Media Evaluation: Interviews with my Target Audience

In the second part of my media evaluation I interviewed three people from my target audience, asking them what attracted them to my music magazine and what they liked about the way the magazine was presented, the images and contents of the magazine. I asked each of my interviewees to analyse a page  of my magazine, explaining to the camera what they liked about it.

Media Evaluation: Script

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

My music magazine follows many of the codes and conventions of existing magazines as well as building on them. My style models were Q magazine and Mojo, with a few influences from NME.

Front Cover

Like many forms of print media and not just music magazines, the title of the magazine is positioned in the top left of the page, the area where the human eye is most likely to be drawn to first when the reader picks it up. The logo itself takes inspiration from Q and Mojo’s logos and sets out the red, white and black colour scheme that the rest of the magazine follows. Much of the rest of the text on the page is white in bold capitals or white in a red box. The black outline on some of the titles also helps it stand out against the orangey background. 

The layout of the text revolves around the positioning of the subject’s face in the photograph, rarely overlapping anywhere from the shoulders up, but unlike other modern music magazines the image is taken out on location from a one point perspective as opposed to in a studio, which I feel lends to the more indie feel of the magazine. The photograph itself is a close-up mid shot of a smug looking singer songwriter looking at the camera. It is important that the musician featured on the cover is looking into the camera, as this is a convention of real music magazines and you rarely see a front cover where the musician’s face isn’t clearly visible.

I’ve also made sure to include other important features of music magazines and their front covers, such as the barcode, the issue number with accompanying price tag and an eye catching sticker of some sort offering a chance to win free festival tickets.

Contents Page

My contents page has a boxed layout taking inspiration from Q and NME. Again, the logo is in the top left of the page in a black box, with the title of the page beside it. Like many modern magazines I make sure to include contact details, such as the magazine’s email address, Twitter account, etc, in the banner. The banner also includes the issue number and date in the top right.

The headers are white in red boxes and the page numbers, white in black boxes, in keeping with the magazines colour scheme. Many magazines often present their page numbers in a different colour to distinguish them from the text they are beside. Many often chose gold.

The text of the contents page is on the left of the page, with a collage of images on the right. Usually the positioning of these features varies from magazine to magazine, but as my style model for this page was Q, the text is positioned on the left and the photos on the right.

The photographs I took were taken to vary in style and colour. I applied photo filters in Photoshop where appropriate to achieve this intended effect. Usually Q only contains one photograph running along beside the text on it’s contents page featuring the musician promoted on the cover, but I decided to take inspiration from other music magazines and include a sort of photo collage, which I feel promotes the other artists more as well. I also wanted to ensure my photographs represented both genders, as to appeal to both genders.

At the bottom right side of the page in a rectangular black box is a subscription offer, as seen in NME as well as other publications. The big bold fonts and use of the logo are designed to draw attention to it and in the bottom left of the page is a note from the editor, which I’ve noticed lots of magazines do.

Double Page Spread

My double page spread takes inspiration from NME, Q AND Mojo. It is almost a combination of the three. You have your image based layout, as seen in issues of Mojo, the article on the right side with a large symbol behind the text, as seen in Q and a large bombastic title, usually with a quote from the musician featured in the article. The list goes on.

Like many double page spreads, there is a page dedicated almost entirely to an image of the musician whom the article or interview is about. I decided to make my image black and white, sort of in the style of Mojo magazine. The title is presented in a black banner, strewn across the centre of the page. It contains a subheading below the title, which goes into more depth about the artist in question. Like in other music magazines, the artists name is highlighted in bold.

The text in the article also varies, with the questions highlighted in bold and the answers in lower case. The first letter of the first paragraph is larger and the article in it’s entirety is spread over 3 columns. Again, following genre conventions. 

To add a little colour to the mix I inserted a large red triangle symbol behind the text of the article and made the first letter red. This is in keeping with the red white and black colour scheme.

2) How does your media product represent particular social group?

My media product represents the musical tastes of young, white, middle class Britons with an interest in alternative, Indie and Electronic music. This is reflected in my photographs, which depict young people in a variety of environments. 

There is little variety in the ages of the subjects in my photographs, with the majority of them fitting into the teenage demographic. However, I feel gender however is evenly represented throughout the magazine, as I depict both male and female artists in my photographs, though a male is featured on the cover. Music magazines usually have this even balance between the genders, with a few exceptions. Kerrang for example is aimed at the teenage boy demographic and so features predominantly male artists. My style models offer a more balanced depiction, though many of the artists featured on the front cover are usually male. I wouldn’t say my magazine depicts a wide variety of social classes or ethnicity’s in it’s photography, though the genre I’m aiming for depicts mainly white, middle class teenagers.

3) What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Bauer Media Group is a multinational media company headquartered in Germany which operates in 15 countries worldwide. It distributes an array of music media, including Kerrang, Mojo and Q magazine. It also owns a 50% stake in the British television company Box Television, which produces several popular music channels, such as 4Music, Smash Hits and Kerrang.

I’d imagine my music magazine could theoretically be picked up by Bauer Media Group, allowing it to be published not only nationally, but internationally, with air time for advertisements on channels run by Channel 4, which owns 50% of the company.

But as my magazine focuses more on the indie artists, I feel a wide international release and air time in the mainstream media would somewhat undermine it’s more indie roots. But Bauer has in the past shown it can distribute magazines to a more niche market with Mojo. Perhaps Bauer could do what they did with Mojo and promote it with its own independent radio station.

IPC Media, which distributes music magazines such as NME and Uncut in the UK, may also be an option if I were to aim for the mass market, though their 2001 takeover by the international media conglomerate Time Warner would further undermine the magazines indie roots.

4) Who would be the audience for your media product?

The target audience for my music magazine is young people in the 16-24 age bracket with an interest in the Alternative, Indie and Electronic music genres, regardless of gender, class, ethnicity and sexual orientation. Though I depict mainly white, middle class musicians in my actual magazine, I feel my magazine can be enjoyed by anyone with an interest in these genres of music, though I am aware the people who are not as represented, such as particular ethnic and social groups, are more likely to be turned off by it.

Specifically I’m looking to win over some of Mojo’s audience, who are often stereotyped as young, white, tech-savy, coffee drinking teenagers and twenty-somethings who are into more obscure, lesser known bands, whether it be because they actually like the music and want to hear something different or just want to appear trendy and cool. My magazine is designed to appeal to them without alienating more casual fans of the genres depicted.

5) How did you attract/address your audience?

Before deciding on the contents of my magazine I asked my target audience what genre of music they wanted my magazine to be about. I put out a questionnaire on my blog and linked to it via my Twitter and Facebook accounts. After about a week I gathered all the information I’d received and created this handy infographic to showcase my findings.

From my results I found that one of the most popular genres of music magazine was Alternative music. Electronic also scored fairly high and Indie sort of goes hand in hand with those two genres, so I decided to make my magazine an Alternative/Indie/Electronic music magazine.

To attract this target audience I featured musicians in my images, mainly form the alternative and electronic genres. You can tell this from their fashion choices and choices of instrument. There is also an air of quirkiness in the photographs which lends to the Indie genre.

I took into account feedback I received for my rough cut from my target audience to create an overall more polished final product. This includes changing the logo for the umpteenth time, making it more in-line with a magazine like Mojo or NME than the Q design I had before. I also varied my photography on the contents page in response to gripes that the photographs, particularly the top one, looked to similar to the photographs on the cover and double page spread. The text was also made larger on the double page spread after complaints it was too small.

The actual content of my magazine also panders to my target audience. The double page includes an interview with a fictional singer songwriter called Graham Kierkegaard, a pretentious, arrogant, ex-frontman who left his band to pursue a solo career, only to be battered by the critics. The character sort of a crude parody of Noel Gallagher, Damon Albarn, Thom Yorke and Morrissey. I found my target audience of young people are interested in musicians with lots of character, who are ‘innovative’ or have a gimmick and make lots of controversial statements, which is why I chose to feature Graham Kierkegaard on the front cover.

Overall I tried to attract my target audience by creating a magazine which sends the message that if you read it you’re better than everybody else. Which is sort of the vibe I get from magazines such as NME and Mojo.

6) What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Before starting this project I was already well acquainted to some Adobe software, such as Photoshop, Premier and Flash, but I had never used Indesign before, and this project has really helped in expanding my skills in that area of design. That’s not to say I haven’t expanded my knowledge of photoshop. During this project I have mastered tools in Photoshop I would have never thought to have used in the past, such as the healing brush and clone stamp, applying them to my photographs to enhance the images.

My skills in photography have also greatly improved. Using the school’s SLR cameras I’ve learned how to apply different apertures and shutter speed the get the clearest and most appropriate images for my magazine. I also learned how to frame my images and the importance of composition. For example, that the subject on a front cover needs to be depicted in a close up or midshot and maintain eye contact with the reader to fit with the conventions of music magazines.

Lighting was another important factor I learned about over the course of the project, such as the importance of ensuring light is illuminating the subject’s face and colors in the environment. I also learned to use Photoshop’s colour filters on images to bring out the fainter colours and create an overall more vivid and striking image.

Creating a blog was also a skill I developed over the course of the project, using the website Blogger to document my progress, post feedback and send out questionnaires to my target audience. On a more technical level, I learned how to save drafts for my blog posts and insert media such as images into my posts.  With the blog I learned the importance of meeting deadlines and writing about my work, taking into account audience and teacher feedback to improve the quality of my work.

7) Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

For my preliminary work I had to create a school magazine which fit with the codes and conventions of other school magazines in a small time period, with a strict deadline. During this time I got to grips with the basics of creating a music magazine, starting to use programs such as Indesign and starting to develop my skills in Photoshop. I learned how to layout a magazine in Indesign using graphics, components and photographs created in photoshop. I also learned how to frame a mid shot for the front cover of my magazine and position the text around it to create the layout and that the colour of the text around an image must contrast with the colours in the image, otherwise you’re left with a jumbled mess.

But perhaps most importantly, I learned of the importance of meeting deadlines, as I was cutting it fairly close with this project, and the importance of making sure my media product fits with the codes and conventions of actual media products, as I feel my final school magazine didn’t really follow any codes of conventions of any actual magazines and because of that the quality and my overall mark suffered.

Media Evaluation (Video)

I created my evaluation in Adobe Premier CS6 and it consists of a voice over punctuated by a slideshow of images, illustrating my points. It answers the seven questions I was set to answer in my evaluation. The points in my answers are reinforced by images in my video, with comparisons between my Rough Cut and Final Cut as well as images before and after being edited and inserted into my magazine. I also show examples of actual media products in my evaluation and compare them to mine.