Megan Summers Foundation Portfolio

Evaluation

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

products? My magazine follows the conventions of rock magazines such as Kerrang and NME.Through my product research I found that these magazines generally use:

-A colour scheme of black, white and a bright colour, (blue) This allows for certain words and sections of the magazine to be easily noticeable and stand out.-Bar code, date and price on the front cover In the bottom right hand corner to make it look authentic.-Journalistic words like ‘exclusive!’ and ‘win!’ To generate interest in the magazine and the stories inside-Image using a direct mode of address Used to simulate interaction between the people in the image and each individual reader.-Bold, loud masthead The masthead is usually bold and large to catch the attention of the reader. The name of the magazine has connotations with music so to make the genre of the magazine obvious.-Cover lines are another convention which I used as they generate interest in the magazine.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

The colours I used on the front cover of magazine and throughout are different on every page to widen the demographic of the audience.The target audience is neither males or females and the colours I have used don’t target a particular gender, this is because I found out from my questionnaires that both male and females regularly buy magazines.However the target audience I did decide to focus on was people who enjoyed rock/indie magazines as I found out from my market research that magazines like Kerrang and NME which deal with these genres are the ones that people tend to buy. Also, when I asked which genre of music people prefer to listen to, thesewere the genres people responded most about.I have decided to make my age group for my target audience 16-25 yearolds as this was the age group which bought magazines the most, listened to rock/indie music, and paid for the magazines with eitherpart time or full time jobs.My magazine will be sold once every month, as everyone I asked said they would prefer to buy a magazine which has a issue out every week.The words used aren’t big or complicated and it makes themagazine less formal so it appeals to the target audience.

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

The publishing company I would like to distribute my magazine would be Bauer Publishing. They publish magazines such as Closer and Grazia but they also publish a music magazine of the same genre as mine, Kerrang, so they would have experience with selling this genre of magazine but this is the only magazine of this genre which they sell so there is room in the market for another. The company is large and has a big influence and would have the power to advertise and sell the magazine to a large market.They sell over 300 magazines in 15 countries, as well as online, TV and radio stations which would help while advertising the magazine.

I would like my magazine to be sold in large music shops such as HMV but also in smaller organisations which only sell music from the rock genre.They can also be sold in newsagents and other small shops which are easily accessible to my target audience.