an update after my draft sketches

After completeing my draft sketches for my magazine I feel now that I have a clear view of how I want my pages to look. I have tried to design my pages so as not to be basic, yet to also be realistic. I didnt want to design pages that I felt I would not be able to complete, possibly due to a lack of experience or my time limit. I still however hope to much improve and greatly build on my pages further than my sketches.

draft sketches of final pages

importance of audience research

I used a survey making website to make a survey in order to get feedback on ideas regarding a music magazine of my genre. I feel as though audience research is very important as you are finding out what the people who would buy your magazine would want to buy. My questions were multiple choice and i asked ten questions. I asked things such as opinions on what colour scheme i should use, and what title they preferred for my magazine. I also asked questions such as if a magazine included competitions would they enter, seeing as most people voted that they would, i will take this into account and feature the chance to enter a competition on the cover of my magazine. I asked the age of people taking my survey so that i could cater mostly towards the answers of those who fit into my target audience; this mainly being people over the age of sixteen. Overall, i think the survey was very helpful and i will take all the answers into account when designing the elements of my music magazine.

survey answers

a song from my chosen genre

double page spread article text

Below is a copy of the text that will be contained in my double page spread article. There will also be a quote featured on the page regarding his up and coming tours so that people are drawn to read the article and therefore find out about his tour.

Talked about as one of the most unique artists of our year, and with his brand new album ‘guitars and lighters’ out now, we thought it was about time we invited him in for a chat. After a long wait RICKY MOSS is back again with a new album and we are pleased to say that it is better than ever. Keeping it acoustic he wows us all once again with his inspiring lyrics and extremely catchy tunes. Well on its way to reaching this week’s top spot, we highly recommend that if you haven’t already done so, buy it now. The album title GUITARS AND LIGHTERS is now on sale in the itunes library. It has taken him a year to produce and the album has exceeded all of our hopes and expectations. At the young age of only eighteen he is well on his way to being nominated as our young artist of the year. As if the news of the new album wasn’t enough, he has too announced the news of a UK tour. We are thoroughly excited for this as we are you sure you all are too. Tickets for the tour have not yet been released but it is thought they will be out relatively soon. In an interview with him we asked him if he told us that he could never have expected this to have happened to him, he spoke of being eternally grateful to his friends and family, and most of all his fans. We asked Mr Moss what it felt like, journeying through the transition from everyday basic life to all of a sudden being a known face nearly anywhere he visited. Being so successful at such a young age would be exciting and scary for anyone; however Ricky Moss seems to be coping extremely well. He spoke to us greatly about his love for all his family and friends, and most of all wanted to express how grateful he was to have the support from all his fans. Explaining that he knows he wouldn’t be where he is today without them.

costuming and props that will inspire my magazine

The artist in this image is called Jake Bugg, he is a solo artist in the indie-rock genre. He dresses quite stereotypically to the way that one may think someone in this genre dresses. He is dressed all in dark colours which is thought common for someone in this genre. As it will be evident in the other images I will post artists of this genre are very rarely seen wearing bright colours and usually wear colours such as blacks, browns and navy blue. Artists of this genre often appear to show quite a small amount of consideration for the way that they dress and style themselves. His clothes are quite basic and simple and are not of expensive designer brands. As for the hair of these such artists it usually looks as though the style is simple and has not taken much time or preparation to create. The clothes appear possibly quite vintage and retro are often styles that have been around before and are now becoming common once again.

Artists of this genre are usually pictured with a guitar as most of the artists in this genre play their own music. The use of the guitar as a prop, particularly an acoustic guitar as this one is, demonstrates slightly the type of music they play within this genre. In the case of this artist who is a member of this genre, the feature of the guitar demonstrates that he plays acoustic music. I know that this is true seeing as I have listened to his music, however even if I had not it would still be quite apparent.




This image is slightly different as it is of a group of artists, a band called Arctic Monkeys. As I have mentioned in my previous paragraph, the colours of clothes that they are wearing are quite dark and quite dull. Once again it doesn't look as though they have put a lot of time and effort into what they are wearing, and the colours are not attention seeking. They are not clothes that would make them stand out and as members of this music genre that is not usually something that they aim to do. Once again their hairstyles do not look as though they have taken much time and are not the type of artists to ever consider being airbrushed as is now common for people on magazine covers.

Unlike the other image there are no props in this image. Although there is no guitar featured in the image it is still widely known that they are a band of the indie-rock music genre.

examples of costuming and props

a reader profile of a member of my target audience

Jake is 19 and lives in Manchester. He is passionate about music and has been playing in a small band with a group of friends since he was 16. He is a fan of music such as the arctic monkeys and jake bugg, and he admires them as they play their own music,  and write their own lyrics. He works part time while he is not studying at Manchester University, and therefore has the disposable income to buy many albums and music magazines. He likes to find out about new and upcoming artists and hopes to one day follow in their footsteps. He prefers to buy actual cd’s instead of just downloading music online. He likes listening to acoustic songs and goes to many gigs. He uses music magazines to find out about how artists have been newly signed by independant record labels and to read reviews on new albums. He has attended leeds music festival for the past three years and hopes one day to play at a major music festival.

an update regarding writing a reader profile

At first I was slightly unsure as to what exactly this was, I had never heard of this before and therefore had to do some research into it and locate some examples. After finding some examples and hearing an explanation by my teacher I realised that it was actually much more simple than I had originally thought it would be.

I found it incredibly simple to then do my reader profile as I knew of a friend of mine who exactly demonstrated the audience of people that I wished to target. Doing this activity really helped me when making my magazine as it enabled me to know who exactly I needed to aim my magazine towards, and who would be buying it.

magazine analysis