My product: Sound fields - Will Jones - Candidate Number: 9038

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

I have learnt alot since my preliminary coursework. On my preliminary cover, I unintentionally stretched my image to fit the scaling on my canvas, this resulted in an image that is shorter and fatter than it should be. By the time I produce my final front cover, I used a number of photoshop tools to digitally enhance my image and had learnt how to resize, crop, remove etc. This allowed me to produce a much more professional background. The main way I used photoshop on my Prelim cover was to basically type the text in different colours over the image. I had only two layers on my cover, one being the image and the other the text. On my new cover, I discovered that I had at least 20 layers and quickly learnt to name my layers so that I knew which one was which.

I did not use any effects on my Prelim which is why it did not look as professional as my main cover. My masthead is very basic on the first cover compared to my effects driven second cover. I learnt much more about photoshop itself and the codes and conventions of magazines which improved my second cover considerably.

I also learnt more about how a magazine works, the interaction of the cover, contents page and articles. I realised how these elements are connected and all have to be cross-referenced. Having researched magazines, I began to understand how headlines and cover lines are worded and presented for maximum shelf impact. While researching further after my prelim, I realised how important relevant, striking images are. Photography was not my area of strength but I now appreciate a good strong image. Another important element of a magazine is to have a striking masthead as people will only see the left hand side of the magazine on the shop shelves.

I learnt that the magazine industry is huge and that there are many music magazines out there, it is a competative genre but one with many niche markets is bound to be successful. The music magazine market is dominated by a few large publishing companies and it was interesting to see which other magazines (non musical) these companies produce. I have learnt that paper products link with online methods to maximise their potential and that the online magazines do not create any threat to paper products.

Overall I learnt that alot of planning goes into producing something that looks simple.

My Prelim cover

 

My main cover

Question 6 - What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

In the proccess of constructing this product, I have gained knowledge and skills in many areas of technology.

I had never used photoshop before starting the creation of my magazine so I have learnt alot from this, I have used the crop and lassoo tool to isolate images from their background. I have used effects to add vibrancy to my pictures and changed saturation levels to give a deeper colour. I enjoyed experimenting with the effects and learning how to make a picture look like it was drawn in charcoal, posterise it etc. I also learnt how to replace parts of an image using the clone tool and used the eraser on my cropped images to tidy them up.

This first image shows the original photo edited in the plasterize setting.

The Second image has the hue and saturation setting enhanced to 100%

This third screenshot is the image drawn in Charcoal

I learnt how to use layers in photoshop and text effects such as neon, glass, chrome, fire etc around letters. I learnt how to keep a background layer, I used a background from photoshop as a layer to give the golden glow, then cropped the crowd from another image and then used the lassoo tool to cut the figure out of the original image and move it on top of the previous layers.

In producing my magazine, I have learnt that Facebook is not only a social networking site but a way of promotion, communication and recieving feedback. See my previous post for using new technologies. I have worked out how to use it as a company page as well as a personal page.

I had never used a blog before I started media studies, it has been interesting looking at other people's work in progress and being able to give and recieve feedback. However, I have not been satisfied with blogger because of its lack of flexibility, for example not being able to change text modes simply like it can be done in  microsoft word. I also was unfortunate enough to lose an hours worth of work as it did not seem to save as it was typing. On the other hand, I have been impressed by  how proffesional I have been able to make my work look and how the blog times can be altered.

Although it was not relevant to my magazine brief, I was able to use Logic Pro on Apple computers to compose the soundtrack to someone else's film brief. As a music technology student, I was taught how to vary sound levels to create suspense (as the film was based on a thriller), write music suit the chosen genre and then transfer the files onto movie maker to be layered. I may be using Logic Pro next year for media studies if I choose to do the film/video brief for my coursework.

I used microsft publisher to store my planning, this was the best program to use as the pages were easy to arrange and it kept everything in order. I did the analysis for my cover page, double page spread and contents page in publisher and then carried them to the blog using screenshots.

Question 5 - How did you attract/address your audience?

I would try to create awareness of my product in several ways. This would be particularly important until it was established and well known, I think it would be important to launch the magazine early in the year to make the most of promoting all of the forthcoming summer's festivals.

When launching, in its first year, mini editions would be given out for free at festivals to raise awareness as it would be handed directly to its target market, Q do this at Glastonbury, producing the 'Glastonbury Daily', a single A3 sheet that gives four A4 pages of festival news, it is widely available across the site.

Sound fields' webpage would be set up, giving basic information but directing the reader back to the magazine itself for more details, just as Q, NME and Kerrang do. The website would grow with the magazine's success but initially would act a bit like efestivals.co.uk with listings and basic information. It would aim to direct the readers to go and buy the magazine by giving a taste of what's in the current edition. It would also suggest they join Sound fields Twitter and Facebook groups for up to the minute news and information.

The website could offer subcription promotion such as subscribe for a year and get 3 free editions. The website would also offer a free download each month, track of the day, polls on reader's views - direct interaction with the reader is a good way to get them hooked - and the option to sign up for a weekly newsletter. I would try to team up with ticket sales agents such as Ticketmaster and SeeTickets and have a link to their website and encourage them to have a link to mine. I would also link to the websites of bands and festivals attracting more people. Mutual links are a good way to increase the likelihood of being high up on search engine's results lists, as is new material (hence track of the day, polls etc.).

It is crucial in today's society to use social media in marketing products like my magazine. Q's facebook page is a great example of this. It is loaded with news, links to Youtube tracks and information on a daily basis. The majority of my target audience will be regular Facebook users as it is aimed at the same market as my magazine, this would be a means of getting information directly to their Facebook page if they joined my magazine page and this in turn would alert their friends to my magazine page, increasing awareness of Sound fields in my target market. Facebook has the advantage of building a sense of community among people and my feedback would be feedback on festivals. Facebook would also link people back to the website and the magazine.

Twitter is also useful but less of my target audience would have Twitter than Facebook, Twitter could be used for short announcement of gigs, breaking news and weather updates during the festival season. A daily mud alert for Glastonbury would be a fun tweet to recieve and weather information could be really useful at festivals where most people won't have access to the internet but would recieve tweets on their mobile.

The website and magazine would encourage readers to link with them via social networking and social networking would push them back to buy the magazine - self promotion!

Many music magazines have their own TV channels and/or radio station, for example, Q and Kerrang. Radio advertising speaks directly to people and is relevant in something related to music, sound. I would use slots prior to the festival season to attract people to the magazine. Because of the nature of the magazine, I feel that it would attract readers by advertising at Gigs and festivals with Billboards, on screen adverts between acts, or handing out useful, relevant branded products such as cardboard sun visors or basic rain macs.

Print adverts could go into newspapers but it would not be right to advertise in other music magazines because of the rivalry. I could advertise through products associated with the various festivals, for example, millets (camping gear), pot noodle (easy festival food), flyers at the gig venues etc. but i think that online marketing via social media and webiste would be much more successful.

The way the cover attracts the audience is by the use of bold colours on the masthead, making it distinctive and looking official. In the masthead, there is a tagline that says 'Your Big Gig Guide', this makes it sound as if the magazine is engaging with the reader which is important as they will then buy the magazine. The puff of the star on my cover is effective as the yellow inside stands out on the orange background and use of blue text on yellow makes the writing stand out even more. Use of a recognised star on my cover is another convention that will attract my audience as people are only going to want to read articles on established stars.


Use of big names in my straplines will keep the reader attracted as a way of prominence.

Question 4 - Who would be the audience for your media product?

How my product attracts my reader profile 

My target audience is young people of both genders aged 16 - 35 in the audience demographics C1C2D. The readers would not only be music fans but most importantly festival goers, attending gigs outside the festival season. The readers would have a passion for live music, generally attending big festivals like Glastonbury and Reading at least once a year and going to gigs outside the festival season.

Sound fields is aimed at my target audience because it follows the conventions of other music magazines appealing to a similar audience. The feel of the magazine is modern and vibrant. Its focus is very specific and the magazine is not very expensive which is important as students and young people have a lower budget. The cover has a wide range of artists to appeal a wide range of people, something that festivals do; giveaways would also link to my focus because they give the reader an incentive to buy the magazine. I have chosen images that my target audience would be able to identify with - the festival pose, the flags story/image, the featured artists having the same look/age as my target audience, making it look as if they are part of an exclusive club.

What other magazines are like Sound fields?

The media product that is most like mine is the website http://www.efestivals.co.uk/. It is similar in that it contains live music listings, an archive of information about old festivals and gigs and sometimes articles related to festivals (travelling, what to take etc). Sound fields however offers the reader much more: in-depth articles and reviews, glossy images that can be taken out and used as posters, giveaways and competitions and it is highly portable.

After extensive research, I have not been able to find a magazine similar to my own as live music seems to be a niche market not yet covered, however, general magazines similar to Sound fields include Q, Mojo and Kerrang. They are similar in appearance with a house style and graphics, all offer in-depth interviews, striking images and reviews (theirs mostly of CDs and dowloads, mine of festivals).

Their target audience is similar but not the same as mine: Mojo is aimed at a slightly older and male group because its articles tend to cover more established bands. Kerrang is definitely aimed more at men being a metal magazine and its content is more masculine. Q's target audience is the closest to Sound fields' but is aimed at general music lovers (those who buy rather than attend). Q is the closest in look, colour and style, and its tone is similar to the one I have tried to use - appealing to lively, youthful readers who want to know more than the basics. It is a step beyond a publication which has the style of an advanced comic! I feel that female music lovers are offered less in existing music magazines than men are, having realised this, I would choose to balance that by including articles on festival fasion etc in Sound fields.

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

This chart from http://www.magforum.com/glossies/music_magazines.htm shows the sales of music magazines from different distributers.

Top-selling music magazines (2008)
Title	Publisher	Genre	ABC figure*
Q (M)	Bauer	Rock	131,330
Mojo (M)	Bauer	Rock	106,218
Top of the Pops (F)	BBC Magazines	Pop	105,025
Uncut (M)	IPC Media	Rock	91,028
Kerrang! (F)	Bauer	Rock	76,937
Classic Rock (M)	Future Publishing	Rock	67,399
New Musical Express (W)	IPC Media	Rock	64,033
Total Guitar (M)	Future Publishing	Practical/playing	48,673
BBC Music Magazine (M)	Bristol Magazines	Classical	47,104
Metal Hammer (M)	Future Publishing	Rock	45,809
Sources: ABC *Jul-Dec 2007

There are three houses that publish the majority of music magazines, these are the Bauer group, Future publishing and IPC Media.

IPC was established in 1963, its HQ is London and it publishes NME among others. It is a subsiduary of TimeInc which is a big international establishment. It has a large portfolio of digitally pubished magazines, published the NME weekly (not a standard convention of music magazines) and aims at three specific markets: men (Nuts, Rugby World), mass market women (Look, Chat, Women's Own) and up market women (Marie Claire, Ideal Homes).

I don't feel that IPC represents my readership and would not choose it to distribute my magazine.

Future Publishing caters for specialist individual magazines rather than the mass market, it produces more upmarket magazines than IPC, more focused towards specific markets. The music magazines represent sub genres of rock, such as Total Guitar, Classic Rock, Rhythm and many others. I would consider this strongly because it deals with niche markets, which is my magazine.

The Bauer Group is the largest privately owned publisher in Europe with growing sales in many areas and a wide ranging portfolio. It produces high quality intelligent music magazines such as Q, Mojo and Kerrang, it's publications are all of high standard and it has a good reputation.

After researching these companies and looking at BBC publishing (Top of the Pops), I believe that the best media institution for my product to be distributed by is the Bauer group as the magazines it distributes are include quality music magazines with the same styles as Sound fields and they are all very successful financially with growing sales. It also deals with a European market with offices in France, Germany and Spain which might mean that they could market my product in Europe as it features European festivals.

http://www.bauermedia.co.uk/

http://www.ipcmedia.com/

http://www.futureplc.com/

Question 2 - How does your media product represent particular social groups?

http://prints.paphotos.com/image/glastonbury-festival_679967.jpg

Festivals are a way of life and festival goers build up a strong loyalty after going to many gigs and festivals each year, this means I believe that a festivals magazine would build up a strong loyal following.

These images show the range of people Sound fields aims to represent:

 

As previously stated, my target audience is young men and women aged 16 to 35, who are not only music fans but crucially festival goers. My readers will be attending festivals like Glastonbury and Reading at least once every year and gigs outside the festival season. They will probably either be teenagers, students or young adults in classes B, C1, C2 & D.

Festivals attendance 2010

Reading	80,000
Glastonbury	177,500
Leeds	70,000
V (2 sites)	90,000
Total	417,500

Attendance Figures over the last 10 years
	Glastonbury (commenced 1970)	Latitude (commenced 2006)	Isle Of Wight Festival (commenced 2002)
2000	105,000
2001	No festival
2002	140,000		8,000
2003	145,000		15,000
2004	150,000		35,000
2005	160,000		50,000
2006	No festival	5,000	50,000
2007	170,000	10,000	60,000
2008	175,000	20,000	55,000
2009	177,000	25,000	55,000
2010	177,500	35,000

Even just looking at the biggest festivals in the UK, it is clear that the market is huge. Although my target audience is niche, it attracts a large number of the population. As shown in the mood board above, the social group represented by gig and festival goers is wide and varied in age, ethnicity, social class, education and fasion. What is common to them all is a passion for music, fun and friendship, Sound field's intention is to represent young festival goers of both genders equally, all ethnic groups (although my original images do not present ethnic diversity, Sound fields would present a range of images representing ethnic diversity)


Cover

I think that my cover is a classic festival image and would attract many festival goers. It is an iconic representation of a festival which people would recognise immediately. The story of the flags would be representative of my social group as the social side of gigs and festivals is crucial. The coverline is a plea, "how will we find our mates?" where the magazine is identifying itself with the social group it represents, creating a sense of fellowship. This is also the sort of story that could overspill into social media, eg a Facebok group called "bring back the flags", which would encourage the readers to interact with each other creating even greater loyalty.

Double page spread

 

My mock interview portrays a teenage star who could easily be a reader of the magazine himself. I have chosen to show this person as a typical young man, eating lots, passionate about music, not money and enjoys attending festivals himself. This reflects the reader back to themselves. My interviewee represents the social group I am trying to represent:

“He has been attending gigs and festivals since he was 8 and has kept going ever since”.

“There is no way I am leaving in a limo and missing all the fun”.

Contents

One of the articles mentioned on my contents page talks about Littleboylost, who have fans in the lower age range that my magazine is representing. Being only 16/17 themselves, their fans are young teenagers, many of whom follow them on Facebook.

Many of these fans would be too young to attend a festival by themselves but are still part of the readership I want to represent, which is why I have included gigs, reviews and fun articles. These teenagers will be coming up to attending their first festival and my magazine would prepare them for what to expect.

The font I have chosen throughout is funky, different and fun, like the people I am trying to represent.