There are many conventions of existing music magazines of which I have followed, However there are also some that I have challenged.

 

Evaluation (1)-In what ways does your media product use, develop, or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

 On the left is my front cover, and on the right is an existing magazine front cover from ‘Q’, and as you can see, there are many similarities and differences between them both. Before starting my magazine creation, I deconstructed 3 existing products, evaluating the codes and conventions throughout. One of the main conventions which I came across was the front cover main image. Most of the magazines which I deconstructed featured a large photo of an artist or band, placed in the centre of the page. I took this in consideration when taking my photographs, so that I would have one which would look similar to existing products. I then placed this image in the centre of the page to carry on conveying to conventions. One thing about my image which I found challenged conventions of most magazines in general was

the black and white theme. Although I did not find many, if any existing products with this feature, I thought that black and white connoted acoustic better than a bright bold image. I also created an online poll asking my target audience if they would prefer to see a black and white image, or a brightly coloured image on the front cover of an acoustic magazine. The results came back as black and white in favour, and therefore I proceeded with this thought. One thing that I also noticed about existing front cover images, was that they are almost always making eye contact with the reader. However, I decided to challenge this and have my featured artist looking down at their guitar – which shows that the magazine is going to be about music, in particularly connoting acoustic.Another convention is the cover lines. I used them down both sides of my image, with a range of different fonts which linked in with my genre, and co-ordinated the colours altogether. I chose to use colours such as; Red, Black, White, and Grey as I thought that they would appeal to both genders, widening the range of people who would buy my magazine, proving more sales. I found that ‘Q magazine’ also used these colours which worked really well as a house style. The background colour of ‘Q magazine’s front covers are usually grey, so I took this idea to use in my magazine instead of a plain white background, which I think makes it look really professional. There are also minor conventions such as a barcode in the bottom right hand corner which I conveyed to, a masthead at the top of the page, and a price and date at the bottom of which I also conveyed to.

As you can see, I have used the same grey-black background as this existing contents page, the same way of writing the masthead, and the same sort of layout. However I decided to insert more pictures into my page so that I had a minimum of 5 at least throughout all 3 pieces. I also decided to use a black and white image which I think looks good as it continues the house style. The title of ‘contents’ is in the same font and colour as my title on the front cover, which also continues the house style. I think that overall, my contents page is a lot different to most existing contents pages, however I think that it looks good and the picture shows clearly that it is connoting music, which is a large factor in the success of a magazine.

Here I have used the conventions of having a subheading/heading which overlaps the two pages, as does the image, so that the viewers can recognise that it is a double page spread, and that they both link. I also used a black background like this existing product that I saw, which I think makes the image more striking. I also placed the text in columns on the left hand page as that’s where most other double page spreads text is placed. Again, I have challenged the convention of having a coloured image, as I thought that a black and white image would further carry on the house style and convey to the acoustic genre.