Drafting and planning/ Target audience

On Thursday I once again took various different types of images for a wider range to add into my music magazine (I also did this for better quality images made easier for manipulation). I took them not only of female models but of male models too to add into my contents page.
Here are the photographs I took:

This is the model I am using as my main artist. The above pictures will feature on my front page and double page spread.

The artists above will all feature on my contents page and one may be a secondary image for my double page spread. 

All of these pictures present unique identities. All dance music artists are different and that is the aim I am going for in my music magazine for example - mixmag (my inspiration) features artists like Tyga and Annie Mac in the same magazine who are total opposites. I used this idea when I took my photographs for my music magazine so that they will appeal to my target audience.

Target Audience

I must remember that my music  magazine is aimed at 16-21 year olds and this means that I will have to keep it quite informal because young people tend to speak in slang or better known as 'text talk'.
Instead of phrases like
"So how are you feeling about the recent release of your new album step-up?"
I could potentially say
"How did you feel the moment step-up came out?"

Young people may be able to relate to these simplistic phrases because the longer the sentence, the easier they may give up - now I am not trying to say that all young people are stupid and illiterate, but the target audience of my 'move' magazine will tend to be the more rebellious sector of young people that are more inclined to go to clubs regularly and enjoy dance music more. This means that I'll have to keep the content of my magazine quite facile to make sure they enjoy their experience reading it.

Drafting and planning/ Research into similar products/ Organisation/ Target audience

The contents page of the mixmag magazine is quite consistent in most of the monthly issues e.g. it's typically either a black background with white text or a white background with black text. I think I will use the colours of  my 'move' masthead of red, black and white to influence my colour scheme on the contents page. I think I will use a white background with black text and red headings.

The colours on the front page will be my artist wearing black clothing posing in front of a lime green wall as the background and this will create a great contrast. I could potentially use secondary images on the contents page containing the same colours this could also influence my decisions on which colours to use on my contents page and double page spread  because the lime green background may create an element of inconsistency if I do not use this colour further on in my magazine.

A usual mixmag contents page will contain around 24 stories spread across numerous pages. I will have to include the top news in the dance music industry, new album or single releases, Q&A and other interviews with new upcoming DJ's etc. I will include articles on the hottest clubs and where artists are performing, who to keep an eye out for and who is in the top ten for the worlds biggest dance music artists to date including when popular gig tickets will be released for which venues. Underneath all of my short and simple titles for each story on my contents page I will have to include a brief summary of what to find. I will keep my main double page spread interview article in the first few pages of of my contents page.

Next to the title contents, I will display the month of the issue e.g. October 2014 or January 2015. The fact that it is a monthly edition of a magazine will have an influence on the price I charge for it and I will include this next to the barcode on the front page.

On top of the main image on the contents page I will put in bold font the page number my main story will be found on which is what mixmag tend to do. I think this is good because it provides an ease of accessibility to the reader especially as my target audience is young and this means I will have to keep the content inside my magazine quite informal and simple to keep the audience interested.

Drafting and planning/ Research into similar products/ Organisation

When looking closely at mixmag magainze (the magazine which has influenced most of my decisions for my own magazine 'move') I have decided to replicate the idea of a selling line. I could talk about it being 'The Most Intoxicating Music Mag Ever'

Mixmag's selling line is 'The World's Biggest Dance Music And Clubbing Magazine', I would like to use a similar selling line. So as part of organisation, I will begin to think about what sort of phrases I can include on the front page of my music magazine.

I also like the way the masthead sits on mixmag magazine as it's very central, seeing as my name for my music magazine is 'move' and the word is quite short, the positioning of this would not look right in the center of my magazine so I will keep it in the top left corner which is very similar to another music magazine which is multi-genre such as Q...

I will need to include a barcode on the front page of my music magazine, typically on mixmag this is found on the bottom right hand corner and is relatively small. I will attempt to mirror this on my own magazine. The issue number, date and price is found on the left hand side of the barcode.

Another thing I will need to address on my front page of my music magazine is that I need anchorage text which refers to my main artist and cover story. This will be about my artists newly released album 'step up' and will contain an exclusive personal interview inside.

Other cover stories on my music magazine will need to be of relevant artists (other dance music artists such as DJ's) so I think I'll use a mixture of male and female artists. I will have to think of some good names to identify all of my new artists.

Overall, I think I have some pretty good ideas for my front page of my music magazine. I will use all of the above to influence my final decisions.

Target Audience

I asked 15 people between 16 and 21 which font they'd like best to feature on my dance music magazine...

The results were:

This chart shows that the most popular font with my target audience was the font 'segoe' as 5 people out of 15 chose it. This also comes in 'segoe ui light', 'segoe bold'. I think I am just going to use the font segoe for my masthead featuring the word 'move'. I will use a secondary font for the headings and subheadings which will most likely be courier, and this will feature on the cover stories etc. A second and third font may feature in my magazine but this may make my magazine look a little tacky as too many fonts can make a magazine seem too informal and childish. 

So overall:

Masthead - Segoe

Headings - Courier

Sub-headings - Courier

Cover stories - Calibri or Arial

Main stories - Calibri or Arial 

Organisation

I have decided that for my music magazine I am going to use this image or an image similar to this as the front page image of the cover star:

I like this because even though typically the artist is supposed to make direct mode of address, she looks quite mysterious and this would most likely entice the reads and make them interested in what the main article is about. 

This will not be the final image I choose because the quality of the image is poor. On Thursday I am going to conduct another photo shoot but with a better quality camera to ensure that I can manipulate my images on paint.net/page-plus fully and successfully without them becoming pixelated.

I will take photos of my artist in multiple poses so that I have a wide range to choose from i.e. ones with direct mode of address and others without like this one. With a wider range of photos, it means that I can fall back on others and can have more to feature not only on the front page but on the contents page and the DPS.

Drafting and planning

Yesterday evening I took numerous photos of my friends that I may use on my front page, contents page and double page spread. I took photos of them individually and altogether.

I tried to give each of them a unique style  that still linked to a sort of rough 'dj' appearance. 

Here are some examples:

On all of these pictures I like the effect of the lime green background. This is because you expect a DJ's appearance to be quite plain and simple because they aren't necessarily known for their appearance - the lime green background still presents them as quite eccentric and cool. Each of the models look great. I will use an MCU of the model I choose on the front page. On the contents page I will use a full length image of the artist. The double page spread will consist of two images... The main image will be another MCU but the secondary image will be a group image with a caption 'the artist meets up with friends back home' or something along those lines.

Overall, I am very happy with my photography. I have used a background that will I will be able to edit, models that are attractive and I have taken a wide range of images. Luckily, if need be, I can take even more photos of the chosen models.

These may not be my final photos... If not, I will conduct another shoot with my chosen model.