Magazine cover Evaluation Karess

The group and i where set a task to create a music magazine cover using forms and conventions that a magazine normally has. The name of the magazine that we decided to create is titled 'Streez Sound', this magazine is aimed at young teenagers that listen to grime music as the genre of our magazine is under the grime music title. We decided that grime would be the ideal genre of music that our magazine should be based on as the majority of the group listen to this style of music and have a lot of knowledge on grime which we thought would benefit our magazine.

We began planning our magazine by thinking about the images that we could use for the front cover of the two issues, having thought about this in a long discussion on the style and type of image we would use we came to the conclusion that based on the fact that the majority of grime artists are of the male gender we would use the two boys in my group to model for the photshoot and be the face of the magazine for both issues.

The next task that we where set to do was the photoshoot where we had two hours to take photos that will ultimately be the image on the cover of our magazine technically known as the main cover image that is usually looking straight at the camera to attract and connect with the audience. With the camera that we where given the group and i went to numerous locations within the college that we thought would look best and took many pictures that could potentially be our cover image, the locations varied from college staircases and classrooms to the colleges outdoor benches. The images that we took seemed to work well with the style that we where trying to create for the magazine and when we where then able to look back at the images it showed that we had a large number of images that would work perfectly for the cover image.

Looking in great detail at the images that we had the group and i chose two different photos that would be the cover for the two issues. The first image that we chose was modelled by both of the boys in my group and it showed them together listening to music whilst looking directly at the camera, this photo was shot in the outdoor benches of the college giving the image extra visual features including the trees and also giving additional light. we decided that this image would work as our cover image for the first issue of the magazine. The second image that we picked out of the many photos was modelled by just one of the boys in my group and showed him again listening to music sitting on the floor whilst looking again directly at the camera. We shot this image in an empty corridor within the college, the emptiness surrounding the model enabled the audience to focus on him and what we assumed would be quite a dark image in outcome of the lack of natural light actually showed a lot of light and shadow adding a great effect to the image. As the first image was for the first issue this image had to be the cover image of the second issue that we create.

The final task that the group and I had to do was to produce the magazine cover and complete it using cover terminlogy which include the Masthead and also the Banner. In order to do this we had to place our selves into two groups that would have control of one issue, after splitting the group in two we began completing our music magazine. In order to successfully complete our magazine to a high standared it was important that the groups had the same banner as the two issues are linked and need to share the same style as one another. We did this by sharing with eachother the font and style of writing we thought would work best for the writing on the magazine. it was important that the font was bold and bright in order to attract the audience and make our magazine more effective. After trying many styles of writing we agreed on one style of writing that we would use for both issues, after this was decided it was now time for both groups to move on and complete the cover seperately yet still communicating with one another.

After long hours trying to finish both issues the covers where completed and they included coverlines that show what the magazine included inside which where competitions, interviews, posters and also free T-shirts and mix tapes, we decided to use these features as this would add a visual effect as with the competitions and interviews shown on the cover image resulted in our magazine being very eye catching and bold with the many effects used to display these features. We also made sure that the covers included the bar code, price and also issue date to make the magazine cover much more realistic to the audience.

Looking back on the process of making our magazine it is clear to see many things that the group and i could have done to make the theme and style of our magazine more clear and make the process much more quick and easy. one of the major issues that i feel could have been changed to improve the magazine is the planning of the photoshoot as i feel we could have communincated with one another better about the style and image that we where trying to create and the exact image that we feel would have been suitable for the front covers. With this said i feel that not having a distinctive target for the cover image enabled the group and i to explore within the college and take a wide range of photos with different styles and themes giving usa large amount of photos to choose to be the cover of our grime magazine. Another issue that i feel could have been changed in order to make our magazine a much more successful magazine was the rate of talking to one another as the group and i talked about the cover of the magazine after choosing the image and discussed a lot about where we would go from there, although this is a brilliant way of making sure we get the best from our magazine i feel the discussions where prolonged and minimized the amount of time we had to actually complete the magazine.