Music Magazine Evaluation

Music magazine evaluation complete email from Joe Barron

Magazine Questionnaire

I made a questionnaire and handed it out to 20 different people in order to establish my target audience, and the pros and cons of my magazine from a range of different domographics.

The results of my questionnaire:

Does the magazine look as though it is of a high quality?
Yes: 16 No: 4

Would you say that the front cover image is interesting?
Yes: 13 No: 7

Would the contents of this magazine appeal to you?
Yes: 19 No: 1

Does the magazine present real media features?
Yes: 20 No: 0

Could you see it on the shelves?
Yes: 20 No: 0

Does the typography appeal to you?
Yes: 11 No: 9

Does the idea of a magazine being non-genre specific appeal to you?
Yes: 19 No: 1

Does the price of the magazine seem realistic?
Yes: 15 No: 5

As the consumer, are there any issues with this magazine?
Yes: 2 No: 18

The issues highlighted were merely just in regards to the double page spread, because the fonts used didn't particularly appeal to them; but this was only because of technological limitations in which I had obstructing me.

Double Page Spread

Contents Page - Updated

Double Page Spread - Research

Here, I am going to look at to double page spreads in a Q magazine, as I have established Q to be the magazine most similar to mine, and there are many elements of this magazine's double page spread that I would like to somewhat imitate.

There are two things that immediately draw the audience's attention when looking at this: that is the letters 'L' and 'J' in a big font and in red, which is the magazine's theme colour. Secondly, the main image which is clearly so important, it needs a whole page.

The images seem to take up a medium close-up, which suggests that the attention needs to be brought mainly to their faces, but also to other elements within the misc-en-scene which bare importance. I am going to take some inspiration from this, in the sense of using a whole side to portray the main image, however, I intend on perhaps doing a medium shot or even a long shot depending on the relevance of the misc-en-scene.

Something that I am very interested in using is the big letter. Looking at other magazines such as NME and Billboard, this idea of making the letter fill a whole page but with the main body of the spread coming out underneath seems to be something that only Q magazine does like this; so what I intend to do is, because my double page spread is going to be on Ed Sheeran, who is well known for having ginger hair, I am going to focus the main image on that colour and on his hair, and then have the first letter of the main body be much larger than the rest and have it the same colour of his hair, to emphasis it and to also add some humor to it, as you will see by the quotation that has been put onto the main image of the Jay-Z article that humor comes out a lot, which is what I have also done for my front cover.

The topics of the main body seem to talk about various things about the artists' career, so I am going to select a few things such as Sheeran's new album, how he became known, what he is working on, and then things such as who he would like to work with in the future and who he has worked with before,

I think then I would need to merely keep to conventions such as a title at the top of the double page spread to introduce the artist, page numbers and decorative lines to keep it neat and tidy. Furthermore, in terms of tidyness, the typography should clearly be going towards the Times New Roman font to show class and prestige rather than going back to Comic Sans and losing the magazine's credibility, as I want my magazine to be a high-end magazine with a target audience of music lovers across the gender spectrum from 18+.

Contents Page

Contents Page Images

       

The image to the left is straight from the camera, and the one to the right is the enhanced version.

Magazine Front Cover

Front Cover Images

                                                             

The image on the left is straight from the camera. The image to the right has been edited.

Music Magazine Research - Contents Page

For my music magazine I have to include a contents page, so I have been looking at contents pages; how they are designed and what is put into them. I immediately noticed the images on the contents pages and they seem to have a natural background. Front covers seem to always have a blank background to give pronunciation to the image and also so you can see the text. The design seems to be so the picture is bordered off and the text goes around it. You can see that although the pictures on the Q magazine contents page has staged the images they have a natural setting and the picture doesn't stand out as much as the front cover image would; but the way in which the people look and everything about them tells you they are a band. Again, the NME image on its contents page is a natural image, more natural than the first, and is of them performing to really give it that 'music' feel. However, even though the text is the focal point and reason for this page the image still dominates it by being big and fairly central.

Both contents pages have also kept to their house style, which for these seems to be the use of the colour red. Moreover, NME seem to always put 'NME THIS WEEK' at the top to make the contents page easy to identify. They also include a date with this in order to show the reader how 'up-to-date' they are. Q also inserts the term 'contents' to show the reader what this page is.

The text is obviously what the pages are about. They all seem to use a kind of subheading and then some text underneath giving further information about the page. I am guessing that the subheading is in bigger and bolder writing so you can quickly see what the page is about, and then you read the smaller print if that certain topic has got you wanting to find out more about it before you decide to read the full article.

Pull quotes are used to good effect to give insight to the article. This will then encourage the reader to look at the main article, to greater effect than just subheadings regarding the page's article, and it is used on the main article as that is the band/artist on the front cover which is the main selling point of the magazine, so it will entice the reader further to read it.

Music Magazine Research - Q

Q is a very well renowned music magazine, and is one of the most popular music magazines on the stands. When it was first made in 1986 it offered a better quality print and better quality of photography. Q magazine still tries to be one of the more quality magazines, and when looking at some examples of their magazines I immediately notice how interesting and eye-catching their main images are. This tells me that the main image is extremely important and needs to catch the eye of the consumer/audience so they will then look at the magazine.

Each of these images has something interesting about them, like how the Beady Eye main image has given Liam Gallagher a very 'raw' 'rock 'n' roll' look, and the way in which the other band members are being reflected in his glasses. It is a very sophisticated image and very clever, and also has a sense of it being like a painting, and all of these features draw your attention to it - his attitude, the way it has been edited, and also the way the anchorage text links in with it.

The front cover with Dave Grohl and the Foo Fighters is bursting with attitude. The way he looks like he is screaming and fire is coming out of his mouth, and also the band are in his mouth is very eye-catching. This image also tells us what genre of music he is, due to the fire and almost 'demented' look about him will draw people of his genre, which I believe is rock, towards the magazine and entice them to look at the magazine and potentially purchase it.

Michael Jackson is an iconic figure and everyone knows of him. His ups and downs along with his general life have always been a big story in the media world. Immediately, anyone looking at this magazine front cover is going to instantly recognise him with or without the anchorage text. This picture has been edited to look very raw, to link in with stories about him like plastic surgery and his struggles with the law etc. and this links in with the anchorage text where it says 'unmasked.'

These magazines have shown me that the main image is probably the most important part of a front cover, but you also need to consider typography; as all of these magazines use the same house style (red) and all use a white background in order to give good pronunciation of the image. I also notice that the background does not have any shadow and is out of focus, to give it a cleaner and also more artificial look. The Rolling Stone, for example, tends to include the shadow of the artist/band onto the wall behind them, which will have been intended; but granted this is a light shadow and not too heavy. This will definitely be something to think about when taking the images for my front cover. But, I have noticed that they all have a blank background instead of a natural surrounding to give clarity to the writing which will inevitably be included in the picture. Moreover, all of these images are a close up, which shows the facial expression of the artist, and you can see the raw attitude of their faces.

Music Magazine Research - Rolling Stone

Here is an issue of Rolling Stone. It is a very popular magazine with a very popular name. During my research into this magazine I found out things about the magazine I did not know. When you go to the shop and find the magazine you will see it in the music section; but, my research showed that despite it being very music based, it is also classed as a political and popular culture magazine, (http://www.wikipedia.com/). This confused me because when I went on their official website you immediately see a heading stating 'New Music.' Then, to the left it has the heading 'Latest News'; and there are seven articles all music based. When you scroll down, you then establish the other elements of the magazine such as popular culture etc., and at the top there is a slide of pictures which are mainly music based, but some contain things such as politics and popular culture. The fact that the magazine has multiple genres gives the magazine a wider audience, thus, giving it more selling potential.

I think that the magazine has Lil Wayne on the front will make this particular issue more favourable to people who relate to Hip Hop and R'n'B. The magazine doesn't always have someone of this genre of the front, giving it variation. Furthermore, the punchy red theme throughout this front cover has connotations of power, which relates to the genre of Hip Hop, with artists of the genre usually being quite strong, and also the music being linked with crime and gangs. Moreover, the typography has 'Lil Wayne' in front of the image, whereas the masthead is behind, showing that Lil Wayne is the most important thing on the front cover. I, however, could not include this in my magazine as the Rolling Stone is very well known, and it doesn't need to sell itself by showing its name because people already know what magazine it is just by seeing part of the masthead; all it needs is the main image and cover lines to sell it to give interest to the target audience. You also see that above where it says 'Lil Wayne' it says there is an exclusive first interview, and this is written differently to all other text on the front, giving the magazine itself a high status, and also that you can only buy this magazine in order to see this interview. But, the magazine does have other cover lines which give other contents of the magazine so it doesn't seem one dimensional, and will appeal to several other audiences.

Looking at other Rolling Stone magazines I noticed that the shot and the typography entirely depend on who is on the front. For example, an edition with Conan O'Brien has a lime green colour for the masthead. Moreover, his name is written in orange to give a humorous aspect to the magazine, and also because he is a kind of 'edgy' character. Moreover, this persona of him is coherent with the striking close-up of him which shows us his crazy hair style, which is the focal point of the image. Therefore, this shows that it entirely depends on the person, as they have only used a long shot for Lil Wayne in order to show us all of his tattoos and portray this 'thug' life style of his.