In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and

conventions of real media products?

For this question you need to discuss your product in terms of the ways in which it follows the
generic conventions of real music magazines, or alternatively, does it deliberately develop,
challenge or subvert the generic conventions of real media products. To do this you need to
put your magazine pages next to real magazine pages and explain the ways in which they
are the same and the ways in which they are different. If they are different, then you need to
explain why they are different. This work should be completed as a video and should include
images of your product intercut with images of real media texts.

Before I actually started creating my music magazine, I researched the conventions that make
up a music magazine and found that the generic conventions were things such as a
masthead; cover lines; sell lines; cover image and barcode etc. My inspiration came from
NME magazine but I also used Kerrang For my contents page. Also, on any given music
magazine front covers the main image used is a medium close up/medium shot and so I
followed this convention by using a medium shot for my front cover. The colours of the NME
magazine are red black and white for the title, and so my title was red and white. For the
background of my magazine I tried to adopt the style of the NME magazine with ‘The
Maccabees’ on the front, however, this did not work quite as well as I had hoped and does not
work well with the magazine. If I did this project again, I would definitely choose a different
background style. For my double page spread I copied the style out of the NME magazine,
and as their article started with a drop capital that came down six lines I made sure that I had
a drop capital to start off the article to make sure it looked realistic. I tried to stick with the
same colours all the way through the magazine apart from the double page spread as the one
I copied was black and white but then I still used a small banner in the top right corner saying
‘interview’ as that’s a convention of real magazines.

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

For this question you need to discuss your product in terms of the ways in which represents
particular social groups. This could be the ways in which it represents a particular youth
subculture, a particular racial group, gender etc. This work should be completed as a video
and should include images of your product.
My target audience for this magazine was aged 16-24 of both genders, mainly aimed at white
British people but is not excluding other races, and so I used three white people on the front
between the ages of 16 and 24. my gender percentage was male (65%) to female (35%) and
so I have used two boys and one girl on the front cover. I have also

3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

For this question you need to discuss your product in terms of the ways in which it would be
produced and distributed. Will your magazine be sold nationally or locally? Would your
magazine be the product of a multinational conglomerate, such as Bauer or IPC, or would it
be distributed by an independent publisher? What would be the advantages and
disadvantages of each option? This work should be completed as a video and should include
images of your product or you could produce an MP3 Podcast with images on your blog post.

4. Who would be the audience for your media product?

Use your demographic audience profile for this but add some more theory to back up what
you have already done. This work should be completed as a video, which includes images of
your audience demographic profile and your product.

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

For this question you need to discuss your ways in which your audience attract/address its
audience. You will need to discuss your magazine’s mode of address, writing style, use of
images, colours, mise-en-scène, ideal self/partner, coverlines, house style, competitions/free
gifts etc.

Through mis-en-scene, I used three teenagers around the age of 17 to create an ideal self or
ideal partner to the people who read my magazine, this would hopefully help to attract my
target audience and to make the magazine more realistic and to hopefully look as successful
as existing magazines such as ‘NME’ ‘Q’ or ‘Kerrang!’

Questions 4 and 5 could be completed as one video.

6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this
product?
You have already produced a series of Camstudio videos showing how you used Photoshop
and Quark. You could produce some more videos of how you posted images to your blog,
and how you used other Web 2.0 applications, such as bubbl.us. You could also discuss the
other digital technologies you used such as Digital SLRs, scanners, non-linear editing
software (Windows Movie Maker), Camstudio, digital video cameras etc. Narrate a
commentary to these videos discussing the advantages and disadvantages of each of these
applications and processes.
I already had basic knowledge about how to use Photoshop and SLR’s through studying
Media Studies at GCSE, but through this project my knowledge has developed and although
the things I have produced haven’t been the best in the class, my skills have developed from
the beginning of the subject. I have also been introduced to new software such as Quark and
Camstudio, also been introduced to using bubbl.us, windows movie maker, scanners and
posterous to save my progress throughout this project including lesson objectives and all the
background research I completed. As I’ve never been able to work a scanner in my life,
learning how to was actually quite useful as I may have to scan things later in life and now
know how to. Bubbl.us, I thought was quite a useful way to plan your ideas for the magazine. I
didn’t like Quark Xpress as some things on it were quite hard to grasp on how to use. I liked
posterous however because you could update it via email or by logging in, you could access it
at home to catch up on work and you could also put your own mark on it, eg the banner at the
top where it says my name, I also liked the fact that if I forgot to upload something or changed
it later on in the project I could upload it and change the date so that it fitted in with the rest of
my blog in a chronological order. I enjoyed the photography side of this project as I am
wanting to take up a career in photography so getting used to using a camera and the lighting
was a really interesting experience for me, the only thing I struggled with about the
photography was time, I wanted to take another photo for my double page spread, one where
the band looked more at home and less model like but as I didn’t have enough time I had to
use one with the two boys standing back to back.

7. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the
progression from it to the full product?

You need to describe the ways in which your understanding of the generic conventions of
media texts and your production skills have developed from the Preliminary Task to the Main
Task. The technology section of this answer could be completed as a Cam Studio video.

You are already in a position to answer questions 3 and 4 but the rest of the questions
cannot be answered until you have completed your magazine.

A rough draft of your question answers must be answered by the time you come back
after the Easter holidays.