Question 1
In what ways does your product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
I am comparing my magazine 'SET' to a cover of NME to find out how my product challenges or develops forms and conventions of real media products. I am using NME because it's target audience is similar to mine so it is useful to answer this question.
Similarities in our designs are the colours used. Both magazines feature colours like; red, black and white which are plain colours that also complement each other and can look very modern without being over the top, therefore enticing the audience rather then overwhelming them. Both magazine feature a female singer as when I did my survey I found that mostly females read these kinds of magazines, I thought it would be good to feature a female artist to be a role model and reach the target market in ways that other magazines may not. These similarities support the use of forms and conventions in real media products.
Differences in these magazines include the picture that has been taken. The NME magazine features a picture of Lily Allen taken from above that flatters her and makes her look like she has attitude which would attract people to this magazine as she looks 'cool' because a lot of marketing is about someones image. My copy of SET magazine features a full body shot of Collette Paterson, she also looks like she has attitude but the full body shot shows the audience that she has attitude due to her stance and the clothes that she is wearing. The font in both these magazines are also different NME's font is thicker and all the letters are unordered and in different font sizes. SET's font is thinner and more organised. I chose to make this look more organised because it is a smarter way to present your magazine to a first time audience.
My magazine develops forms and conventions by using similar colours and models but challenges conventions by being more organised and using different poses for the front cover.
Question 2
How does your media product represent particular social groups?
Question 3
What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
IPC may publish my magazine as they are the publishers for NME and as our target audiences are very similar it would be a good distributor for my magazine as they are already well established and could help make my magazine more popular due to the already well established audience.
Question 4 & Question 5
Who would be the audience for your media product? How did you attract/address your audience?
Question 6
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
The first thing that we had to learn was how to use blogger, this would be essential as all of our coursework must be uploaded to blogger to be shared and also marked. I found blogger easy to get to grips with because I have used similar websites before and I thought that it was a good idea to use a blog as everything can be uploaded instantly and it is easy to track your progress as everything can be found in the same place without looking through multiple files.
Other programmes that I had to use is power point and microsoft word to help me with my research and planning. I used microsoft word to help me produce a questionnaire that would help me find my target audience. I found that it was teenage girls aged between 16-19 and that they would pay up to £2.00 for a copy of my magazine. I also used powerpoint to help me answer some questions in my evaluation. I already knew how to use these programmes so getting to grips with the software wasn't hard for me but I had to learn how to format my documents and my pictures to upload onto blogger.
I also learnt how to use prezi and a website called slideshare, slideshare helped me to upload my powerpoint to blogger and prezi is an alternative way to present my work and research and it was easier to get to grip with then when I first used programmes like powerpoint.Using InDesign was the hardest programme to learn how to use, along with photoshop to edit my pictures. I was not used to using macs but after a few weeks I was slowly learning how to use InDesign to create my magazine and it was easy to use one I learnt to use all of the tools. InDesign was effective and would be good to use in the professional world of publishing.
Question 7
Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
