Evaluation, Forms and Conventions

A convention is a set of agreed standards which all products have; it is like the stereotypical things we think of when we think of a product such as a magazine we think as having an image, a title, barcode and subheadings telling the reader what is in the magazine, but Some magazines are more conventional than others, depending on the subject matter and the audience. The genre of my magazine is main stream as I would like it to appeal to most members of my target audience. I have looked at several different magazines such as ‘Billboard’, ‘Smash Hits’, ‘NME’ and ‘Mix Mag’ the ‘Billboard’ and ‘NME’ are more main stream therefore they appeal to a wider target audience, therefore they will have more well-known people featured on the front cover, this is opposed to ‘Mix Mag’ which has a very separate genre which is disco, this means that it will only appeal to people who like disco music. So from researching these magazines I decided that I would prefer to create a magazine which would appeal to more than one group of people.





My front cover challenges forms of media products in several different ways, firstly I have a mast head, which is the title of magazine, the title of my magazine is ‘Mannequin’ I decided on this name because Mannequins are used in fashionable high street shops to promote their latest and most up-to-date products in their shop windows; this is to entice the customer to look further into the shop’s products. Therefore the consumer will be more likely to but a product in the shop. This is all due to the fact that they promote their business by using mannequins. Taking this all into account I have decided to call my magazine ‘Mannequin’ as it will lure my target audience into buying the magazine as it has the latest music and fashions featured in its pages. Just as the mannequins in shop windows lure customers into the shops. The only problem I have with my main title is that it doesn’t really stand out, so if I were to do this again then I would choose a much bolder font which would really grab the viewers’ attention. I have included a date line on the front cover of my magazine; this is to inform the reader what issue the magazine is. On the front cover there is a main image which is the main thing which will lure the customer into buying my magazine. When selecting an image for my front cover I had to choose carefully because it had to be eye catching for the viewer, in order for them to buy the magazine. I chose to make the image black and white because I thought it would make the magazine look slightly more inviting as it makes the magazine look classy, this is effective because my target audience (of working class and lower middle class) would like to be seen with a product that looks very modern. In my main image five teenage boys are denoted, this is because I wanted my target audience to relate to them, as they’ll be of the same age range therefore they will be able to connect with them, all of the people in the image have eye contact with the viewer, this is significant because it makes the magazine more appealing to viewer as it looks as if the people in the image are looking at them. When taking this photograph I had to consider the Mise-en-scene as I wanted all of the boys to be visible so I told them all to be on different levels and I wanted them on a relatively plain background. I made all of the boys dress smartly to set a good example for my readers. The main cover line on this magazine cover is ‘The Figures’ but this is not as clear as it could be, so in the future I think that I could make this element more evident that it is a cover line, so I would add more information to help the reader understand this article, they would then be able to understand the image. The image which I chose for the main image I had to move around in order to create a third in which to write my cover lines, so it is the right third where I have placed two of my cover lines, and to balance this out I have included another cover line of the left side. There are not too many cover lines on this magazine because I wanted this to attract to teenagers, I believe that if there is too much text on the cover it will put the people off buying the magazine, as it will look daunting for them; so I have limited the amount of text in order to make this magazine appealing to the viewer. I have included a barcode on the cover of my magazine; I decided to place it in the top right corner as I wanted this to be out of the way so it did not attract too much attention to the viewer, on the barcode I have included the date and price of the issue, this is so the viewer can refer to it easily without searching the whole cover. At the bottom of my magazine cover there are six coloured photographs, which will entice the viewer to look inside as they will want to know more about the photos on the front cover. The fact that they are coloured gives a good balance between the black and white image and the small thumbnail sized images at the bottom. Also when looking at the magazine there is a line in the middle of ‘The Figures’ faces which then leads onto the smaller images, so this is an arrow which points these pictures out to the viewer. I have only used the colours black, red and white; this is because these colours contrast well with each other. I have continued this theme of colours throughout my contents page and double page spread this is because I wanted these colours to be my house style. When researching magazines I found that I was put off by too many different colours. So that I why I decided to use only three different colours.



My contents page is very appealing to look at because there is a lot going on. There is a clear space in the middle where I have left enough room write my entire regular and feature articles. I think it looks appealing for the viewer to look at; this is mainly because all of the images are around the edge so it draws the viewers’ eye to the middle which is where all of the important information is. I have used some of the conventions usually found in contents pages. Firstly I have included a features section; this is where all new interviews and one off articles would be paced. There is also a regulars section, this is where the same articles are written each month but up dated for the next month. In this section I have included a fashion article; this is so the readers can keep up-to-date with the upcoming month’s fashions. ‘Ask Fred’ is like an agony aunt, so he helps people through their problems, when looking through magazine contents pages for my research I found that a number of magazines have these problem pages, I think that this is because it helps the target audience feel more connected with the magazine as they can feel sympathy for other reader and find out how their problems can be resolved. All of the magazines that I looked at had quizzes where the viewer could win prizes, so I have included this feature as it would appeal to the target audience of teenagers as they would like to win something that would make people envious of them. A gig guide in a music magazine is the most important element because it is one of the main things that people buy the magazine for, it helps music fans plan their year months in advance. I have included a ‘Reviews’ page where all of the latest movie, album releases are reviewed, this is significant because it will make the reader want to know people’s opinions on the things that they are interested in, and if the reviews are good then it will influence people to try it out for themselves. For my feature article I have interviewed several well-known artists and bands, I have chosen a wide variety of people as I want these interviews to appeal to my target audience. I have included all of my cover stories on these pages as the reader will want to read about the articles on the front cover. I have used several different fonts in this contents page this is because I want my viewer to feel excited when they look at this page, so when they see a variety of different fonts it will make the page look chaotic but inviting to look at. The images I have chosen are all depicting people of the same age range as my target audience (except Marks reviews) this makes the reader connect with the piece as they know that they are of the same age range as the people in the images. whereas the images I have used for the reviews man, are just amusing, so I thought that my target audience would find them funny, so if they think that the images are funny then they will find his reviews funny but informative, so they will attract the target audience.



My Double Page Spread has several conventions that challenge real media products. Firstly I have included a kicker, which has been placed underneath the photograph and the title, this is so once the reader has looked at the photograph the next thing they read is the kicker, which then gives them an insight to what the article is about. I have included a drop cap in my kicker, this is to emphasise the word ‘Exclusive’ which tells the reader that this interview to be seen nowhere else so it is exclusive to the ‘Mannequin’ magazine. I have included two pull quotes, first; ‘Indie Rock Electro Funk’ I decided on this as a pull quote because I thought it was very amusing when interviewing this band, and it will make the audience wonder what it is they are referring to, so it will make the reader want to know what the question was to get this response. The second pull quote I decided to use is ‘The Beatles act as our foot stool, while Mick Jagger goes and makes the tea’ I also thought that this was a very witty comment to make, but little does the reader know, but this quotes is not in in the article written here, but if they visit the web site, then they will listen to the whole interview (which is said in the side bar) and will hear the quote there. I have divided my page so I have equal amount of space in each of the columns where my interview is written and this is where he body of text is. It was hard to try and include gutters in my piece because the answers to my questions were sometimes very short. I have not included a caption for my image because it is obvious that this is the band the article is about. I have used a variety of different fonts; this is because I did not want the viewer to be bored of just one font, so I thought that a variety of fonts would make the page look more inviting to look at. I have used only three main colours, black, and white and red, this is keeping with the same style as the front cover. I have used the colour red to colour the most important parts of the text this is to attract the readers’ attention to the most important parts, such as the names of the band and the pull quotes. From researching double page spreads, I really like this layout opposed to one whole page taken up with an image and another page taken up with the text, so I liked the fact that the top half is the image and the bottom half is the text, this gives the illusion that there is less text, so this will be more appealing to the audience. When choosing an appropriate image for my double page spread, I had to consider the layout that I had chosen, so when I tried this image I found that this image fitted perfectly. I decided to turn this image black and white because I didn’t want the viewer to get distracted by too many different colours, also I think that making an image black and white makes it look more classy (depending on the image). Looking back at this image intertextuality has been used, as this would be recognisable as similar to the iconic Beatles Abbey Road album cover. I thought that this image would be especially good to use because it would make people think about what they are seeing as it would remind them of the iconic image. This image would entice the middle class target audience to read the article as they would recognise the image as being like the original Abbey Road image. This then may make the article appeal to the target audience’s parents as they would be more likely to have seen this image when they were younger, so when they are seeing my image it may trigger off memories about the ‘Abbey Road’ album. The fact that I chose to use this image connotes the ‘The figures’ have been inspired by The Beatles. The Beatles are still one of the most well-known bands as they were so popular, and ‘The Figures’ ambition is to be as popular as The Beatles.