Sophie Nutt Describe the ways in which your production work was informed by research into real media

texts and how your ability to use such research for production developed over time. [25 marks] At the beginning of the media studies course at AS level, I completed a preliminary magazine before conducting research for my first draft of my music magazine. Little to no research was done before beginning to construct this preliminary magazine as it was done in minimal time. However, from general knowledge that I have previously gathered from reading magazines, I created a three palette colour scheme consisting of grey, black, and maroon, which was consistent throughout the front cover and contents page. Although this consistent colour palette created professional aesthetics, there was a lack of variation within the font, creating confusion surrounding the distinction of the masthead, titles, and tag lines. As well as this, the lack of research done is illustrated within the graphology and page layout of my preliminary magazine. I failed to take into consideration conventional layouts of real magazines, such as page numbers, and the information on the contents page was dispersed across the page, alongside the pictures that were similarly displayed in a dispersed way. This layout made the preliminary look unrealistic and unprofessional, as a result of my production work being minimally informed by research into real media texts. This is also the case in the little variation and skills in camera work evident within the shots taken of the models for my front cover and contents page. However, once constructing my hip-hop/urban music magazine for my final product, extensive research was conducted into real media products in an attempt to inform my understanding of the conventions of magazines that I was going to adhere to. The masthead of my hip-hop magazine, Major, used a bold font named lemondrop. I decided to use this style font for my masthead after taking inspiration from Complex magazine because of the striking, bold, and versatile style that it had, which would grab the attention of the target audience. As well as this, the graphology of my magazine, including the page layout, is conventional and conforms to the expected commercial style. However, during my research and planning stages, it became clear that I wanted to create a minimalistic and stripped down design, which goes against the conventional commercial and heavily advertised magazine layout. This minimalistic style is evident within the double page spread of my magazine as I incorporated the letter L into the background of my article, using a tool on Adobe Photoshop CS6 to make the colour translucent, and inflamed the size. This is a design technique that was influenced by a double page spread from Q Magazine, that I analysed in the pre-production stages of my research and planning. Considering the iconography within my production work, I took lots of inspiration from already established hip-hop/urban artists that I discovered during my research stages, for example Iggy Azalea and Azealia Banks. When creating my artist, I was influenced by their attitude, fashion, and visual appeal, hoping to recreate a similar iconography for my cover star, Libby Zarong. This was further emphasised through my camerawork and

Sophie Nutt framing, elements that took inspiration from magazines such as HighSnobiety, as I used a blank backdrop in which to shoot my artist in front of, so that the main focus was of her and the persona that was being presented. Finally, the research conducted within the pre-production stage of my magazine assisted in my decision to include a three palette colour scheme, the most common in magazines, of red, black, and white. This was a conventional feature, however I chose to incorporate this as the research conducted demonstrated how professional and minimal this colour palette was, which is a style that I wanted to portray amongst the stripped down approach. Following my AS coursework production of the magazine, I began A2 with my design and production of a music video and ancillary texts, including a digipak and magazine advert. The pre-production research that I conducted heavily influenced the first and final drafts of my music video and ancillary texts. After I had completed and gathered feedback for my first draft, I wanted to focus on elements to use in my video that would differentiate it from the original official video for Navy by Kilo Kish - the song that I was using for my own music video. Following research into existing music videos from a similar genre to the experimental and new wave style of Kilo Kish, I decided to edit the exterior shots included in my music video into black and white, lowering the saturation in iMovie, giving the video a different aesthetic edge. This was influenced by conventions of real media products, such as the video for Chum by Earl Sweatshirt or Nosetalgia by Kendrick Lamar and Pusha T, both of which also incorporated a similar mise-en-scene of an urban location. To further differentiate my product, I began to research the use of opening titles in a music video for the aesthetic function. However, once looking further into examples of this, the use of this research informed me that the opening titles also acted as motif for the artist. Therefore, the way in which I used this research developed into a new aspect of my music video and building of a realistic artist. I decided to use simple and clear font styles similar to the font that I used in my AS final magazine, Major. I took significant influence from the opening sequence to A.D.H.D by Kendrick Lamar, who installed recorded footage behind the text. I continued to use conventional elements of existing media products within my ancillary texts, as the colour palette for my digipak and magazine advert photographs was a three palette of black, white, and grey influenced by the album artwork for the 1975. Although this album contains a completely different genre to the one of which I was designing, it was aesthetically pleasing and is a conventional colour palette that can be used across all designs. However, my ability to use such research for production developed over time as I began to analyse the conventions of real media products and attempt to challenge the forms and conventions of popular and conventional products, instead of taking inspiration from them. For example, I chose to use the name Matutine for my artist, meaning just before the dawn. Conventional artists create an alter-ego with a catchy stage name,

Sophie Nutt and by going against this expectation, the name Matutine would create intrigue amongst the audience. I built upon this in my digipak design, explaining the definition of the name in the left inside panel not an expected format for a modern digipak design. By choosing to do this, the minimalist style, similar to the one created in my AS magazine product, was evident and was consistent throughout towards my magazine advert. My media products have used, developed, and challenged forms and conventions of real media products throughout. Different elements and features of each media product have been influenced or created for a purpose, which has been decided with the aid of thorough research and planning. Across the course, these skills have developed and aided me in more ways than just taking influence from previous work, heavily impacting my production.