MEDIA EVALUATION PART 2

MASTHEAD

My masthead is based on the Classic Rock magazine masthead. The two end letters of “rock” are purposely larger than the rest of the letters, and the whole of it is in capitals. Differently to mine, Classic Rock has two words in the masthead so they have the smaller word between the two large letters at the top where there is a gap. The bold, serif font in white grabs your attention and the large letters make it more in your face and link to rock and classic rock symbols and logos. Bands which use a similar style design in their logos are rock bands Metallica, Led Zeppelin, Pantera and more as well as the game Guitar Hero, linking to the genre of music and many more. This is effective to the audience because they automatically feel the genre and are drawn to the font design they recognize.

OTHER FEATURES

I used a similar looking banner font and design to Uncut magazine, apart from the fact they did not use a background for the banner. There are both short snippets to summarize a few of the stories and artists inside. My banner is at the bottom however, because of the irregularity of the letters in my masthead, it didn't look right because of the blank space between the middle letters and the banner. I used a background because It wouldn't have been easy to read otherwise and it is similar to Classic Rock's banner which is at the top. Similar to my design, uncut uses a small line between the names and snippets to separate them. The stories in the banner add more to the cover and help show the range of music in my magazine and appeal to the audience with their ideal festival, new bands and iconic artist interviews. Both using accent colour as

background for banner, links with the whole cover and draws audience's attention

I noticed Classic Rock have a few design features which add to the interest of the magazine cover and draw your eyes to certain parts. I used lines as a sort of decoration and separation for the “plus” artists feature which creates a eye catching feature and closes it in without making a box. I also used a black box/background around the heading for the main article “Eleanore & the Blacktops” which made it stand out and attract the audience's attention as the main feature. Similarly, in Classic Rock the lines have been used between text to draw your eye along the text, making it a focus point and more decorated. There is also a black box paired with the accent colour of the cover

which I have similarly used.

CONTENTSI mostly based my contents page on NME'sbecause the classic rock magazine's con-tents pageswere more dulland aimed atan older audie-nce and I wanted tocaller on the slightly more fun designto the contents page to appeal to my younger audience, even though they are not the same social group as NME they are the same age range, so it calmer, more serious version of the NME contents, which is too Cluttered. I made sure I used the same fonts and colours to create the house style and same feel as the front cover.

I used the masthead from the cover in the contents page at the top left, like NME, because I feel it looked more professional and gave it a house style. I chose not to use a black banner all the way across because I felt it looked to cluttered.

I used the same sort of layout for the actualcontent as NME, withblack boxes as sectionsof the magazine, eg reviews and features and the name of the section in white. The stories names are in bold and the description in the thinner font underneath. The page numbers are on the left with the accent colour from the cover. Using this layout means the audience's eye is drawn to the different sections and it is easy to find what they want to read if they are looking for something specific.Classic rock also use this exact samecolour and font design for the stories, however they write themin a long list without the subheadings.

I created a subscription box at the bottom right of the page using the same colours from the rest of the magazine, and using a mini image of the front cover. This will appeal to my audience because they are students and want to save money

CONTENTS IMAGES

I used this image for the main photo on the contents because it is the cover story, whichis usually the theme most magazines use rather than showing a new main focus in the contents.As you can see my image is quite similar to the one in MOJO; the model isn't looking at the camera (unlike the cover), it is a mid shot, they have a relaxed and normal pose and are wearing similar clothing which appeals to the audience. The image is usually different to the cover because the audience have already been drawn in, and now the image in the contents shows more about what the article will look like. The audience are drawn in by the fashion sense which represents them, and her smoking.

For a smaller image I used a long shot of a group of men representing a punk band. Similar to the Rolling Stones image on the left in Classic Rock contents, the image shows the whole body and outift, and the group have a relaxed neutral pose. The images are both in black and white, which show they are an older band. I have used more punk clothing with leather jackets and studs which appeals to the audience, as they like boots such as Doc Martens and leather and studded jackets.

I also used a small live shot from a gig, as the audience for my magazine enjoy going to gigs and parties as they are younger than the audience for Classic Rock. NME often use live shots in their contents page, as they are also aiming it at a teenage/young adult audience.The use of a fisheyelens also appeals to the audience who also have art andphotographs hobbiesaccording to my questionnaire.

DOUBLE PAGE SPREAD I used a green box at the top left hand corner as an anchorage for the page, and changed the opacity so it wasn't overly bold and overtaking, and you can still see the background through it so you know its not a headline. This is like the box NME have in their left hand corner which just quickly catches the readers attention if their flicking through, and tells the reader what's in there because you read from left to right and top to bottom therefore you will see this first, so its good to have something to look at there otherwise it feels bare.

The image I used for my double page spread is a full length shot of both members of the band. I used a colour image this time, so it is more interesting to look at and I could link the colours with the text. I used the purple from the jeans as a colour for the questions and quote and I used green to contrast this and stand out. The clothing is the same as the other images and represents the audience with the young and interesting clothes like the boots, coloured jeans and leather jacket, and on the male the beanie, vans shoes and the military coat. The setting is outside, against a graffiti wall which makes it seems more rough and serious like the music. The images were shot at night with a flash which made the images have more contrast and the colours and shadows stronger, catching the eye. It is typical to have the whole band and a long shot on the double page, as you have not seen this yet in the contents or cover.

I used black boxes behind the text to make it stand out to the audience and introduce the article alongside the image. I used a quote because a lot of articles both in indie magazine NME and rock magazines Classic Rock or Uncut have a focus on a quote as a headline or subheading.

I put the page number and website for my magazine in the left corner of the page, with the number in bold. This is the same as Classic Rock do theirs.

For my double page spread, I roughly based the writing side layout on this Classic rock double page spread. With the heading and summary at the top, and two columns for the article with a line down the centre to separate them. There is also an image in the middle to break up the article to make it more interesting and have a focus point. I also used the lines and “words by” and “photos by” in-between the article and headline to add a more professional finish to the spread, as most magazines have this somewhere. I followed the quite typical layout for the spread, using a bold drop letter at the beginning of the article and the other things I have mentioned, as well as a highlighted quote and fact/info box at the end of the article.

I used the same colours as the left side to use as highlights and accent colours in the writing side, for example I used the green in the summary, leaving the band name in black so it would stand out. I used the purple colour for the questions as its less bright than the green and doesn’t stand out too much from the article but is enough to catch the audience's attention. The quote is in purple and I used green to highlight the important parts of the info box at the bottom. The black boxes for the quote, headline, and info box link with the headline on the other side of the page as well as the contents and cover, giving the magazine a style and theme.

Some of the features in this NME magazine double page spread are more playful and appeal to a younger audience than the simple layout of Classic Rock's article, which is why I've incorporated some of the styles used, like the box behind the quite and the linking of the info box, quote and title but in a more toned town colour and style.