In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

             In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Before i started to create my music magazine i need to see what conventions where typically used Indie Rock magazines. The reason why i was focusing on Indie Rock magazines was because this was the music genre i wanted to aim my magazine at. So my first step was looking at there front covers and analysing what conventions where common in all of them. Here are some of the magazines i looked at:

1. First thing they all had in common was that they all had a clear Masthead.
2. Secondly on every single one they has somewhere on the page a related artists name in bold on the cover.
3. There is either one or two main people as the cover image.
4. They all contain some puff and plugs, using the left third. 
5. Each of the also stick to a specific colour scheme.

After completing my research i then went into creating my music magazine front cover, remembering to apply all the research information about conventions into my work. From doing the research task it will help me create a more professional looking magazine as it followers the trends of whats already out there on the market.

1. So from seeing from my research task that all the magazines had titles which where easily recognised i new that was a must for my magazine. I chose to have the title as 'Honour' as it was simple and easy to read. As well as it being easily recognisable on the page and it would be no matter where it was placed on the page.
2. Next thing to add was some related artists in bold. I chose to have two artists names on my front cover to help make my style of magazine even clearer. I kept one of my artist down the left third and to match my research i had another one in the middle of the page.
3. For my front cover i had a girl hold up a sign with a John Lennon quote on because on all of the covers i research they all had a celebrity to match the artists names they had on there covers so i need to have a picture that related to the artist name. 
4. Pretty much no matter what magazine you look at they will all contain some puffs and plugs on the page. So i decided to contain theme related ones such as the chance to win free festival tickets.
5. For all magazines its important to have a colour scheme. This is because it keeps the magazine looking good, not a mess and everything all goes well together. I decided to go with black & white as the main colours but with a hint dark red just to stop it looking so dull.

After making my front cover i then need to look in to contents pages. So the same process of looking at front covers i did for contents pages.

1. First thing they all contain is the title of there magazine  along with somewhere on the page it says 'contents'. 
2. Different article sizes/ columns 
3. Images

My Contents page after looking the research.

1. I wanted to my title as well as 'contents' both bold on the page, just so it was clear. i put 'contents' on top as it is the most important for this page. I also kept both of the fonts the same.
2. On my contents page i have made some articles larger than other. I did this to the article which where on the front cover as well as articles which i think people would be more interested in reading. Just like some of the contents pages i researched i decided to have my articles divided into 3 columns. I did this because i feel it makes everything clear to read and looks the best. 
3. While doing my research i found that most contents pages had either one big main image or lots of little ones. I decided to go with lots of little ones as i feel i didn't have an image good enough to sum up everything. Also i think it looks better. Also with each image i put the page number in the bottom corner.

My final research task was to look at double page spreads.

1. Image Taking up over half of the page
2. Bold titles 
3. Pull quotes 
4. Drop letters
5. Colour scheme 
6. Page number

My double page spread after apply the conventions: 

1. From my image i didn't want to have it taking up over half the page because i would have enough   space for all my writing. I already lost a lot of room when i created a boarded for the page. However the photo still does take up a lot of the page anyway.
2. Like most of the magazines i looked into they all contained a bold title. So i decided to have my title to spread across half the page, this make it easily stand out.  
3. In the majority of the magazines i say they all had included a pull quote.  They are good to use as they give people an insight into what is included within the article. I also like to use it as it broke up the columns so it didn't look so repetitive.
4. It is a very common thing for double page spreads to contain drop letters at the stat of paragraphs.  However i felt my text didn't need it and if i did include it it would clutter up that area to much. As it already included my photo and title. 
5. Through out all magazines you should always stick to the same style of colour scheme. This helps the magazine to all flow together so it looks as it its all as one. 
6. The page number is a must as it allows people to flick through a magazine to the right page instead of having to look at each page individually.