Welcome to my AS Media Blog, this is a blog which follows the journey of the making and also the planning of my music magazine. This is the coursework part of my AS Media Studies, which I have to make a music magazine for. Here are the main Posts that I have done:

School Magazine- this was a preliminary task
Initial Ideas- this has all of the ideas that I had for my music magazine at the start of this project
Rough Cut- this was my first draft of my music magazine
Rough Cut Feedback- this is the feedback that I got from my target audience on what they through of my first draft of my music magazine
Final cut- this is my final magazine after I have improved on the feedback from my target audience
Evaluation- this is an evaluation of my music magazine and also this project as a whole

Monday, 12 March 2012

Picture Planning Table

This is my picture planning table this includes a lot of information about the different pictures. I have to have at least four images to be used in my music magazine. So I have planned to use four that look like this. I may change or take some more or different pictures in my final draft, as these pictures are just for my first draft. So I may change them Some of the information that it includes is:

  • Time and date that picture will be taken
  • The model used, pose and costume
  • Location
  • Type of lighting 
  • Camera angle and distance 
  • Where the picture will be used
  • Mise-en-scene
Here is may planning table for my pictures that will be used on my music magazine:

Making my barcode


I made my barcode for my front cover. I did this through using Photoshop; I used this video to help me see how to make it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wkw_ZW9Qpgs

Here is my finished barcode that I will be using on the front cover of my magazine. click on the picture of the barcode to make it bigger.


Wednesday, 7 March 2012

Magzine First Draft Started


Today I started to make my music magazine first draft on the computer. As the deadline for the first draft is on the 20th March. I have to have  to make my front cover,  my contents page and also my double page spread all done by the 20th March. I will be taking my photos next week for my magazine, so that then I can add them into my first draft. I started to make my contents page today, I have done the main outline of the layout of the page. 

Monday, 5 March 2012

Audience Research


This is my audience research; I did this to see what the target audience of my magazine thought of my ideas for my music magazine. I asked three different people all of these were in my target audience for my music magazine so here are the questions that I asked my target audience.


  1. Would you pay £4.30 for a music magazine? If yes what would make you pay this?
Person 1: I would pay this much for a music magazine, the reason that I would pay this would be if from the front cover I could see that there were a good amount of articles and interviews from artists and bands that I like or would like to read about. Then I would pay this much if I could see that the magazine was worth buying.

Person 2: I think that this is a good price for a monthly magazine and I would pay for it. If there was a good amount of content in the magazine then I would buy it, but if the magazine did not have a good amount of interviews, news and stories then I would not be paying this much for a monthly magazine. If this was the cost of a weekly magazine then I would not pay this for it as I would not feel that it would be worth it as there would not be enough content.

Person 3: I think that it would be a bit better if the cost of the magazine was £4.00 instead of £4.30. As I feel that this would be a better amount to pay for a magazine. I would pay £4.30 if there was a good amount of stories and interviews, but if there was not much in the magazine then I would not pay this much.

  1. What makes you want to buy a music magazine?
Person 1: If the cover catches my eye or if there is somebody in the magazine or on the cover of the magazine that I would like to read more about.

Person 2: A good amount of interviews and stories, so that there is a good amount of content in the magazine. As if there is not a good amount then there is no need to buy the magazine as there will not be a good amount to read.

Person 3: If there is a good amount of music news and articles in the magazine then I would buy the music magazine. I like to see a good range of stories and interviews on the front cover as this will them make me more likely to look at the magazine.

  1. Which parts of music magazines do you prefer? The features, Interviews, Music news or other?
Person 1: The part of the magazine that I most like is the interviews as you get to read about a certain artist or band and find out more about them. I also like the music news as it shows you what is happen and going on in the music world.

Person 2: The part that I most like is the features and the interviews. As I like to find out about new and well-known artists and bands. I like to mainly read the articles that are shown on the front cover.

Person 3: I mainly like the features that are on the contents page and also the things that are on the front cover of the magazine. As they are the things that normally make me want to buy and read the music magazine.

4. What attracts you to a music magazine front cover first? The images, cover lines or something else?

Person 1: I will pick up a music magazine to have a look at if there is an interesting story on the front cover or if there is a band or artist that I like on the front cover. Another thing that I like is if there are posters in the magazine of bands and artists that I like.

Person 2: Cover lines attract me to magazines if the cover lines are interesting. Another thing that I like on the front cover of the magazine is the image as this is one of the first things that I see when looking at music magazines. Something else that I like on the front cover that is one of the main things that I spot on the front cover is the title of the magazine, as it will depend on the type of magazine it is on whether I would read it.

Person 3:  Normally the picture of the artist or the band as this is the most eye-catching thing that I see first. As the picture fills the whole of the front cover. The stories or feature that are normally on the front 
cover of the music magazine, as these are on the front cover and are normally in big bold lettering.

  1. How often would you want the magazine to be released? Weekly or monthly?
Person 1: I like to buy magazines monthly as then you get more in the magazine as it is not coming out as often, as weekly magazine normally don’t have as much in them. I also feel that it is better value for money when they are monthly as you do not have to pay as much every week as you are only getting it every month.

Person 2: Monthly as I think that there is more in a monthly magazine and also I feel that I would not want to get a new music magazine each week. Monthly would be better.

Person 3: Weekly if it had a lot of content and it was worth it, but I mainly like to read and buy music magazines that are monthly as then the magazine has a lot more to read and also it is better than having to buy it every week as this can get really expensive. But if you buy it monthly you only have to buy it twelve times a year.


From this research I have found that £4.30 would be a good price to use for my music magazine so I will be making my magazine cost this much. This is all an average price for a music magazine as well.  Another thing that I found was that I need to have good articles shown on my front cover as this is one of the things that makes people buy the magazine. Also my front cover needs to stand out and by eye-catching as if not then people will not see it or want to buy it. I also need to make sure that I have good features as these the features are normally the things that people like the read the most. Need to have good names for the articles on the double page spread, as this helps to make the article more interesting. I also need to have good pictures on my front cover and double page spread as these take up a whole page each. I will also be making my music magazine a monthly magazine as most people do not like weekly magazines. 

Thursday, 1 March 2012

Initial Ideas


This is my initial ideas diagram this shows all of my initial ideas for my music magazine the things that the diagram shows is my ideas for:

·         The Colour scheme
·         Target audience
·         Ideas for the contents page
·         Ideas for the double page spread
·         Ideas for the main image on the cover
·         Ideas for the smaller images
·         Stories and feature that will be on the cover
·         Title of the magazine
·         Stories and feature that will be on the contents page
·         Title of the main story on the double page spread
·         Ideas for fonts
·         Wording for double page spread
·         Images for main spread and also font
·         Layout for front cover

This initial ideas diagram shows all of these things listed above. These are my initial ideas, so then these may change as I design and make my music magazine. Here is my initial ideas diagram:



Monday, 20 February 2012

Half Term what I did


This week I have been evaluating and looking at magazine front covers, contents page and double page spread. I have looked at five double page spreads, front covers and contents pages. Through looking at these this has helped me to see what I like and what I don’t like about magazines. This has really helped me to use what I want to do with my magazine. 

Friday, 17 February 2012

NME Contents Page

This is the fifth and last contents page Research, this contents page is from a NME music magazine. I have done five front cover research, five double page spreads and now five contents page researches.


At the top of this contents page there is a title that says “Inside this week” the date is that the magazine was released is then under this title. I like the way that the title has been shaped so that it fits in in-between the pictures. I will not be using this type of title for my contents page I will be having a bar that runs along the top of the page, as I like the way that this is done.

The colour scheme that is used for this contents page is very plain as there are only really to colours of white and black. I don’t like this as I feel that it is boring and also very plain as well. I will be having three colours in my colour scheme.

 There are main different types of font that are used on this page for each of the different boxes under the images. I do not like this as I feel that it looks very inconsistent. I will not be having lots of different types of fonts on mine I will just have either sans-serif font or serif font not both of them with different fonts.
This contents page is a bit different from some other contents pages that I have looked at. The layout of this contents page is very square like there are three pictures down the left side of the page with page numbers that they are on and a small description. There is the one bigger image with the page number with the description of the page. There is then another two images to the right in a column again with the page number and also the description. Under these to images there is a box white is trying to get you to try and subscribe to their music magazine. There is then another image with the page number and description to the left of the subscription advert. There is also a very thin column which is titles plus. This has numbers of pages and then the name of the pages. There is no real list of what is on each page which I do not like as there are just mainly seven boxes which have the page and other things in like the photo and the page description. And then there is the small list of some of the other pages. I will not be doing this on my music magazine contents page as i do not like the way that this contents page has been done, I like it more when there are certain headings and then the pages are under them in order within each section.