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

Before I created my media products in my magazine that I designed, I researched and observed different professional magazines such as Kerrang and this helped me realise what conventions were and what was needed to make a good magazine.

Also when creating the media products, the textual analysis I did helped as it gave me ideas on how the magazine should be structured and helped me visualize what my magazine should look like.

In the magazine I designed I had many different media products which used many different forms and conventions so it can attract the target audience by its professional/ recognisable format.

First of all you can see that my masthead is placed at the top of the magazine in the centre. This is a standard convention used by all magazines to make the title clear and recognisable to the public. The masthead is always uses larger text compared to the other pieces of text on the magazine and also written in a different font to make it standout, to give the magazine originality and to attract the reader’s attention. Also by using a bold font which I used, it helps it stand out which is another convention which links with the masthead.

My magazine masthead

Since the genre of my magazine was rock, I decided to use the magazine Kerrang as a case study as it is the most familiar one to me. Kerrang guided me to create my media products and helped me base my design round the same way they design their magazine and this made them one of realistic competitors.  As you can see from above it is similar to how Kerrang present who will be featured in their magazine by framing the text and using contrasting colours to help it stand out to the reader. Also this is placed at the bottom so you don’t take the focus from the main image.

My magazine also has the convention of having a colour scheme. During my research of magazines I found out many magazines like NME or Q have a constant colour scheme of red, black and white but when I looked at Kerrang magazine I saw they liked to change their colour scheme every time they release a new magazine, this is done because they would want to keep their magazine fresh and exciting but they keep the same colour scheme throughout the magazine. I followed what all these magazines did and kept the colour scheme throughout the magazine, the colours I used was black, grey and yellow as I thought that these colours go together and create a neutral and inviting feel towards the magazine. Also I included a bar code on my magazine as I could see from research if you are going to be selling your magazine it will need a bar code. By doing this it made my magazine seem more realistic and professional.

Also in my magazine i thought I would include a selling line on the front cover. I think this is very important as it would be used as a marketing technique as it challenges the reader and make them feel like they need to read the magazine as it challenges the reader. For example the selling line is ‘TAKE A CHANCE ON THE WILD SIDE’ as shown below.

By using a selling line it shows what the magazines view on music is and from the selling point I used the reader would thing that they feel music is wild.

Throughout the magazine I followed the different forms and conventions that I was able to use. On my magazine I used a typical feature that all magazines used which is the date and selling price but I didn’t put both together I thought it would be more useful to keep them apart because I thought it would give it better structure and presentation.