My audience research- spider gram

This is my Audience research spider gram. I listed all the things which i would like my magazine to include. 

Audience Research

Audience Research on Prezi

Audience research- reader profile of XXL magazine

The Reader- XXL mission is to take a mature real and intelligent approach to hip hop music. XXL keeps up with hip hops energy and targets the people that live for urban music. The general target audience for XXL magazine is 78% male readers, with the median age of 27, and 44.7% college buyers, and 67% African Americans. Priced at $5.99 XXL is the number 1 selling magazine on the newsstand which outsells magazines like Rolling Stone, Vibe, and spin. The readers of XXL purvey hip hop culture; consume music, and fashion and lifestyle on a level that defines logic. The readers are either in clubs, online, onstage, and at shops (places they can gain or access music from).  XXL readers helped the magazine to become NO.1 most influential brand in rap media. XXL is no.1 selling ABC audited music publication sold worldwide and is the hip hops media brand. 

Demographics

Demographics is the statistical of a population which include age, gender, income etc.  
It is important for me to understand demographics because they tell you who would be interested in reading my magazine. It is good to understand what the reader wants therefore you can give them that. Also having information about someones gender, age, income and education tells me how likely that person is too read my magazine. Every bit of information i receive will be important as to what to include in my magazine. Also interests, TV shows they like and hobbies help me when creating my magazine.

This is an example of a demographics table:


The demographics range I will be targeting is working class, and skilled working class. I'll do this by pricing the magazine low (around 2.50) and the magazine will be a glossy styled magazine, and will be publish monthly, also will be sold in local stores.

LIIAR analysis of MOJO magazine

I Mojo magazine is published originally by ‘Emap’ and now since 2008 ‘Bauer’ now publish the magazine. Bauer also publish Q magazine and Kerrang. Mojo is a monthly magazine in the United Kingdom. Bauer also publish women’s magazines such as ‘bella’, ‘take a break’ and many puzzle magazines. The Bauer Publishing Group comprises 282 magazines worldwide in 15 countries, as well as TV and radio stations.

A Mojo magazine target there audience at obsessed music fans. The mean age for readers is 37 year old men.  The magazine features genres from modern rock, folk, soul, country and reggae. Mojo delivers a 66% ABCI audience. Readers of Mojo are rather more influences than followers.

I The ideology of the magazine am quite simple. We can see from looking at the front cover what music genre the magazine is and what target audience the magazine might appeal too. I can identify this by what images, text and colours are used on the front of the magazine. Also the front cover is in blue and grey which appeals to men more than women. Also on the front cover they aren’t anything that could appeal to women like images or colours. I also know this magazine is rock, folk magazine by what bands are on the front of the cover.

Front cover-

L The image of ‘the smiths’ on the front cover is a medium shot. The shot is of the full band with the main singer stood at the front (taking up most of the magazine) and the other 3 members stood behind him. The colours of the magazine are all in similar colours blue, white, grey and black. The colours could be like this because of which month the magazine is for (October) because October is seen as a cold month. The main cover line stands out more than the masthead; I think this is because the smiths are such a big band. The cover line is also centered right across the middle of the magazine in bold lettering. The cover lines are located around the sides of the smiths, which makes the band more visible on the page.

R The smiths are represented by the magazine as being a very successful band. We can tell by how much space on the front cover the band take up.  Also the singer of the band is stood at the front, I think this is because more people recognize his face than the other members and Mojo want people to see his face first and recognize him straight away.

Contents page-

L The contents page is very minimal with only a small contents box and the image in the background being more dominant. The content box only consists of 5 main stories which would interest the readers more and does not say about any other articles in the magazine. It also gives a brief description of what will be mentioned in these articles giving the reader a brief description of what it’s about.

R The contents page represents the magazine as being a magazine for an older generation (30-40 year olds). This is because of the use of images and text on the contents page. The background image which takes up a lot of the contents page is in black and white and is of 2 people who I do not recognise that look like musicians?  

Double Page Spread-

L A lot of the double page spread is taken up by images. The images are of the band members from when they first started out, this links to the front page ‘the birth of a legend the smiths’. The double page spread takes us through the life of the smiths and have used images to show this, they have used images so it’s not all just writing because that would put many people of and they want their readers to be interested. The double page spread is set out in a particular ordered way with the text on the left page and a lot of the images on the left page. They is also a quote in the centre of the page this encourages the reader to read this page.

R The smiths are represented as being just an average band on the double page spread. They aren’t anything that jumps out on the page that tells me different. However they are represented as being quite an old band by the use of black and white images. 

Genre Decision- Rap

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJt7gNi3Nr4

Artists:

-          Jay-z

-          A$AP rocky

-          OF

-          Hopsin

-          Nas

-          Mellowhype

-          Cam Meekings

-          Lecs Luther

-          Joey Badass

Uses and gratifications

Why would people read my magazine?

- Social Interation- getting information for facilitating discussion with others
- Relaxtion- Reading to release pressure and unwind
- Information seeking- Reading my magazine to stay abreast of current events or to search for information
- Interpersonal Learing- The desire to understand the minds of friends or significant others by reading my magazine

Brief

To design a front cover, contents, and double page spread of a new magazine. All images and text used must be original, a minimum of four images must be used.

Preliminary task LIIAR analysis

Language- The masthead stands out on the magazine, they're also very big bold letters compared to the rest of the text on the magazine. They isn't much text on the front cover only a little. The main headline is in the top right hand corner which doesn't really stand out as much however it is linked to the image of kanye west which takes up most of the cover. 

Institution- A American magazine by Conde Nast publications, which also make vogue and glamour magazine. 

ideology- Kanye west's face takes up most of the magazine which could represent that he is very known and  is powerful. Also having his face this big catches the readers eye almost straight away, you also see his face before you see the 'GQ' logo. Also his eyes are center of the page which almost make it like he is looking at you. 
Audience- The audince of GQ magazine is men. The magazine is a mans magazine, i beleive the magazine target audience is mostly aimed at wealthy middle aged men. I believe this because GQ stands for Gentlemens Quarterly, gentleman is also a posh word which is another reason i think this is for wealthy men. The price is £4 also, which is quite expensive, so wealthy people are more likely to buy it.

college magazine evaluation:

For my preliminary task i created a front cover of a college magazine. Throughout the making i had one main idea that i kept all the way through whilst creating my magazine. I wanted my magazine to have the conventions of music and fashion, by making this possible i needed too use a female model on the cover and have cover lines that linked too music. My college magazine has the common conventions; masthead, date, bar code, and cover lines. My magazine targets college students and represents the college as a whole. By targeting my target audience i used cover lines and text that would appeal to them. I also tried to focus the colour scheme with reds, greens and browns as this was going to be the 'autumn' edition. My main image also relates to the target audience because its a student that attends wyke and the photo is took on wyke grounds.  

My main image is what i first planned to do. With the entrance to wyke being in the background it makes it more realistic and come too life rather than it be a plain background. Also the fact the model on the magazine is holding books and folders you instantly see a link too college and instantly know the magazine will be to do with college or a relation too that. The image is a very clear picture so you can see the models facial expressions, by the model smiling you see that she is happy which creates a sense that wyke is a happy place too be. 

The things i would change on my magazine is the layout. I am not too keen on the colour and size or the cover lines. I also could of done too add some more cover lines in as it looks quite boring. If i was too do this again i would definitely take more time positioning and finding suitable colours that stand out from the main image. 

When using photoshop i didnt edit my main image because i wanted the image to look as natural as possible and i didnt want it too be over edited. As this is a college magazine they is no need to edit the model etc. because its not a fashion magazine, my image is just a very natural image. The only tools i used on photoshop was the tool that makes the image bigger. i also used the text tool to create my masthead and cover lines.

Overall i am very happy and pleased with my final outcome. I achieved the targets i set my self and kept with my initial idea.

Final front cover- college magazine

This is my final front cover for my college magazine. I am happy how it has turned out and i am please with what it looks like.

Mock up of contents page

This is a mock up of my contents page. This is just an idea of what it will look like. I would like everything that is in the magazine too be labeled down the left hand side. Also down the right hand side i would like some images of what is going to be in the magazine. I would like my contents page too be quite plain and minimal.

Preliminary task front cover mock up

This is my mock up of what my college magazine cover will look like. This will help me when coming to designing my front cover because i will know where to put the masthead and cove lines etc.

Preliminary task: survey

Survey for college magazine

1.       What would you look for in a college magazine?

Music 1111111111

Sport 111

Fashion 11111

Games 1

2.       What would you like to read about in the magazine?

Sport 111

Music 1111111111

Performing art 1

None

3.       Would you rather see pictures or writing?

Writing 11111

Pictures 1111111

4.       Would you read the magazine if it was free?

Yes  11111111

No 1

Maybe 1

Don’t know

5.       On a scale of 1-5 (5 being highest) how likely are you to read a college magazine?

1

2 1111

3 111

4 11

5 1

6.       Is they anything specific you would like to see in the magazine?

n/a, no, tour dates, new film releases, news about college and events, music, fashion, beauty, events, no, events, no, no

7.       What type of magazines do you read the most?

Music 1111111

Fashion 11111

Sport 1

Other

This is my survey for my college magazine preliminary task. By doing this survey i found out what to include inside my magazine. I asked students in my class to get the feedback i need as this will be targeted at college students. 

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Preliminary task mood board

This is my mood board for my preliminary task. I used mainly college pictures and fashion and music magazine covers. I used these because I want to bring fashion and music in to my college magazine. I also used images of students and wyke because these are the type of images I would like to use for my college magazine.

Contents page analysis

The main colour scheme for the magazine contents page is bright pink, white and black. There are 3 images all music related which indicate this is a music magazine. The main image is of Pharrell Williams which could mean there’s a page on him in the magazine. There’s also a smaller image of Justin Timberlake at the bottom the page which reads ‘on the cover’, this tells us he could be the main double page spread in the magazine.

The layout is very simple and is categorised in to 3 main sections ‘remix’, ‘headliners’ and ‘features’ which are in bold, bigger writing that the other the other text. Also there’s a main headline on the contents page that reads ‘fashion rocks’ that’s also could mean they is a section on fashion in the magazine.

Conventions/contents analysis front cover

Masthead- The masthead is very clear and understandable for the reader to read. Also it’s in black block letters and is on a white background which makes the name ‘company’ stand out. Also on the letter ‘n’ reads ‘magazine’ in white which stands out more rather than it being under the master head. Although you cannot see the full master head we still know which magazine it is because of the constant on going same master head on every magazine they print.

Headline- The main headline on this magazine cover is ‘Ibiza rocks’. We know this is the headline because it is in a different style of writing and colour than the other headlines, also it’s in the centre of the page and is positioned differently so it hits the reader’s eyes straight away.

Main Image- The main image is next top models winner Mecia Simson, however it does not mention the models name as a headline and only says ‘its Britain’s next top model’ which almost makes it like she is new and no one has heard for and she hasn’t been revealed yet. The outfit the model is wearing is very summery which fits in with the ‘Ibiza rocks’ headline. Also there’s a shadow behind her which makes the model come of the page and look more 3d.

Colour Scheme- The overall colour scheme is very summery colours pink and yellow; they stand out on the white background which makes it more readable. Also the black logo really stands out with it being a different colour to the headings.

Sell Lines- The main sell line on this magazine cover is ‘254 hot looks for less’ it’s bigger than the other headlines and really catches the readers eye as it’s also just below the price logo. The next main sell line is ‘x rated erotic fiction’ which makes the readers want to read about it.

Analysing a magazine cover

Here I have analysed a magazine front cover. I have tried to identify as many key conventions as I can. This will help me when coming to create my magazine cover because it will help me know what to include on my front page.