Magazine title

After evaluating my class feedback on my title page I have decided to go with the name 'Break Down'

Audience + Profile

My magazine will appeal to teenagers aged from 12-19. The target market is quite a young age therefore the magazine must be reasonably censored. The magazine is targeted towards both genders and I will show this through the reversed gender stereotype idea which is where the male is following the stereotypical female role and vice-versa. The magazine is also aimed at guitarists and people who are learning the guitar as it will have tabulators and chords ETC

Audience Profile
Name: Katie Ford
Age: 17
Favourite bands: Nirvana, Foo Fighters, Green Day
Favourite films: Anchorman, Waynes World, Dewey Cox: Walk Hard, Step Brothers.
Favourite Actress: Will Ferrell, John C. Reilly, Mike Myers 
Favourite magazine: NME, Kerrang! The Wire


After looking at my draft I asked Katie if she would be interested in buying my magazine and this is what she said: 'Well it has a bunch of decent bands, and I like the red, black and white colour scheme. I'm not sure I'd be willing to pay as much as £5 for it though so maybe bring the price down slightly? Other than that I'd most certainly buy it"

Possible magazine title names

I looked through my list of music and at the song names to get inspiration for a title. I liked two Guns N Roses songs called 'Attitude' and 'Break Down'

I also thought of the colloquilism 'What Ever' as it reflects on the whole rock and roll attitude.

The last title I thought of was 'Electriff' as this combines the words electric and riff.

To conclude the four titles I have are 'Attitude' 'Break Down' 'What Ever' 'Electriff'

Pitch

Luke’s Pitch

Reversing gender stereotypes

I thought in terms of graphology, for my magazine I could reverse the stereotypical representations of genders. I will do this by having the female holding an electric guitar, dressed in in black and leather at the foreground. She will also be wearing Slash's top hat which is designed for males; I got this idea from the music video to Beautiful Dangerous where Fergie wears Slash's top hat. Furthermore the male model for my magazine will be in the background so they appear smaller, and they will be holding a tray with a microphone on. The male will be wearing ripped black or red jeans and a tshirt which doesn't fit. I will develop this idea further avoiding making the image seem sexist as that is not my intention.

Star Wars

I was looking through my old films and found the Star Wars films and thought it may be a good idea to incorporate a Sci-Fi theme into my magazine; neon fonts, bright colours and light sabres etc. I found an example which shows the Sci-Fi theme.
I like this because it is very bright and would be different to an ordinary music magazine.
I don't like this because it doesn't give connotations of music or the representations of music, it makes the audience think more of games and films.
I will most likely not use this for my magazine however I will put it into consideration.

Slash

Slash is a very influential character to include in my magazine. This is because he would make the magazine very "cool" because he has is own style which is very rock and roll. If I was to include Slash's style in my magazine then I would use his costume which normally consists of leather jackets/trousers, sunglasses, and the classic top hat which he wears. There are also other features which I could use to represent Slash which are nose piercings and big bushy hair. This is Slash's classic style (Below-Right)

My favourite pieces of work from Slash are mainly his material from his former band Guns N Roses. I really enjoy his starting riff and end solo from Sweet Child O Mine, I like his version of the Godfather theme tune and also November Rain.

The White Stripes

I am a fan of The White Stripes because of their artwork, style and songs.
Artwork

The White Stripes have released 6 albums. The artwork on these albums all follow the red, black and white colour scheme which gives connotation of love, darkness and light. This makes the artwork very deep but also keeps the vibe positive.

My favourite White Stripes song is Icky Thump , You Don't Know What Love Is or We Are Going to be Friends.

Artists

I chose 4 of my favourite artists and will decide on which would be the best for my own magazine.

The first artist is The White Stripes. I think this band would be excellent to incorporate within my magazine because of their style. Their style is colourful and kind of childish however they do have quite a deep vibe to them too which means that they would appeal to a wider audience. The White Stripes' colour scheme is red, white and black which means that they would be suitable to incorporate into a magazine.

 

The second artist that I have chosen is the guitarist Saul Hudson (Slash.) Slash would also be great to use in a magazine because he has a very stylish appearance and appeals a lot to the teenage audience because of his "cool" appearance. Slash has a black colour scheme within his appearance so it would narrow down the audience slightly because some people aren't into that.

Bob Dylan is also one of my favourite artists because of his deep lyrics and strange style. Dylan would be a great artist to use to influence my magazine style choice because of his quotes, style and pragmatic messages that he has in his songs. Bob Dylan is not as heavy as the previous artists as he sings folk music therefore I will not be able to include him in a rock magazine however I think it would be a great idea to make a guitar magazine.

Pink Floyd are another favourite of mine as they have their own proper independent music which is very physchedelic and mysterious. This would be great to include in my magazine because of the colours and themes used. By giving the magazine a physchedelic theme I can make the magazine as strange and mysterious as I like however I would still have to use the correct layout ETC.

After comparing these different artists I have found it hard to decide on which artist's style to choose however I have decided to create a guitar magazine as I can interpret my favourite artists into that.

Magazine Register

This is a formality spectrum which i created on Microsoft Publisher. It shows all the different conventions of register which are present in the English language. I will look at 5 music magazines relevant to rock audiences and conclude what register the majority of them use.The magazines that I have chosen are Mojo, Q, Rolling Stone, NME and Kerrang!

NME uses a lot of quotes from artists as the sub heading for the front cover of the magazine which would be close to the main heading which in this example is MUSE. It is hard to decide what the register is as the text is usually just band names and quotes and the occasional brief fact. I would put the register in 'Non-Standard English' because of phrases like 'Jamie T live... in a toilet' This isn't slang how ever it is not Standard English.
Q uses the colloquilism 'Kick off' which is not a standard english idiom. Also words like 'Orgy' and 'Tit' these are very taboo terms therefore I have decided to put Q in the 'Taboo' category.

Magazine Typography

The typography used in magazines are usually colourful, bold and unusual text. The masthead usually has its own designed font for the specific magazine.

For example Kerrang! has a very large white font which acts as it's brand image as it is a well known masthead for the magazine. This masthead has a crack which runs through the word Kerrang! which gives connotations of destruction and rock; this fits nicely with the magazine's context and purpose. The font is bespoke and unique because it has been designed specifically for that magazine, this is shown through the crack feature and also the coloured in 'A'

Another example of a magazine with a specifically designed font for a masthead is Q Magazine which has a more tidy hand written look. This design is much different to Kerrang!'s designed because it gives connotations of intelligence and makes it seem as though the content of the magazine is full with useful and interesting information.

Both fonts however are bold, white, clear and easy to read. This means that I will have to use a clear, white, bold font for my magazine and possibly design my own font too.

Contents Page

By observing these magazine contents pages I have found out that the page consists of mainly picures which overcrowd the page and make the text seem pushed out to the sides of the page; it is as if the pictures are the primary elements on the page.

The contents page still sticks to the magazines's colour scheme and specific layouts. These three all follow the 'F' layout.

 

Double Page Spread

After looking at existing double page spreads from professional magazines I have discovered that one of the pages consists of a large picture which coverers the majority of the page. and the other page contains mainly text however there are other forms of graphology such as large colourful headers, smaller photographs, backgrounds ETC. The typography has a very small font apart from the headers which is very large and bold. Also the colours stay within the magazine's colour scheme throughout the double page spread.

 

Split Screen Imaging

This album cover shows a quadruple split screen image of 4 different historical figues; Bob Dylan, Malcolm X, Fidel Castro and John F. Kennedy.

I like this type of imagery as it shows a variety of different subjects in one image; this saves room and allows there to be much more content that a regular photograph.

This would also appeal to the target market. for example the picture on the left shows iconic figures of the 60s therefore it would appeal to the older audience as well as young people who are interested in 1960 history.

This magazine cover is in the style of 1930 Art Deco. This design makes it seem vintage and classic however the date says 2012 so we know it is modern designed to look old.

This design uses three colours which are turqoise, white and a minimal amount of black. The black contrasts well with the background, partly because the background colors are slightly whitewashed and faded.

This magazine style would maybe work for a music magazine as it offers a unique and alternative edge which appeals to some audiences, however the colours may need to be more lively and more graphics would  need to be present as it needs more of a selling point.

Overall this design appears to be a little bit too simple for a music magazine.

 

This magazine cover is in the style of Roy Litchenstein. This is shown through the use of benday dots, bright colours and cartoon-like shapes.

This magazine is inspirational as the bright colour and cartoon-like shapes make it stand out from the other magazines as it appears very different.

The design of this type of magazine would be aimed more towards the younger audience as it seems a lot more fun and exiting than the others however it would not be as appropriate for a music magazine.

To conclude, this style provides a very colourful magazine cover and would be appropriate for some genres of music for example pop and alternative rock however it would not be appropriate for metal or hip-hop ETC.

Artwork

Magazine covers can be influenced by album artwork due to the graphological elements such as colour, themes and shapes. An example of this is the De Stijl album by the White Stripes. (Below) This album uses shapes and poses to create the theme of the art movement called De Stijl. The shapes are very geometric and this gives connotations of tidiness.
Furthermore the colour scheme in this artwork follows the traditional colour scheme that The White Stripes use which is red, black and white. Coinsidentally this is the most common colour scheme used for magazine covers. I know this by comparing a variety of magazines and studying which ones are most affective for me. (Below)

I have found out that the red, white and black colour scheme is a lot more comfortable for the user to look at as the other magazines that use other colour schemes seem more overcrowded and complicated.

These two magazine covers advertise the products in different ways. The one on the left uses the image of Bob Dylan to attract the audience which is Dylan fans, and makes them interested in reading/buying the magazine however the gaming magazine on the right is much more abstract and uses drawn artwork to entice the audience. The image is of a boy who is inside an arcade machine and is controlling the characters within the machine, this gives a semantic meaning that the user is in control of the games which entices the gaming audience as that is how they want to feel when playing the games.

AS Media Foundation portfolio G321 Schedule 2012