence, for
example on my front cover Charlotte is represented a hybrid which
crosses the idea of being a rock and chick and a Goth girl which are two

By Thomas Swallow

AS Media Studies: A: Block

alternative lifestyles and such symbolises the mode of address of I am
have created for my magazine and finally some of the gestures, such as
the on the Sons of Archangel band photo, their gestures connote non-
conformity by contrasting to the dominant ideology of younger people
always being happy as according to older generations we have nothing
that would make us unhappy in our lives.

Finally the last two ways in which I attempt to attract my target audience
is through the house style of my magazine, in particular the crack font
which is used which shows non conformity through its semiotic value and
through the cover lines which talk as being such as gigs and downloads
which adhere to the social conventions of their life style and the
technological convergence which has been centred around this audience
in relation to how they obtain music.

6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this
product?

Whilst constructing this product I have developed my understanding of

various technologies through my use of them in the process of creating
my media product.

I have used blogs which I have found to be a great resource in the

obtaining of examples for my research and with posting various
documents and data to create an online course work folder. There have
been some issues with exactly what could be displayed on the blog as a
visual element once uploaded, however due to Posterous, the site which
we were using to create out blogs, newly enhanced post editing functions
can be now overcome with the option of uploading documents to a post
and dragging and dropping them in exactly where you want them in your
post. So for example when I originally tried to upload a high resolution PDF
of my draft contents page to my blog through Google mail, I had to Zip it
as an archive, but then once this new development had taken place I was
able to remove the archive from the post and upload the PDF directly, so it
was then shown as a visual element on my blog.

Another technology I used during the process of creation was digital SLR
cameras which had great advantage for producing higher quality images
than normal digital cameras, but having also the great disadvantage of
being very sensitive in their set up, for example, the focus of the image,
and their fragility, as for example, if by accident we touched the mirror
inside the camera we were warned that the camera would break, and
therefore we had to be very careful when using them as they were so
fragile.

Camstudio was another new technology to me that I had used during my

coursework as I had never used screen recording software before. I found
it to be a great tool for making things such as tutorial videos and how to
do things, however the major setback over this software is that it was very
temperamental and as such it could take many attempts in order to create
my videos.

By Thomas Swallow

AS Media Studies: A: Block

I also used the editing software Windows Movie Maker and Sony Vegas
when creating videos for my blog, and the main thing I found out was that
like when I used the Final Cut editing suite last year at my secondary
school that compared to these professional editing suites standards
editing software such as Windows Movie Maker are highly inefficient and
impractical for creating effective media products. For example, when I was
creating my treatment video I wanted to use a song called City on Fire, by
Fightstar, as a back ground music for my video, however as I had the song
on ITunes, Window Movie Maker wouldn’t let me apply it to my video due
to Windows incompatibility with Apple products whereas Sony Vegas
simply imported the song within a matter of seconds and allowed me to
use it in my product.

By using Quark and Photoshop Elements 5.0 I have found out that there is
a clear distinction between these two pieces of technology which originally
didn’t think existed. As I always knew that Photoshop was a piece of
designing and image manipulation software and I originally thought that
Quark would be similar. However as I have since discovered Quark is a
piece of software in which you produce layouts, you do not design things
in Quark, and very often you don’t create things in Quark either, you
create a basic layout and then import graphics from things like Photoshop
and text from word processing software such as Word. So I have
discovered that co existing technologies are often interlinked in the
professional media industry in order to achieve a final product.

Finally the last main technology I have discovered and learnt about
through the production of my course work is that of sound recording
software in particular Sony Sound Forge Audio Studio and Audacity, and
have discovered that in contrast to the editing software I had used I have
preferred to use the simplistic Audacity than the professional Sound Forge,
as although Sound Forge had a lot of tools and features, which I could
enhance the audio of my video by, it was over complicated to achieve a
result not much different that simply just pressing the record button on
Audacity.

So I guess from this to conclude this part of my evaluation I have learnt

that although professional technologies are impressive for some purposes
they would never be the best possible option.

7. looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the
progression from it to the full product?

Well, to start with:

The preliminary task we carried out was a sort of introduction into our
major practical work. We researched examples of college magazine and
textually analysed them, that gave us insight into the generic conventions
of magazines and then by actually creating our own college magazine
cover and contents page we were able to develop our creative and
technical skills of using Photoshop and Quark, which in Quark’s case was
completely new territory for me.

Then after we has actually learnt these generic conventions and

developed our skills through this preliminary task, we then went on
expanding our understanding through doing similar textual analyses of
music magazines, which developed our understanding of generic elements
and conventions of music magazines in relation to what we already knew,
and our skills expanded even further by completing various tasks such as
our audience profiles which required us to use skills already learnt in
By Thomas Swallow

AS Media Studies: A: Block

Photoshop to create a new media product to represent our audience and
through this task in particular I learnt about a tool in Photoshop that
reduced the amount of space taken off around an object when using the
magic wand tool.

So really, the message is that we were constantly learning and developed

our technical and creative skills. However, I guess one thing we did learn
along this line of progression was not only to use design and layout
programs but also to apply the same creativity and skills to things such as
videos designed for our blogs which we all did on various bits of software.

Finally then to conclude:

The dominant theme throughout our learning, I believe is that from our
preliminary task when we were a bit more confined with we could do, due
to the conventions of college magazine; I believe we learnt how to express
our creativity more in our later products whether they were something like
blog work that involved creating some kind of media text or our actual
production work itself, as in this stage of our coursework due to the
vastness and variety of music magazines available we were able to
express the creativity of our work more, for example I created a band logo
for my contents page whereas before, we had to copy our college’s logo
during our preliminary task. So really the most important thing we have
learned is that basically we can be as creative as we want in our work;
because as we found out Photoshop near enough has a tool for everything.

By Thomas Swallow

AS Media Studies: A: Block