Video diary

G321 AS media video diary: http://youtu.be/2Y51SuiZ-Xo

Proposal feedback

Recently I asked a few people I know about what they thought about my draft proposal. Some were good critiques and some were bad. However from all of it I did take on board what they said and will use it to write a better and clearer proposal next time. The categories they were presented with to give feedback on were the following, ‘Target audience’, ‘Purpose of my magazine’, Contents of feature article’, ‘Contents of magazine’ and ‘Business model’.

 Target audience

I was told that maybe the target audience age group may be too narrow and may need to make the difference in between 14 – 21. The target topics may need to be of a bigger range in consideration of my age groups. However I was told it was good that I knew my target audience and what I wanted to present to them. I was also told that some of my vocabulary could have made a little more sense. On the other hand the description was good as well. 

Purpose of my magazine
As for the purpose of the magazine, I was told that I could add more detail and explain in a little bit more detail what the real purpose was. Other than the not so good aspects of it, I was told I have got the purpose description precise.

Contents of feature article

The feature artists should incorporate other genres and artists that will suit all needs not just the age range that I have chosen and people who enjoy pop music and magazines.

Contents of magazine

Include new and upcoming artists, not just popular big names in the industry. I was told to add people who are on the verge of becoming famous, such as, years & years. I was also told that I should have included the names of the artists that would feature in my magazine.

Business model

Create a specific colour scheme according to gender and make the colour of the writing more vibrant. I was also told to make the text of the front cover different to draw people in as well as to have big bold headlines.

Mood board

Cover lines

Best female artists...
Whitney Houston, Celine Dion,
 Mariah Carey and many more

Disney Stars...
Where are they at now?

Jingle Bell Ball 2014
What's this years line up?
Any of your favourite artists?

Nikki Z...The Tour
Behind the action with the queen herself

Draft Proposal

Production Diary 10

This week I have been gradually finishing off the tutorials for my magazine. So far I have reached the front cover and I am designing the title, and cover articles and where I would like to place them on the cover according to the picture that will be placed for it. As for now I have placed a random picture from the internet there just as a rough template of my layout. The main colours I have chosen for my magazine are turquoise as a girly colour and a purple/blue as boys colour, this is two make the magazine unisex and not a one gender based artefact. When I get back to the lesson this week, we will most likely be finishing off these drafts and p0lacing everything into place and as there aren't many lessons left we might have to carry on after Christmas; the first week back.

Analysis of Covers

Names Ideas

PUMP IT
HITS!
MM (music matters)
1
Curve
Spark
Beat
Shuffle
Tune

Image Ideas

Promotional Method

Promotional methods is a technique in which magazine companies can gain more readership by advertising their magazines at places where posters of the magazines can be seen every day. I have come up with a few ways of promoting my magazine.

As my magazine is new, I think it is always best to give out freebies, promotions, special editions, download codes etc. This will give the audience a good first impression and will target the industry. The advantage of having freebies, will give the audience a good impression and will hopefully encourage them to get the magazine. In my opinion I think the first of the freebies for the magazine should be a free download code (song/music videos), which can be accessed by the public through mobile apps. QR codes may also be a great source for the audience to download these freebies as it may be quicker and easier to access rather than through a mobile app.

Another method of promotion of the magazine is through social media. For example, twitter feeds and competitions, Facebook pages, Youtube channels etc. There could also be radio/ TV adverts and maybe even posters around popular social places e.g. shopping centres and gyms. The artist that will feature on the front cover, which is also another great way of promoting us and the artist themselves. Other artists that will feature in the magazine can promote themselves in the magazine on their social media pages, this is another way for the artists to promote themselves as well as promoting the magazine as fans of the artists will buy the magazine due to the artists featured and this means it can boosts the sales of the magazine.  

Social Media

Social networking sites allow people to interact in online communities, such as Facebook, to share thoughts, status updates, stay in touch, and upload photos and more with members of their own personal networks. Most social networking sites affect the magazines in similar ways, with the exception of what their own sites allow.

 Facebook is an online social networking site that connects people with friends and others who work, study and live around them. People use Facebook to keep up with friends, upload an unlimited number of photos, share links and videos, and learn more about the people they meet. The way businesses can use Facebook is by definitely by posting the latest feeds, photos and even advertising for the magazine in order to get more people to subscribe and read it.

 Twitter can be another way for businesses to connect with the social society. Similar to Facebook and many many other social networking sites, Twitter also allows people and businesses to share feeds, stay in touch, etc. This site also allows the audience and readers of the magazine to interact with the producers of social media withn the magazines, directly by posting on their wall and by direct messaging them (DMing).

 

Youtube Channels can be used to connect with the audience through vlogs, channels and even by subscribing. Youtube never used to be a popular way to watch and upload videos to, however over the century, this social media site has allowed people from the public all over the world to become connected and closer to many different aspects of life, whether this be watching films or tutorials or generally in this case how a magazine is produced and all the different factors of it.

 

 

Feature Article

NIKKI Z

After a period of relative silence, Nikki Z has swept into 2014 to claim the throne of pop music and has claimed the biggest fandom in the world.

Since her new single ‘One Night of Broken’ topped the 2014 charts, Nikki has been owning the spotlight and rolling out the fame carpet in front of her. Her feature on Jessie J’s “Bang Bang” quickly set the record for the third – largest first month download count of 2014. Billboard and Q magazines pronounced her as “the hottest female on the planet”, even before her latest single was released and topped the charts. However none of this would have happened if Beyoncé hadn’t offered to step down and support Nikki in her upcoming fame. We caught up with the pop sensation in our latest interview to find out how she’s feeling about becoming the next big queen.

First of all thank you for taking time out to talk to us and your incredible fandom, considering your busy schedule after being pronounced the Queen of Pop. Speaking of your fandom, how do you feel to have so many people supporting you and looking at you for inspiration, does it make you feel good or…?

From the bottom of my heart I’d like to say thank you to all these amazing people who have been through with me in and out of hard and rough times and supporting and not giving up on me, all the way. Not only do they make me feel good, they make me feel like I’m actually getting somewhere in life, it’s like they are the extra boost you need in order to succeed. Although some may claim I am the inspiration, they are wrong. To be honest if it wasn’t mainly for them, I wouldn’t have produced a new song or wouldn’t have got this far, so in the end they are the ones that should be looking in the mirror of inspiration, not me.

What would be your advice to any young and upcoming artists who would like to be a part of the world of music?

Do whatever you want to do. Be whoever you want to be. Don’t let anything hold you back or get in your way. Be yourself. Along the way there will be a lot of people who will criticize you – believe me it’s a scary world out there, but what you have to do is forget about them. This will be hard no doubt in that, however despite who they are, including family and friends, you have to focus on your needs and dreams and not theirs. Evidently there will also be many people who will support you – don’t let them pressurize you into doing something you don’t want but do let them help you. You get out what you put in, believe me you have to work damn hard to get where you want to be in life and it certainly will not be easy at all.

So who influenced you to pick up music, write songs and go on tour?

Before I could even think about becoming a worldwide international pop star, obviously like many new artists I didn’t really have a goal just a dream. I think the people who influenced me the most was probably my friends as they heard me sing before in school, although at this point I was very shy, anyway not getting into any of that (laughs) um I think the well yeah my friends influenced me most to start singing and really all my thanks and praises go to them. To write songs well I think it was more of an inspiration from situations not all good, there was definitely some bad times too, but getting back on track, um more of an inspiration rather than an influence of somebody else’s back. To go on tour was an influence from a bit of everywhere, for example, friends, family, fandoms, songs, other artists I’ve worked with etc.

Have you got any specific favourite songs on the album and are there any other artists you would like to possibly work with on future albums and chart toppers…?

 

My favourite song would most likely have to be m new single, ‘One Night of Broken’ by far. It’s not lively but it does have quite a few morals and I think that’s just inspirational to everyone including me. In the future I would like to hopefully work with Ed Sheeran, Cheryl Cole and maybe even a boy band like The Script or a girl band like Little Mix. 

 Omg, talking about the tour, you got any details on it and how was it to work with Jessie J and Taylor Swift?

 Omg working with them was AMAZING!! Never in a million years does anyone get this same opportunity that I got, felt to so special. They are both extremely lovely and I guess well it was definitely a dream come true. To be honest I’m still in shock myself even though it’s been a few months now. My tour…WOW that was an experience of a life time, just you know to be on stage and having fun and loving it and seeing the smile on the fans faces and WOW. Just incredible honestly. Could never forget the moment when I walked on that stage and felt the warmth of the screaming fans and my name being mentioned and yeahh' it was a great... great time. I think I’m just pretty glad that I got pushed and inspired to achieve my dream all the way and I really do owe it to everyone who played a part in my life at that time. And yes there are some details but I have to keep my mouth shut for that, maybe just maybe you will find out from a little birdy, but who knows…? (laughs)

 What’s next for you then, away from your music of course?

 Alongside everything like my tour and taking time out for family and friends, next to be honest I’m not really sure. Actually there is an album coming out, however that’s being kept zipped up. Maybe another tour, maybe in another country, who knows? Fingers crossed if this tour goes down well then yeah sure I’ll for sure do another sure maybe featuring some cheeky chums as a surprise, for not let’s just keep our fingers crossed and let nature take its course.

 Damn we are all out of time Nikki, it’s been the greatest pleasure speaking to you and I’m sure this won’t be the last, best of luck with your tour and hopefully an album release soon?

 Awhh that’s a shame was really getting into this, your welcome anyway hopefully next time we can do a game sort of thing like spin the bottle with another group or something and let’s keep our fingers crossed everything will go according to plan. Thank you anyway, was nice meeting you. So as she leaves the building, we wonder, will she go on to become the pop sensation she wants to be and will she remain as the queen of pop with her lovely and vivid attitude towards music? Who knows? We’ll find out next time she’s on, when we start to talk about other parts of her life…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Production Diary 9

During this week we have been again looking at tutorials on how to complete our final magazine. So far I have got up to writing the article for my feature page. On Friday, I stayed behind school with a few of my friends and did a photoshoot on the screen for my magazine. Not only did they help me with mine but I also helped them with theirs. Most of the pictures were taken on the screen however I also need to take some pictures outside of school in a natural setting with natural backgrounds. These pictures will not be of friends in school but friends out of school creating a bigger variety within the genre. All of the pictures would have been taken on a Canon camera and a sequence of pictures were being taken with another camera but the same type during our photoshoot after school on Friday.

Article for feature page

Over the years this e beauty has known to become popular over her romantic love and break up songs. She’s encountered many situations which help bring these catchy tunes to being however just recently she released her new album, Red. This is the fourth studio album by American singer – songwriter Lauren Kelly. Now you ask why it was named after a colour, why not a flower or the many many boys she’s been with...well the album title was actually inspired from the “semi – toxic relationships” that Kelly had experienced during the process of composing this album. She describes all the heart-breaking emotions she felt as being “red emotions” due their intense nature. The album features collaborations with, a member or Snow Patrol and Britain’s favourite boy Ed Sheeran.

Red debuted at number one on the US Billboard 200 giving her third consecutive chart topper in the US. In the first week, Red received 1.12 million sales making it the third biggest album debut in history for a female artist and became the fastest selling album in over a decade, taking over stars like Avril Lavigne and even Madonna. The album was also a huge global success as it hit as the first chart topper in the UK, Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand and charted in every other top ten market…including China. Overall worldwide it sold 6 million copies as of August 2014 after being released by the Big Machine Records in October 2012.

 

In August 2013, previewed the lead single of the album, “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together”. She revealed her side of the story and meaning behind the song and quoted, “All the different emotions that are written about on this album are pretty much about the kind of tumultuous, crazy, insane, intense, semi – toxic relationships that I’ve ever experienced in the last two years. All those emotions – spanning from intense love, intense frustration, jealousy, confusion, all of that – in my mind, all those emotions are red.  You know, there’s nothing in between. There’s nothing beige about any of those feelings”.

Production Diary 8

This week we have been looking at the tutorial videos on how to present our contents and feature page in our magazine. So far I have reached the point where I have finished stylising my contents page and placing al the text for the different categories in the relavent spaces and am now moving on to creating the feature page background and the article to place on it, so in my case there would be something on Lauren Kelly behind the scenes of her concerts or how she writes her music and how long it takes her; if she writes it on her on or with a partner.

Contents Page

CONTENTS

 

Reviews

Behind the scenes action!

See what hot beauty Nikki Z gets up to before hitting the stage

Best Female Artists...

Whitney Houston, Celine Dion, Mariah Carey and many more

Disney Stars...

Where are they at now?

 

This Weeks Artists

5 Seconds of summer

Avril Lavigne

Beyoncé

B.O.B

Calvin Harris

Celine Dion

Cheryl Cole

Chris Brown

Demi Lovato

Drake

Ed Sheeran

Emily Osment

Eminem

Example

Frank Ocean

Kelly Clarkson

Lana Del Ray

Mariah Carey

Bridget Mendler

Miley Cyrus

One Republic

Paramore

Rihanna

Taylor Swift

The Script

Whitney Houston

 

Q&A

Your questions are answered by our young rebel, Avril Lavigne

Win Tickets To

Glastonbury, V Fest, Reading Enter Now

Itunes Download Code!

Get your free code here today

Artist of the month!

Who proved to be successful this month?

 

Production Diary 7

This week in class I have been looking at tutorials of which help me to finalize my magazine. So far I have got up to styling my Contents page, this includes placing pictures in, deciding what we would like to put in as text on our articles e.g. in our feature, reviews, whats new etc. sections. I started off with my contents page because I figured that it may be the easiest to guide me the through the rest of the magazine as I would know where to place the articles on other pages and especially on the front cover, it makes it easier to decide which articles and stand out features should be put on to draw in the audience.

Magazine Institutions

The four main magazine institutions are: BBC - Emap – IPC Media - Bauer

IPC Media

IPC Media Music Magazines are dedicated to music and music cultures featuring many different famous musicians, but also new musicians that specialize in certain types of music. It is one of the UK's leading consumer magazine and digital publishers, with a large portfolio selling over 350 million copies each year. It was formed in 1963 as International Publishing Company and currently produces over 60 iconic media brands, with print alone reaching almost two thirds of UK women and 42% of UK men – almost 26 million UK adults –their websites collectively reach over 14 million users every month. IPC is owned by Time Inc, the publishing company of Time Warner Inc. The company has many sub-brands within their portfolio such as: IPC Media Connect, Market Force, Southbank, Ignite, and TX.
The majority of music magazines only focus on one genre, however they also focus on many genres that have similarities with the main one. They may also include feature articles and up and coming profiles on artists. For example, if you had a magazine on Taylor Swift, she would be represented through Pop and Country so she would span across two different genres. Also each of the different genres of music attracts certain types of audiences. Also each of the different genres of music attracts certain types of audiences. 

BBC

BBC magazine is the magazine publishing arm of the BBC worldwide. BBC provides a varied and wide range of magazines that target many different audiences. They focus their magazines on music, gardening, children’s popular TV programmes, cooking, cars and astrology.
The music magazines that the BBC has published include:
Its Hot - Top of The Pops - Classical Music Magazine
The BBC publishes many different genres of magazines as well as major websites through their digital channels as well. There are only a few magazines that are of the same genre. Top of the Pops attracts age ranges from 11 up to 15 years due to the content, music articles such as ‘Glee’ and ‘X Factor’. TOTP- affectionately known was launched in February 1995 and is released in magazine style monthly, but now has a new website which is updated every day with new ‘Today’s News’ section and new features.

Emap

Emap specializes predominately in the ‘b2b’ (business to business) publishing space. It has specific publications for each genre and in general these are quite different and contain specific content relating to an industry such as nursing, retail and media. This attracts a very wide audience which is attracted through magazines and on-line versions including rss feeds on breaking news within the industry publications.
Emap was established and founded in 1947 and has its Headquarters near Camden in London. The name Emap originates from East Midland Allied Press.

Bauer

 Through Bauer Publishing Group own Bauer Media its publishing company;it is Europe’s largest privately owned publishing group. The Bauer Publishing Group is a worldwide media empire offering over 230 magazines in 15 countries. They also feature heavily online, TV and a wide range of radio stations.
Bauer Media is a multi-media platform UK based media group. The group consists of many sub-brands and companies mainly around two groups – Magazines and Radio – this is widely recognised and being innovative and industry leaders, which is reflected in many awards and accolades they have won within the industry. On average over 12.4 million people listen to a Bauer media radio station. It owns the number one and four top commercial radio stations in London. Kiss is one of their prestigious radio stations which attracts and is targeted at the young dance audience.

Article Analysis

Codes and Conventions

Production Diary 2

This week we carried on from our planning and research of our preliminary task and started to take pictures for it. We were sent out of class in small groups to be creative and imaginative of the genre of pictures we would have liked to put in our magazine. After taking these pictures, they got scanned and processed and we started to create our final task partly using our plan and partly using fresh ideas.

Production Diary 6

This week I have been looking at uses and gratifications. This has helped me to figure out what I need in my magazine and helped me understand that my magazine must entertain, inform and excite readers to the mazimum possible level. I have also created my survey on music magazines, this should help me to understand what type of audiences like and prefer to have in music magazines, in order for me to apply to my own magazine. One thing I will consider in mind as I produce the final magzine is to keep on reffering back to my survey, previous students work, analysis of work etc. to insure I get the best result in my magazine for the audience to enjoy.

Production Diary 5

This week I have been looking at contents pages and analysing them. This helped me to see what creates a professional appearance and what factors are needed to navigate your way through. I have noticed that there are big numbers on top of pictures. This is to tell you what page the picture is linking to. I have also noticed that there are a wide range of shots, from close ups to long shots. It has started to give me an idea of what the structure and layout of my magazine should look like.

Music Magazine Survey

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/9PQLB9V

Production Diary 4

This week, I have been asked to pick out two magazine articles and analyse them. The purpose of this task was to help us to understand and give us ideas of what we should apply to our magazine. From this, I will look at the layout, the posts, the subheading of the posts and see what kind of things I would like to put into my magazine to help it look the part. I also found that these magazine articles will make things so much easier for me to apply to my final magazine as I would have a hint of an idea of what to put in it and how I would like it to look.

Production Diary 3

This week we were told to choose 3 magazine covers (e.g. previous students work) and analyse them. I have decided to choose 3 different magazine covers which I thought would give me a better and much broader understanding of what a magazine cover should look like and answer questions like why is it like that or why has the designer placed that there....From these magazine cover examples, I will gain suitable knowledge for my final magazine and how I would like to present it.

Production Diary 1

Iv'e just started using blogger and it seems great. In class we were told to complete our first ever AS media task which was to plan our preliminary task. Our preliminary task was to create the cover page and the contents page for a school magazine. I planned mine to be named as 'The Haydon Haul' and took pictures to put in and on it.

Propsal

From the research I have done, I have come to a decision that the genre of my magazine will be pop. Even though pop may be the hardest genre to create for a magazine, because of there are so many artists and so much you can talk about with pop, I have decided to take this challenge as a leap and to hopefully generate a decent pop magazine which is not too crowded but not to structured either.  As pop has so many features, articles and stories to it, you mainly see these magazines around and you gain a knowledge about what type of fonts, articles, colours and even celebrities they use.  For my magazine, I have decide to use Taylor Swift. She is an amazing singer and a great inspiration, which is what most readers like to look for as well. The excellent thing about Taylor, is she isn’t just about one genre. Her music is either pop or country which gives a good variety and change to the pop genre.  

 All magazines have practically the same purpose, to entertain, to inspire etc…For my magazine, my purpose was also to inspire and to entertain but not only through text on a page but through social media like, Instagram - maybe the new fashion sense which may correspond with the meaning of the music, for example Taylor’s break up song “we are never ever getting back together”, where she wears pyjamas which shows she doesn’t really care what her ex thinks of her and then party clothes at the end to make him jealous. Facebook could be another example of social media – where you have a post or a picture or a readers post and you see how many likes, shares and comments you get for it, this also includes what people comment regarding or disregarding the post and if people tag friends which may show they are either getting the tagged person to look at the magazine and read about it or there could have been an article which could relate to them in a way. Whichever approach it is, the good thing to look for is how many people are relating to it or impending in it in some sort of way which helps with the amount of readers and subscribers. There are also other ways in which I could draw in readers like Twitter feeds, and telling them to subscribe.

 The target audience for my magazine will be aimed at those who are listen and connect with pop and other genres which are interlinked with it. This would be people between the early teens and the early twenties, 12-21. However there may be a surprise audience, of which the ages will be over 21, although to be fair many people do have children and so they may be reading to them or maybe they just may enjoy the idea of these magazines and prefer them to more well-structured ones.

 

Business model(TBC)

Content of magazine(TBC)

Content of Feature articles(TBC)

Uses and Gratification theory

Analysis of Contents Pages

Final Preliminary Task

Cover:

Analysis of Previous Students Work

For my Analysis of a previous students magazines, I will be using the work of Geeta Gohil who completed her AS Media last year in 2013. The two magazines I will be analyzing will be the Preliminary Task or the School magazine and the Music magazine.

School magazine:

In my opinion, the way in which Geeta has presented her front cover is good because it has a clear layout and it is easy to read. For a starting point of the AS media course, I would say she has kept the front cover pretty simple in order for her to compare it to her final piece in the exam. 

What stood out to me most was her attention to detail on presentation and and her use of vocabulary to draw in audience. For example she uses big, bold story guidelines such as "Double Delight". This phrase is in red and a bold font has been used to draw in her views. Another example is her use of pictures. The main picture was part of the building work and outside the library in St Mary's; the other picture was "Best Results" and two students looking pleased.

As per the contents page, Geeta has designed it to look quite simple yet still effective. Although there are several pictures which are bunched together at the bottom of the page which makes the page look a bit scruffy and the whole page looks cramped together. Despite this, she has managed to get the Haydon school logo in and good eye catching story guidelines.

Music Magazine:

There is a massive difference between the Preliminary Task and the Final magazine and in Geeta's case a lot has been changed and edited to make the final magazine look professional compared to the Preliminary Task. The way the whole magazine has been laid out looks like an everyday eye catching magazine you would see in your local big retail supermarket.

The font is a lot more eye catching and bold so it stands out.The range of colours is very exquisite and used to catch the attention of the audience. The contents page for example is quite crowded however most magazines are like that anyway. Although it may look very crowded, it really brings life, atmosphere and understanding of the music magazine that is produced.

Preliminary Task design ideas

Preliminary Task:

For the Preliminary Task, we have been asked to produce a school magazine. For this we will be creating a front cover and a contents page. In one of our previous lessons, we were sent out to take pictures around the school for guidelines to what we will eventually assign to our front cover.
Below will be what I have already sketched out and planned for my magazine.

For the front cover of Haydon Haul I have outlined some of the parts that I would like to talk about in my magazine. I have already taken some pictures around the school; these helped in deciding what i wanted to use as articles. The main ideas for my magazine are, Haydon morals, Recycling, Former Sixth Form students and Best results. On the front cover of my magazine, I have also included some pictures of things that I thought related to my ideas and searched images from google to help me decide what I wanted to apply to the final piece. This will also help me to hopefully attract audience.The pictures that I drew on my draft were ideas that I had got from around the school when we took pictures of what we wanted on our magazine.

For the title I wanted to use a big bold font to try to attract as big of an audience as I could. I also used punctuation like exlamation marks to manipulateviewers into reading my magazine.

On the contents page, I outlined the key ideas and placed them in order of where I personally wanted them to be in the magazine. Again I added some images of which were from google and around the school of which inspired me to apply to my final piece. Some of the pictures I used for example were people or a person throwing something in the bin and a load of exam papers with excellent grades.  

As research to help me with my own blog and magazine, I took a look at previous AS students work and used some ideas or similar ideas which could potentially help me with my own magazine and blog and could help me get up into the top region of marks.