Front Cover Analysis - RESUBMISSION

Front Cover Analysis -Resubmission

in this prezi i have analysised 3 Differnt Music Magazines, the main things i have analysised is the Mise-en-scene, uses and gratification theory and the general layout and structure of the magazine front cover as well as colour sceme and images used.

Contents Page construction

first i added a banner at the bottom of the page to try and reduce the amount of white space

 i then began creating rectangles where my atricle names and summarys would go into, i decided to use two different alternating colours to try and help make the articles stand out from each other. 

the next step was to create the title section for the page, for this i used a horizontal rectangle that was red.

 after that i began creating the alternate article boxes on red.

Contents was then added to the top of the page and a rectangle that was edited using the Rubber tool in photoshop which has featured items written across it. 

 i then added page number using the same alternating colour scheme

 article names and summaries came next sticking to the alternating colour scheme

 after that i added images that linked in to my chosen article to help give some media for the page while still dealing with the whitespace issue on the right hand side of the page.

Front Cover Construction

 First i stated with a blank page and added a banner across the bottom of the page and added a red stroke around it,i did this by adding an achor point mid right on the box and removing the the top left anchor point

i then added a rectangle shape and rotated it using the free transform tool and added a grey coloured stroke around the box.

i then added my mast head image and rotated it to match the rectangle

i then copied the top rectangle and scaled them down, i then change the style of two by using black main colour with a red stroke

my next step was to insert my main image of my model

next i added a black box at the top to fade the picture and added my main banner with an overlapping banner on the top (see next Picture)

i then added my main Articles to the lower banner

i then put my coverline on the banner and my featured articles in the rectangles to the left

Evaluation

Evaluation

Through this process I learnt how temperamental technology can be on a good day, in this process I ran into so many problems I have lost count, the main one was storage of work especially Blogger, the other problem I ran into was during the photography stage of my project when a number of the images I had taken became corrupt and unusable, as these were the originals I had to do a re-shoot.

The technology I had to used was quite advanced for example I used many types of software’s such as Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Lightroom and the most important Adobe Photoshop, without the use of these software I would not have been able to get the level of professionalism that I personally believe that I managed to achieve on the final product, I believe this also help to attract my audience because it made my magazine look good and appropriate to the genre in which I was attempting to target, I also achieved this by using 3 of the main colours most commonly associated with the genre to try and help my magazine fit in with more ease.

I believe if my magazine was to be distributed it would be one of the key ways for the mass market of Classic Rock Fans to keep up to date with the most recent events yet be reminded of some of the most key events in history that helped shape the genre into such a distinctive genre as it is known as today.

Over the course of this project I have learnt to always be thinking on my feet in terms of design, such as how can I tweak this image to get the full effect from it? Or how can I take this design to the level? After the first few designs and mock-ups I discovered that personally “Okay” was just not good enough and that I had to keep pushing myself to think outside the box, also I learnt to keep a good amount of backups of my work in different locations in case anything happened to my work (like it did) overall I believe this project has help me become more creative and insight full in terms of magazine and not just Graphic Design.

Final Magazine

This is my final design for my magazine titled "Sticks + Stones"
This is the Front Cover:

as you can most likely see, my main house style comprises of three main colours : Red, White and Black.

My Contents Page at first felt crowded and cramped so to solve this problem i made into a double page contents page, i also attempted to create a mirrored looked:

Double Page Spread:

Front Cover Mock up

I made 2 Different Mock up of my music magazines front cover, the is only two similarities between the two is that i have banner going across the page diagonally at the bottom of the page, and also that i have my masthead located in the top left hand corner of my magazines front cover. i decided to not go for design 1 because i felt that it was too generic and very similar to most of today's common magazines

Design 1:

Design 2:

College Magazine - Finished

Analysis Contents Page

Features Of A Contents Page

when designing and creating a mock up of my main contents page

Research - Double Page Spread

Research - Contents Page

Research - Front Cover

Photoshoot

For the photoshoot i chose the stage in the main hall at college, mainly because it was a large space with a variety of different coloured backdrops that could be switched easily and there was many power points in the area of the stage, for the photoshoot i had a variety of lighting set up for my photoshoot and Kit Hicks as my model, i also had a guitar with me to use a prop.

Evaluation

Music Magazine Masthead

My Music magazine is called Sticks + Stones, and due to this name my masthead needs a style that can be easily associated with classic rock, i created 4 variations of the same masthead the only similarity of them is that for the word sticks i have made them out of drum sticks or actual sticks apart from one masthead which does not share these similarities, variation 1 has the "+" in Sticks + Stones apart from one masthead which does not share these similarities

Variation 1 (Image Bellow) I used an image of a drum stick that I acquired from the internet to form the word "Sticks" and the "+" of my magazines name. I did this using simple manipulation tools in Photoshop for example I rotated, scaled and duplicated.

the main reason I decided against using this masthead is because the stylization of the word "Stones" I felt it seemed too cartoon like for a professional classic rock magazine.

Variation 2 (Image Below) is similar to Variation 1 apart from i used the warp tool in Photoshop to make the word "sticks" seem more natural and easier to read, the block like style of variation 1 made it hard to read.

Variation 3 (Image Below) this variation was my favourite because it was easy to read and still related to the genre of the magazine and the title of the magazine.

Variation 4 (Image Below) in this variation i used a font that i acquired from www.dafont.com the font is called stickchop and the main reason this font stood out to me from the rest is because of the similaritys to bamboo which is related to the word "Sticks". the other font used in this masthead was called "stonehenge" which is what i got from the same website as the "stickchop" font, i felt that this font did not seem as rock orientated as i like and did not relate as well to the magazine as Variation 3.

after creating these 4 different variations for my masthead i felt that variation 3 was best suited for my magazine because it looked more rock appropiate and coresponds with the words in the title "Sticks + Stones".

Publication Plan

Publication Plan

Magazine Name:  STICKS AND STONES

Stylized Name:

http://www.dafont.com/stonehenge-loboloco.font

http://www.dafont.com/stickchop.font

Positioning Statement: Stick it to da man!

Price: £1.99

Distribution: sold at all major retailers and music shops and festivals

Rationale:  the reason behind the magazine is to supply people my age with a magazine that is informal and cheap which allows them to catch up with the world of Classic Rock.

Style:  the magazine main style and approach will be of an informal manor with a free Rock look, eg. Posters and peeling stickers to help with the styling of each page but it will also help with maintaining a house style throughout the magazine

1p = 1 Page

2p = 2 Page

Regular Content:

1.       Editors note

2.       Band Interview – M(1p)

3.       General Charts(1p)

4.       Classic Rock Chart (1p)

5.       Featured albums – 4 (2 page spread)

6.       Band News(half p)

7.       Calendar/Upcoming Events(pull out poster)

8.       Our Gig Reviews(1p)

9.       This month’s YouTube must watch (5 videos)(1p)

10.   Fans in Force (2p)

11.   Featured Songs(5 Songs)

12.   History 101 (important dates related to the current months)

13.   Labelless (unsigned band of month)

Featured Content:

1.       Artist Interview – F(2p)

2.       Artist Mini Biography(half p)

3.       Money, Money, Money - Spotify not paying artist enough royalties and other stories(1p)

4.       Bridging the Genres – cross genre music(1p)

5.       Festival Horror stories(bad experiences) (1p)

6.       Turn Back Time – our favourite broken up bands(2p)

7.       Fans Speak out – Gig Reviews from Fans

8.       When Genres Clash – unusual music collaborations e.g. Aerosmith + Run DMC (2p)

9.       Live feed (Festival News/lineups)

10.   Live Fools (top 10 concert bloopers)

Styling

Cover lines: Franklin Gothic Medium (Bold)

Headlines: Franklin Gothic Demi Cond (Not Bold)

Captions: Franklin Gothic Demi Cond (Bold)

Body Text: Century Gothic

Music Magazine Name

Music Magazine Title
Bellow are 3 names I had come up with for my Music magazine, i then asked Friends and Peers to vote on which name sounded best and most appropriate for the Genre of Classic Rock the three names i had developed were:

"The Flyer-V"
"Rock On"
"Sticks and Stones"

the main reasons behind the name "The Flyer-V" was to make the connection of classic rock via the play on words "Flying V" which is a type of guitar, i am hoping that this name will help the reader instantly make the connection between the magazine and classic rock without actually seeing the house style.

the main reasons behind the magazine name "Rock On" is to try and make an instant connection with classic rock, this is most likly the most releavant title for masthead, but with this in mind i believe it is not the best name for my magazine.

the main reason behind the name "Sticks and Stones" is a play on words Drum sticks and Rolling Stones, this is would make the connection between classic rock using the association of the rolling stones and drum sticks. 

Vote Results
1) "The Flyer-V"           -6

2) "Rock On"                -1

3) "Sticks and Stones"   -8

after finding that "Sticks and Stones" was the most popular it was suggested that i drop the "and" and replace it with a plus sign, also while gathering feedback I discovered that all but one person felt that name 2: "Rock On" was appropriate to the genre but was too cheesy. the main reason behind "The Flyer-V" not being the most popular is because it made my magazine seem to much like a flyer and gave the wrong impression of the magazine.

College Magazine - Mastheads

bellow are the top mock-up designs for the Masthead/Logo of the college magazine that we have been tasked to design.

I decided to make the "T" and the hole in "O" into Arrows pointing upwards this is an intended pun making a connection with the word top.

I am also most likely to settle with the Second logo as my final one mainly because in the first one the size of the "C" makes it hard to recognise the word "Class"

College Magazine Name Ideas

Richmond Roundup -
"This is not toy story"
Alliteration
Catchy
Easy To Remember


Top Class -
Top = "Proper Good"
Class = Pun
suggests you will be top of class if you read it
relates to school

Schloar Weekly -
"Boring"
"Sounds like a smart newspaper"

Music Magazine Moodboard.

Analysis - Front Covers

Similarities: Q and LOOK use banners with bright colour banners most likely to attract customers attention.

Q and LOOK use big headlines directly under the mast head.

 Q and Marie Claire use a simliar colour scheme (Red Black and White)

College Magazine - Evaluation

College Magazine - Finished

College Magazine - Plan

Richmond Roundup -
"This is not toy story"
Alliteration
Catchy
Easy To Remember


Top Class -
Top = "Proper Good"
Class = Pun
suggests you will be top of class if you read it
relates to school

Schloar Weekly -
"Boring"
"Sounds like a smart newspaper"

bellow are the top mock-up designs for the Masthead/Logo of the college magazine that we have been tasked to design.

I decided to make the "T" and the hole in "O" into Arrows pointing upwards this is an intended pun making a connection with the word top.

I am also most likely to settle with the Second logo as my final one mainly because in the first one the size of the "C" makes it hard to recognise the word "Class"

A Level Media - Introduction

In this topic i will be researching , planning and producing a Music Magazine, for my research i shall be viewing and performing  analysis different pieces of magazine from different music genres to help me decide a way to make my magazine stand out but also fit into the genre more easily, after conducting the research and analysis i will be able to then plan my magazine and fit it into the genre by creating mocks and getting feedback on the mock-ups of the magazine.