Editing Using Photoshop

 These are some of the photos which i found on the websites. I edited them to how I would have liked them on Photo shop in order to practice for when I come to edit my photographs.

Website Photo Research

In order to influence my photo shoot, I have looked at the following websites of existing acoustic artists.

http://www.jamesmorrisonmusic.com/

http://www.colbiecaillat.com/

http://www.johnmayer.com/

on these websites I found the following photos..

I liked all of these photos, because they all have a relaxed feeling to them, which conforms to the genre of the music magazine. I like the colours in these photos as they're all calm and not bright and striking. My favourite photo is the last one, so I would like to try and capture a photo like this whilst doing my photo shoot. 

Risk Assesment

Here I have created a risk assessment for my photo shoot to ensure that it will be a safe environment for taking my shots. Now that I have highlighted the risks and found solutions, I will be aware of hazards to look out for and therefore I will be safe with minor chance of injuries. 

Editorial Profile

Hey Guys :) Basically, my music magazine is of an acoustic genre, inspired by artists such as James Morrison, Taylor Swift, and Joshua Radin etc. Featuring a range of new and existing artists who conform to this genre, this magazine will offer you the motivation to try out new things and achieve things you never thought would be possible. Articles, interviews, tips etc will be included in this magazine helping you to do so. The calming sensation of listening to acoustic personally helps me to work, and relaxes me when I am having difficulties. Even if you thought acoustic music was not your thing, then I assure you after reading this, it will be! So go ahead, get unplugged and try it out.

Dani x

Target Audience Customer Profile

I have created a customer profile in order to highlight my target audience making sure the conventions of my magazine will appeal to their tastes. My target audience is for both genders, aged 14-19.

Name: Rachael

Age: 17

Gender: Female

She is a former student at college, studying Art, photography, and maths. In her spare time she likes to meet up with her friends, experiment with her camera taking photographs, and listen to calming acoustic music whilst doing her school work. She listens to artists such as; Colbie Caillat, James Morrison, Paulo Nutini, Joshua Radin, and Joe Brooks. She has a passion for playing the guitar, however could use advice and contacts to progress her talents further. My magazine is aiming to meet these needs for Rachael and many other people in the same situation. 

Existing Music Magazine Research

I have looked at many existing music magazines to influence me in the making of mine. In particular, I wanted to look at acoustic magazines to see what they look like and the conventions in which I will need to look at. I found this magazine called ‘Acoustic’ which obviously follows this genre. I like the way the featuring artist is making eye contact with the reader, luring them in to buy the magazine, I also like the way he looks relaxed which conveys to the calm acoustic genre. They have used lures, bold captions, large artists’ names and the rule of thirds to entice the reader into this magazine.  I will consider these conventions when making my magazine and would like to shoot a photo a bit like this, but with a plainer background. 

The second magazine which I looked at was ‘Q’ magazine. Although this is not an acoustic magazine and doesn't follow the genre of mine, I chose this as I like the layout and sophisticated look to it. The grey background is useful as it draws the readers attention to the title name and the foreground picture. I like the way there is a simple colour scheme of black, white, grey and red. I think I will use this technique for my magazine, but change the red tone to a different colour. I was also thinking of having a black and white foreground image; however after seeing this, I have decided that it may be more effective to have a coloured picture instead. 

Title Ideas

 I was very undecided about what to call my music magazine, so I created a brain storm to help me with this decision. I looked on the internet to find music related words, asked my friends and family and wrote down all the words which came into my head of use.

Two of these ideas caught my eye; ‘Player’ and ‘Unplugged’. I will explore which of these names looks better on my front cover and try out different fonts and logos to decide on the final name. 

Advantages & Disadvantages of my Questionnaire

Advantages:

The advantages of creating polls for my blog are as follows; It was a quick and easy way to create a questionnaire as all I had to do was upload the poll, and let my target audience vote anonymously. Displaying my results in a pie chart enabled me to see easier which answer came out on top.

Disadvantages:

There aren’t many disadvantages to this as I thought it was a really efficient way to collect information. However, with a poll I cannot guarantee that everyone who took part in it was within my target audience’s age range which could have a negative effect on my magazine. To overcome this, I could have created a questionnaire on paper and handed it out to my chosen audience.

Overall, I think that creating polls for my blog is an advantage to the making of my magazine. I could have created more questions, but the results I have collected have influenced and changed my ideas about my magazine which was very useful. 

Questionnaire

Questionnaire Results:

In order to have an idea about what type of magazine features my target audience would like to see, I uploaded a few polls onto my blog for people of both genders and ages around 16-22 to vote on. By doing this, I have a less bias view on my ideas, and get to see what other people would like to see.

My results were as follows: 

Would you prefer to see text or photos featured inside the magazine?

From this poll I have found out that my target audience would prefer to see photos inside the magazine. As the result came out with 4 votes for text, this was more than I expected so I will be adding in quite a bit of text, but mainly photos.

 Which genre of music would you like to see features in the magazine?

This clearly shows that my target audience would prefer to read an Acoustic magazine as supposed to a Rock, Pop, R&B or any other genre. As a result of this poll, I have decided to base my magazine around an Acoustic genre.

Would you prefer to see black and white photos on the front cover, or bright colours?

These results show that my target audience would prefer to see Black and white photos on the cover of my magazine, rather than bright colours. I will bare this information in mind whilst editing my shots. 

Double Page Spread Analysis

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Dps decons

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Contents Page Analysis

Contents Page Analysis

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Music Magazine Analysis

Media

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Existing Music Magazine Analysis

In order to create my music magazine, I have looked at the front covers, contents, and double page spreads of three exiting music magazines; NME, Kerrang, and Q. I have analysed the codes and conventions of these pages, and will use techniques explored to feature in my music magazine.

Music Magazine Moodboard

I created a mood board to show the sort of pictures that particularly attract my eye, and the conventional consistency of music magazines. I found that most pictures are bright and colourful, which makes the magazine more exiting. I included a CD which came as a free gift with a music magazine. It is used as a lure to make readers interested, and potential buyers. Interviews are always featured inside, along with concert/gig information. A page is usually devoted to new artists/tracks, to promote the singers. I will take on board all of these ideas in the making of my magazine, and include some conventions named above. 

Pre - lim Photos

Dsiuh

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Preliminary task

The Preliminary task was to produce the front page of a new school magazine featuring a photograph of a student in medium close up, plus some appropriately laid out text and a masthead. Additionally we also had to produce a mock-up of the layout of the contents page.

To do this, on Thursday 30^th September, Alex Walton; a former photographer for the Herald, spent a day at the Kings School with the A level media studies students. The day consisted of a two hour induction about how to use a camera, general photography skills and techniques. This was then followed by 3 hours of preparation time before creating any front cover specialising in school education. This was made by taking photographs around the school grounds of anything which would attract consumers, using the techniques which had been previously explained. The photographs were edited using Photoshop, in order to create the final piece providing us with experience in producing our own magazine.

Before deciding upon a front cover idea, me and my partner brainstormed and came up with the idea of an art based school. We took many medium close up shots in the art room at our school, with bright colours included to appeal to students. We used mainly blue and pink as our house colours to conform to both genders.

The day was beneficial to me in many ways; such as to help me understand the concept of photography, to experiment with Photoshop, and learning how to entice customers to buy your photographed products.

AS Media Studies Brief

My name is Dani Bennett, and my brief for AS Media Studies is to create a front cover, contents page, and a double page spread of a new music magazine. This blog will allow me to record my planning and research, which will be beneficial in the making of my magazine