My Mission Statement

My new project, will target teenage males and females. I am going to specifically target those of the rock/ metal music genre, as this is the main focus of my magazine. I will combine stylish, visually appealing imagery with interesting, witty, hopefully humorous but also serious takes on the music industry.

Although the magazine is about the metal/rock genre, I am hoping to include other aspects of media, such as television and radio, as well as beauty and fashion. By doing this, I will look at the representation of the music genre, and how it's portrayed in other aspects of the media.

My magazine's role on readers' lives is to inspire, excite, provoke and entertain.

The Mission Statement

• Explain what kind of music magazine you hope to create by focusing on genre and style.
• Explain the audience that you are trying to target.
• Give a brief overview of the content of your magazine.
• Descrive the tone and attitude of your magazine.
• Explain the role that you think your magazine will play in the lives of its readers.

Music Magazine Covers

The Image

• If there is a person/group on the cover, what do they represent?
• Are they a stereotype?
• How has this stereotype been constructed?

The Gaze

• The gaze refers to the direction in which the person on the cover is looking.
• Are they looking straight at the audience?
• Are they smiling - enticing the reader in?
• Do they look friendly or cool?
• Do they look seductive?

Representation is KEY.
Going to include one or more people, no image is to contain no more than five models.

School Magazine: Analysis and Evaluation

School Magazine: Analysis and Evaluation from harrevs

School Magazine Contents Page - Final

This is my latest and final attempt at my school magazine contents page. I haven't changed much since my previous page, however, I decided to rearrange some of the layout. This included slightly moving the bottom picture to the right, and adding the page number of the feature, as well as extending the box of text under the coverline, "Hometime!." This makes better use of the space, but still keeps to my ideal layout and structure for the contents page. I am happy with the overall result, however, if I were to attempt this task again, I would edit the background image, so that the text would match with the lines on the paper, as I think it would have had an ever more interesting, and better looking effect.

School Magazine Contents Page - Third Attempt

My latest attempt at my contents page, and also my third, I think that my school magazine contents page is near completion. I edited some of the text, making the coverlines bold, making them more eye catching. I also made sure all the sub text under the coverlines were a similar size. This was going to be my final contents page, however, the empty space next to the bottom image, in my opinion, either needs to be filled, or the structure needs to be slightly rearranged to use all the space provided.

School Magazine Contents Page - Second Attempt

This is my second attempt at my school magazine contents page. It has a lot more features than my previous, as adding text was not as time consuming. I deciding to head the contents page, "Timetable," to correspond with the school theme, and I thought it would be more interesting and unique if I used language common around schools. Therefore, I found, "Timetable," to be appropriate, as the contents page displays everything included, in an ordered fashion. I also decided to use side headings for my coverlines, because therefore I could set out the column as a timetable, using specific language, such as, "Break," and, "Hometime." Like many contents pages I found when doing research, I decided to put the month of the issue at the top of the page, with the page number at the bottom left, with the school magazine name to the right, promoting the magazine itself. This is still unfinished, as I have to tweek certain parts, changing sizing, fonts and picture layout.

Which Genre?

After doing some research on various music magazines and the genres, I think that I am going to focus on the rock genre, purely because I think that it is a good genre to represent, as although I would have liked to look at the pop genre, the rock genre is represented in a more unique way, and is easily recognisable by the outfits/costumes, hair and make up. I also found that there are more magazines focused on this genre, and so it would be useful for general research. I am mainly going to use Kerrang! magazine for inspiration, however I am planning on looking at any magazine covers/contents pages/double page spreads that feature the rock and metal genre of music.

Music Magazine Research

Before deciding on a specific genre to use as a baseline for my music magazine, I am going to carry out some research into the industry, looking at popular music magazines, and examine the types of genres they specify. Although I do not want to copy another magazine, I think that choosing a genre which is well received by the public and is good to use as a template will secure for me a good and interesting music magazine, and I will no doubt be influenced by certain genres.

Most music magazines continuously use the colours red, white and black, although this assumption is purely based on music magazine of a rock genre. However, after looking up magazines of more of a pop genre, I found that although using more of a variety of colours such as yellow and blue, the black, white and red colours still play a major role in the design of a magazine cover. 

Music magazines have a similar structure and design to other types of magazines, however, details like the colours and various images used means it's unique, helping it reach its potential aim, to inform the readers of the music industry, such as new artists, albums, events as well as music from the past. Music magazines also look inside the artists' lives, such as the magazine "Billboard", displayed above, as it clearly shows the main feature is purely focused on the actor/singer Darren Criss.

Music magazines also have the same codes and conventions as other magazines, as they obviously have a mastead, as well as a main image, a main coverline, and usually short, snappy coverlines. However, what makes music magazines different from other magazines is the language used, and using artists on covers, as the magazine needs to look interesting and represent the genre clearly, as the first impressions of the reader will surely affect sales of the magazine. Also, most music magazine covers I have found on the internet display as the main image a medium close up of an artist, which is used so that the reader can instantly identify who the artist is, and knowing that they are featured inside may push some customers to purchase the magazine. An example of this is shown in the Rolling Stone magazine below.

The contents page of a music magazine also follows the same structure and design of any other magazine, due to the demand of its purpose, as the layout used for most contents pages are convenient for the reader, and therefore do not need to be altered.

The contents pages of the magazine display everything featured in the magazine, as well as giving more detail about the stories and features on the cover. White and black are often a popular choice of colours, purely because they are suitable for the job. Like other magazines, rather than focusing on one image, like on the cover, they present a variety, displaying other information in the magazine, giving the reader a summary of the magazine.