Evaluation Question 1:

In what ways does your media product use, develop or

challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

• In many ways, my magazine follows the conventions of classic rock magazines, such as MOJO and NME.

• However, I decided to challenge some of the conventions to make my final product stand out from the rest.

One of the conventions that many classic rock music magazines follow is the colour

scheme:

• The genre of Rock is commonly associated with a specified selection of colours including black, red, brown and yellow.

• This colour scheme is regularly used in rock-oriented music magazines, and is a convention I decided to follow, as I think it brings out the character of he genre.

• To support my argument, I have researched classic rock music magazines, and added a selection onto my presentation.

• These resources include MOJO, NME and Melody Maker front covers, contents pages and DPSs.

MOJO Music Magazine

Yello

w/b

row

n

Red/black and whiteBlack and white/brown/red

NME Music Magazine

Black/red

Black/brown

Black and white/red

Melody MakerBlack and white/red

Black/yellow

Black/yellow/red

• Another convention I decided to follow is the type of shot used in the front cover of my music magazine.

• I feel this is a convention that cannot be broken successfully, as an off-focus shot, tilted angle shot, long shot or extreme close-up, to name a few, would distract the viewer from the information the magazine is selling.

• As well as this, I think that audiences are used to seeing specific types of shots, and a photo that breaks this important convention would result in the magazine´s cover being ‘uncomfortable’ to look at.

Below are some examples of the types of shot commonly used in music magazines’ front covers:

Medium shot High/low angle shot

Close-up shot Group shot (any of the previous shot types used)

For example, an image like this could not be on the cover of a respected music magazine:

• A convention that I believe can be broken is the use of the same fonts throughout the whole magazine (in this case front cover, contents page and DPS).

• I think that using a large variety of fonts adds character to the magazine, as well as makes it interesting to the viewer.

• However, this has to be done with care not to end up using a different font for every paragraph, as this would make the read a tiring task for the eyes.

• To ensure that I wouldn’t have this problem, I limited my font selection to <10.

• Lastly, I have compared my final product to an official classic rock music magazine, trying to be objective in all my findings.

Front Cover

Wide range of fonts (including two in the masthead)Smiling person (contrasting with the serious/stern expressions we are used to seeing on rock stars’ faces)Off-centered photographTilted titles. E.g. Exclusive interview!

Follows Challenges

Use of genre colour schemeClear Plug (stands out)Medium shotPerson looking at the cameraBlack and white/sepiaPhotograph (conveys it’s old)Person is in front of mastheadSell lines in front of personUse of words or phrases like ‘Plus!’, ‘Sex’ ‘The real/true

story’.

Double Page Spread

Use of red, two columns, person is looking at the camera, quote from the article, use of a black/white image.