Drafting Text

When drafting my text, I decided to not plan too much. Therefore I wrote down some topics that a music magazine is likely to ask in a interview with a band/band member. I decided that I would use these topics I wrote down and come up with the text as I went on. I feel that this was a better way of writing text as it would stop me from changing my mind and the way I wrote.

Planning/Sketching Page Layouts

The plans and sketches for my page layouts are shown here.

Shooting/Choosing Images

When shooting my images, I wanted the pictures to seem natural and that the person was not 'posing' for the pictures. This is why I decided that I would like him to be with a guitar also, this is because it seems that he does not even notice he is getting his picture taken and that it would be natural for him to pick up a guitar and play it. Also when shooting the images, I wanted the lighting to be focus on the main person but dark away from him.

When choosing the images I wanted to use the ones which showed our artist's calm and sophisticated side and not the drunken singer side which is spoken about in the text. The only picture that he seems not to be 'calm' in is one where he is posing with a guitar looking down a camera lens.

Setting Up Images

When setting up my images I decided that I should show a blank background so that the person in the picture would be the main item of the picture. When deciding how I wanted to show the artist, I though that I would like to show the quiet, soft side of the artist and not the drunken, loud side. I did this so that the audience may see this side to him and maybe also engage themselves in the text.

Planning/Sketching Images

Here are some preliminary sketches I made.

Analysing Front Cover Images

When trying to plan a front cover we analysed other music magazine front covers.

Researching and Designing Mastheads

When researching mastheads we again looked at current music magazines.

After this I designed my RADAR masthead.

I then made a change to the title by adding a double quaver instead of a A which shows that the magazine is focused on the music.

Investigating the Conventions

When we investigated conventions, we looked at present magazine covers and analysed how they looked then wrote them down.

Also, we then looked a feature conventions and did the same.

Also, we decided to look into music audiences and what people stereotypically think certain music fans look like.

Exploring Values/Ideologies of Different Music Magazines

I researched thesimilarites and differences between NME and UNCUT readers.

Researching Target Audiences of Different Magazines

I found that after looking at other magazines, people tend to buy the magazine if they know what they are expecting inside of it.

Next, I look at what kind of following Mix Mag had. After some research, I found that the kind of people that buy MixMag are people who are intrested in DJing, dance music and basically ravers. I think this is because MixMag contains music genres such as dance, rave and hardcore.

I found that with Kerrang! that they mainly have an audience of Rock and metal fans. This is because Kerrang! only really reviews and shows this kind of music in the magazine.

I found that NME had an audience of many music fans ranging from pop to metal. I think this is beacuae NME seems to cover a range of music genres.

Investiagting the Market

At the beggining of the term I did some research into the magazine market to see if there were any other magazines which were attepting the genre of music I was thinking of doing. After looking at several music magazines like NME, Kerrang! and MixMag, I found that these magazines did not give the reader much information about the Britpop scene and new british music. I found that these magazines featured mainly indie, rock, metal and dance music. However, I did look at the magazine Q and I liked how it was set out and wrote. Also, this magazine was the only other magazine which featured mainly british music. I decided that this magazine would mainly aimed at late teens to people in their early forties, this would be because of the content i.e cursing would not be suitable for children.

I did also look at magazines like Plan B, MOJO and Rolling Stone, looking at these helped me in choosing my layout and writing style.