Feedback 30/11/10

Good analysis of genre Mehnan- but alot more to do for your research- make sure your posts are detailed in their analysis - are you doing this for homework?

Research to be done :

- Needs to be good detailed focus on audience research - outline your target audience ( demographic and psychographic profiling - see your first pack)
- Look on the uk tribes website and post some videos on your blog - http://www.uktribes.com/ (password = iblametheparents)
- 10 target audience questionnaires with feedback - graphs and charts to be put on your blog too.

- Genre: Look and analyse the conventions of the music genre/s that you will focus upon in the magazine - post some music videos (from youtube) on your blog that illustrate the kinds of artists that you would have in your magazine.

- Institution: who will publish your magazine - see the foundation portfolio blog - for links to companies

THEN you can move onto your planning - see the before you blog sheet for what planning needs to be done - this should be being done in class AND for homework at the moment!

Miss McNulty

Research

On this specific magazine cover, the thing that interested me was the use of the long shot, which is hardly used on magazine covers, and also the pose of the artist (turning around, with back facing to the cover). Also the use of the animals is very interesting, and I am going to take this idea into consideration when constructing my own magazine.

The use of the close up shot on this specific magazine cover really interested me as it makes it seem like the artist/model is looking directly at the audience, which could help intrigue the audience and pursuade them into buying the product. Also the background is very simple, and as the image is in black and white it makes it stand out really well. The use of the text colours, red and black, also make it stand out as the background it plain white and the image is in black and white. 

The pose of the artist and the shot used here really makes it stand out, as usually models used on front covers all have a serious look, or show no emotion at all, whereas on this cover the model/artist is smiling which really makes it stand out (no one wants to buy a sad, depressing magazine!)

Also again, it is very simple and stands out very well as the text is bold, and quite large, and also easy to read!

Preliminary task

For my Preliminary task i had designed a front cover and contents page for a college magazine. 

This was done to gain a basic idea and understanding of how to create a magazine cover and contents page, and was also done to train us how to use adobe photoshop and In design. 

As this was done very quickly and roughly I realized i had made some mistakes and will take these into consideration for when I start my actual magazine for my foundation portfolio. 

The general errors i realized i had made was, firstly the title of the magazine was covering the actual image on the front cover, which is not usually done as the image is the main attraction and the title should generally be behind it. Also i realised that the information about what is in the actual magazine wasn't really coordinated very well and the fonts are very similar, whereas most magazines use different fonts that are brightly colored to grab the attention of the consumers right away. I also had missed out the barcode, and realised that the background was very dull and didn't help in making the image stand out. My contents page is also very simple and doesn't tell the audience very much about the magazine, which makes it seem very boring. 

After realising all these mistakes that i had made I now know what to not do when constructing my own magazine, and know what I have to include and improve on to make my magazine successful. 

Feedback 16/11/10

Hello! 

a) Dont forget to follow the 'Before You Blog'! sheet ...

b) Also dont forget to label each post- by copying the title of your post into the bottom left labels box on your post!

c) Be detailed in your analysis and comments on images etc...

d) and remember to make your blog creative! You can add different elements to make your research and planning more creative .. how you present your research and planning is up to you e.g.

- images (scanned drawn images, phtotds you have taken as a record or ones you find on the Internet)

You can also label ,contents pages and feature articles on Word and put them into your blog posts (Using command , shift and 4 keys and it will save as a JPEG image)

- videos ( from youtube - or even ones you film of yourself discussing your R and P)

- Graphs and Charts - e.g. top 20 album chart etc...

- links to websites you found useful while researching

- Audience research - make questionnaires or write questions and film people giving their responses!

Remember that you must continue this for homework to complete it all to a good standard...

Miss McNulty

Here are some links to some interesting blogs...

http://www.alevelmediastudies09-11.blogspot.com/ : Really good magazine blog

http://www.wix.com/dementedpics/demented-pics-2 (look at their Thriller research and then Thriller directors research!)

http://yaleblock1mediaproject.blogspot.com/: Really good opening sequence and blog

Introduction to Project

Name: Mehnan Ahmad
I have chosen to do a music magazine as my foundation portfolio.
The genre of music i am considering to do is R'n'B/Pop.