Candidate Details

Jennifer Sarah Hall

Candidate Number: 5050

Centre Name: Wilmington Grammar School for Girls

Centre Number: 61119

Final Media Products

7) Looking back at your preliminary task (the school magazine task), what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

When I first began the course I was set the preliminary task to create a front cover and contents page for a school magazine. For the front cover of my school magazine the layout is quite basic and although it is supported by my research it does not seem to be as structured as the front cover for my music magazine. The front cover for my music magazine is based solidly on my research and the titles, image and  text reflect this. I believe that since I started the preliminary task I have learnt quite a lot and it has helped me to create my final media product. I began to use Photoshop and In Design for the school magazine and through using these I learnt how to alter images and text by using the tools available. 

I feel like I have become more knowledgeable in the use of technology during the main task that I was given to produce. In the preliminary task I don't feel like I was prepared enough to use the tools in photoshop and therefore tended to just use resizing and cropping tools rather than experiment with healing tools. The main problems that I had with my images in the first task was lighting and had I been better at photoshop I'm sure I could have adjusted the brightness and contrast. In the second task I did much more research into the preparation of my magazine and made sure that it was relevant by addressing my target audience. In my first task it was quite obvious who the magazine was for but it did not have a more specific audience like my final product does. Through researching the type of reader for my magazine and their hobbies I was able to focus the product more on them and how it would increase the interest in my product. In stark contrast, I feel that I was not as well researched for my preliminary task and was more focused on making it appeal to school students rather than a more refined target audience.

The layout for my preliminary task is quite basic and although I am pleased with it considering it was my first task, it does not reflect the research as well as my final product does. The text used in the first task is quite boring and does not grab the reader's attention as well as I think that it does in the second task. The photographs taken differ hugely as the preliminary task photos were taken outside in natural light and without special equipment. I hardly edited these images in comparison to the photos used for the second task. In the main product I used artificial lighting equipment which I could adjust and I also used a tripod in order to keep the camera still and prevent blurring.

Looking back at my preliminary task I think it is fair to say that I have progressed in my learning and understanding of technology and how to produce a media product. I think I have understood that in order to create a successful magazine you must research the genre of music that it is catering for the the type of audience that you intend for it to
be read by. The magazine should contain content which will interest the reader and will suit the social group that it aims to target. In the preliminary task I do not feel that I  fulfilled these aims as well because I was not aware of what exactly was involved. I had never used the software before and therefore it was 'trial and error' until I began to create my final media product in which I was able to experiment more with.

6) What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

During the process of constructing my media product I have used several software design programs such as:

By using In Design I have been able to create the text that I have used in my products. On the right is an example of how I reached the final logo for my magazine Warp. By using this piece of software I was able to experiment with fonts, font sizes, text effects and colours.

 

Using In Design I typed out the name of my magazine in capital letters and selected the font Cairo SF and chose the font size 90. I then copy and pasted this so that I created two of the same texts. I filled one of the texts in black and left the other white and by doing this I was able to send one of the text boxes to the back behind the white text and create a shadow with the black text. Using the lettering tools I was able to move letters away from each other and create distance between them. Once I was happy with the logo I grouped the two text boxed together and created my final logo.

I used Photoshop to edit all of the photographs used in my media product. It became evident during my research that most artists featured in magazines are airbrushed and images are edited to suit the purpose of a product. For all of my pictures I beautifyed the skin, removed backgrounds of changed the shape of an image.

Above I have shown the after and before image that I used for my front cover. On the right you can see that the model has a dark shadow on the left side of her face which could distract the reader when looking at the image. I have removed the background so that I could alter the colour of it for the front cover of my magazine.

By selecting the magic wand tool I was able to make quick selections around the image and delete what was not necessary or alter the selected area. This reduced time and saved me having to individually select unwanted areas of the image.

In order to remove the shadow from the model's face I was able to use a healing brush or the spot healing brush tool to remove and beautify the skin.



On the right is a print screen of the dodge, burn and sponge tool. I used the burn tool to lighten the colour of my models hair so that it would blend into the background. I used this tool instead of having to select the background between bits of hair because this tool lightens the hair to the background.

Aswell as this main software programs I used Blogger to record the blog entries and show the updates of my media product. I have also Windows Movie Maker to create some of the videos which are shown on my blog. To add sound to these videos I used a microphone which could be handheld and record sound bites.

I used a Canon 500D digital camera to take the photographs which I have included in my media product. I learnt how to focus the camera with the zoom lens and how much distance was needed when taking the pictures. Before starting the process of constructing my product I had never used a digital camera like this or any of the software mentioned above. I have learnt a significant amount as I had never used Photoshop to edit images but I found that I learnt how to use it by experimenting. Using In Design was not too difficult as is similar to Word in the way that a lot of the fonts are similar but you can add effects to the fonts. The digital camera that I used was not too hard to use as it functions like any other camera but you have additional settings to increase the quality of the image produced.

5) How did you attract/address your audience?

Please press play and watch the presentation for this question.

4) Who would be the audience for your media product?

As I have previously discussed, I believe that the target audience for my magazine would be readers of both genders, in the age range of mid teens to early twenties and those who are into punk rock music and could fit into sub cultures such as punk, metal heads and grungers.

I used a website called UK tribes to do some more research into the youth subcultures which exist in society today. Although the social group 'punks' do not appear on here, the closest to them I guess would be 'Emos' or 'Metal heads'. An emo is supposedly linked to emo music which is often expressive and confessional. Emos are usually seen to be wearing dark clothing and behave in a quiet manner. I think that perhaps Metal heads are more relative to Warp magazine as they are fans of heavy metal music and also wear dark clothing. Their hobbies tend to include moshing at gigs, listening to metal, watching horror films and playing instruments. My media product features articles about films and gigs so I think that this would appear to the target audience.

Here are two pictures of my sister who I would consider to fit the sub culture of Punks and people who like Rock music. She often goes to gigs and festivals such as Download and Hevy Festival. My sister dresses in dark clothing, has tattoos and her hair is brown with the side of it shaven (this can be quite a typical hair style for punks). Her favourite genre of music is rock, techno and punk. I think that she would fit the target audience as she is 20 and she is a female who likes the music which my media product has been designed for. I asked her what she thought of my media product and she gave me the following response: "I would probably buy this magazine because it has a lot of my favourite bands such as the Dropkick Murphys in it. I like it because I would be able to read about upcoming gigs and read about some of my favourite

bands."

My media product would aim to target audiences with readers such as my sister who is perhaps a more mature reader but is also interested in reading about bands and looking at additional features such as posters.

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

The music magazine, Warp, that I have created is a punk rock genre type magazine and I believe that it would be likely that a media institution such as BAUER media group would distribute my media product. This is because this media institution is known to distribute magazines such as Q and Kerrang.

After some research into this media institution, I drew a conclusion that this would be the best institution to distribute my media product. I discovered that it's circulation figures were quite impressive:

These figures were taken from their website and show the circulation for each magazine that they distribute from January-June 2010.

Although I have decided that Bauer media group would be the idea media institution to distribute my media product, I have also looked at IPC Media which distributes magazines such as the NME and Uncut. I have chosen Bauer media group because of it's excellent circulation figures and because my magazine is similar to Kerrang. However, IPC Media distributes the NME which I can compare my media product to because I have used it as inspiration for my contents page and double page spread. IPC media is another well known media institution but I feel that Bauer media group would be more likely to distribute my media product because it distributes Kerrang which is a similar genre of music to my magazine. If Warp was to published with magazines such as Q and Kerrang it would offer perhaps what is not on the current market to more social groups such as an equal gendered magazine and would circulate high figures because of Bauer's good track record.