Production Process: Contents page and double page spread development

I originally designed the draft contents page shown below.

After I created this draft, I realised that it didn't really follow the format of a magazine contents page. By researching into existing music magazines I acknowledged that images are featured more heavily on contents pages and so i created the following draft.

The new draft of my contents page is more iconic of that of a music magazine.

The red area towards the bottom of the page is for a magazine subscription deal. To calculate what price I should offer I worked out what the correct yearly price would be if the audience purchased it every week for a year:
£2.49 x 52 = £129.48
and so to entice the audience and make the subscription deal worthwhile I set the price at 60% of the annual cost which is £77.69 for a yearly subscription.

"Subscribe to Xtreme for a year for only £77.69"

I realised that for a reader looking at this number in the magazine it appears to be a high amount. Therefore, to make it more appealing I divided it into 12 monthly instalments 77.69/12 = £6.47 as this is an odd amount I rounded it up to £6.50.

"Subscribe to Xtreme for a year for only £6.50 a month"


Below is the contents page from Kerrang's September 2010 issue which I scanned into the computer. I used this as a guideline for how to produce a profesional and conventional magazine contents page.

My final contents page

When developing my double page spread, I wanted to include an exclusive interview with the female band featuring on the front of the magazine. I used the magazine technique of columns to display my interview text on one of the pages and then to make my band picture stand out and be striking to the audience, I decided to dedicate the whole of the second page to that image.

This could be a risky technique as it could leave the pages looking bare but it looks effective in the image I scanned in below from Kerrang magazine.

My final double page spread

Production Process: Image editing development

So far in the production of this music magazine coursework I have used 3 editing programmes to manipulate my images. They are: Picasa 3, Paint and http://www.picnik.com/. Although I used all of these software products efficiently and they did enable me to meet the needs of the requirement, in order to ensure a more professional presentation I decided it would be best to use Adobe Photoshop Elements 5.0 (Editor). The other programmes that I have used so far were ideal for changing the lighting and texture of the image but effective cropping was an issue. Therefore, I decided to experiment my cropping ability on Photoshop by cropping an image that would appear on my front cover.

This is the image that I first took of the guitars:

Then I roughly cropped out the background around the two guitars on paint.

After this I uploaded the image onto photoshop and did the following:

Production Process: Advert and contents page progress

From looking at already existing music magazines, the contents page usually appears on the second page of a double page spread. Therefore on the first page, I decided to include a fictional advertisement to advertise an 'Xtreme Tour'. I created fictional bands to feature on this advertisement and top locations throughout the UK for the bands to play at. I carefully considered the dates that I included and the venues at which the tour will visit so that it would be within a time frame that is possible and realistic.

Below is an example of an advert and contents page double page spread taken from the September 2010 issue of Kerrang magazine, which I scanned on to the computer.

Draft of my attempt

After I constructed this advertisement I realised that because this advertisement area is of such a prime location within the magazine, that other companies would pay a great deal of money to advertise their product in this position. Therefore, if my magazine was real it would benefit more from having an advertisement in this position from another company or brand. For example, I could include a tour advertisement but for one band instead of my own magazine or I could include an advertisement for a separate product that is related to the rock genre.

Production Process: Draft of front cover

Shown below is an image of my front cover with all of the features so that I can look at which features need to be positioned in different areas on the page and which features work well in the position they are in. Also, I can get a feel for what sizes the various images should be and can then edit them to perfect the front cover.

I used http://www.dafont.com/ to find the appropriate font for my music magazine. When searching through this website I realised that they featured a vast array of fonts. So I narrowed my search by looking through the 'destroy' font section as I perceived this to be most suitable for my genre.

This is where I found the font '28 days later' and decided to use this as the font for my masthead.

I then went on the 'eroded' font section and found the font 'you are loved'. This is the font I used to represent my featured articles through the headlines and the stand first.

Below is an example of the font 'you are loved'.



Production Process: Photography plan for the front cover

The image that I include must reflect the rock genre of my music magazine. In order to feature female artists on the front cover I have decided to create a fictional band. The band that I create will need to have a suitable name, image and props. The name of the band will be 'Strike Two' and will consist of a pair of female identical twins. Instead of using real twins as the artists, to show my development and image manipulation ability I have decided to feature one model and duplicate her but change the style of her hair and outfit so that they look like a pair of identical twins.

The clothes that my model will wear will be dark colours, leather jacket, black jeans etc, all of which are iconic features of a rock person's image. The model will wear heavy amounts of make up to enhance the rock image that they need to portray. The main image that will appear on my front cover will be set against a white background and so making my band stand out in the foreground. The props that I shall include within the photo will be an amp, microphone, and red electric guitar.

When considering the positioning of my models I have decided to have one of them sitting on the amp holding the microphone or singing into it. This will give a casual but edgy feel to the magazine portraying and hinting at the characteristics of the artists included. The other twin will be posing with the guitar but not in a traditional 'playing' pose.

Below are some photos that I have taken that can possibly feature on my magazine front page and that I have edited:

I edited the first image transformation on a website called http://www.picnik.com/ and the other two image transformation on Picasa 3 publication.

Realising that the third image doesn't look directly at the audience, I acknowledged that this photograph couldn't feature on the front cover but could accompany the inside article.

Production Process: Clifton Road Live Gig 02/10/10 - Court Lane

When attending and working at a local gig at Clifton Road Youth Centre on 02/10/10, I took the opportunity to photograph the main headline band both backstage, on stage, and amongst the audience. I did this as I knew the band 'Court Lane' was an ideal band to feature within my rock music magazine. Shown below are some of the images I took, which I can manipulate and use within my music magazine production.

Meet the band
From left to right: Ryan, Ciaran, Ethan, Rob.

Although it is an all male band and I am hoping to feature a female band on the front page, they can certainly be a featured article within my music magazine. 

Research and Planning: My Music Magazine Production

Before starting the production of my music magazine, I had to decide for definite the genre of my magazine and who the target audience would be. Shown below is the publisher document I created to start the planning process.

After I had established that my music magazine would be for the rock genre and knew my target audience would be teenagers to young adults of both genders, I did some research into which magazines already existed that met my specification, using the results of my questionnaire to help. I did this in order to see what key features I should include within my magazine and what elements I could improve upon.

Shown below is the front page of some already existing current rock magazines.

From researching into the rock genre, that I want my music magazine to feature within, it soon became apparent that male artists almost always feature on the front cover (as shown by the images above) therefore, a unique selling point of my magazine will be featuring a female artist on the front cover. This will help attract the females within my target audience.

Also, from researching into music magazine covers I noticed that most of the band pictures look at the audience. This is effective as it entices the audience and shows that the magazine is addressed to them, it is a magazine feature that I will include in my production.

As well as this, I acknowledged that all the current music magazines available have certain codes and conventions. Many of which are apparent on the front pages shown above. They include: a banner, a headline, a lure, a by-line etc. I will try and incorporate these and many more conventional elements within my music magazine production.

In preparation for my music magazine I compiled a document displaying different camera angles and shots that I had researched. I can then use these various camera techniques within my music magazine production to give a professional effect.

Research and Planning: Magazine Questionnaire

I devised and conducted a magazine questionnaire to hand out to people of a variety of ages and of both genders in order to establish my target audience. In doing this I gained an understanding of which aspects of magazines that people liked and which aspects they thought could be improved upon. Therefore, I could address these issues and make resulting improvements within my music magazine, thus creating a unique selling point and attracting my target audience.

Below is the questionnaire that I created.

 I then printed off 15 copies of this magazine and went about distributing it.


Shown below is an example of feedback from one of my questionnaires:

After all of my magazine questionnaires had been completed, I took particular interest in those that were completed by people within the age range of my desired target audience of 15-25 years old. I studied their responses to see what aspects they liked about their favourite magazines and what improvements they thought could be made.

Magazine Preference data

Out of the 15 questionnaires distributed, 5 people read music magazines, 4 read gossip magazines, 1 reads a school magazine, 4 read fashion magazines and 1 read a women's magazine.

Also, it was clear from the results of my questionnaires that the majority of my target audience aren't subscribed to their favourite magazine and usually purchase it on a weekly basis. Therefore, I will ensure that my music magazine is available for individual purchase each week as well as subscription so that it appeals to my target audience. This means that a price will have to appear on the front cover of my magazine.

Music Magazine data

Out of the 5 people that read music magazines, 2 read Kerrang, 1 reads NME, 1 reads Q Magazine and 1 reads X Factor (X Mag). All of whom are male apart from the person that reads X Factor (X Mag) who is female.

When analysing the replies about music magazines it was obvious that rock magazines were most popular. Also, the point was made clear that some females feel as if there isn't a rock music magazine available for them to read as they think that Q, NME, Kerrang etc are aimed more at the male gender (indicated by the result shown above). Therefore, I will produce a rock music magazine for both females and males and so broadening my target audience. I will do this by including articles about both female artists and male artists.

Preliminary Task: School Magazine

Prior to starting the music magazine coursework I created a fictional school magazine to see where my strengths and weaknesses lie within magazine production. I created the front page and contents page of the magazine. The target audience for my school magazine was year 3 primary students. I chose this target audience as I could include content which would appeal to them about the transition from infant to junior school.

My school magazine proposal

Before I could create the magazine I had to contact a primary school and ask their permission to feature children in my school magazine. Below is a copy of the email I sent to the school.

Fortunately, the reply was yes although I still had to ask the parent's permission so I attached the following document to the email to be sent to year 3 parents.

I had 7 reply slips from parents allowing their children to participate and after asking them a brief questionnaire about what they enjoy about school and what they would like to appear in a potential school magazine, I selected 4 to be my potential models.

After choosing who would best suit the school magazine I then went about creating the product.
Shown below is the front page of my school magazine.

Below is the contents page of my magazine.

The production of this task allowed me to acknowledge what main features a magazine consists of such as a barcode, a mast head, lures etc. Also by completing this preliminary task I could see what improvements I would need to make for my music magazine coursework.

After its creation, I then deconstructed the fictional school magazine cover and contents page that I produced. I did this is order to acknowledge my current understanding of magazine features and my ability to include them within my later work. This task of deconstructing my own work was very beneficial as I was able to assess my own strengths and weaknesses within the production of the task and acknowledge what I could improve upon for my music magazine coursework.

Shown below is my school magazine deconstruction: