My media product utilizes the conventions of Vibe magazine; it has stuck to a short title with only 4 letters like Vibe, but it goes about its own way of doing things in an attempt to redefine conventions as it uses them, like with Vibe they have a theme for each issue, I chose to put that into use with my magazine. The magazine itself is not meant to be like all he others on the market, I want it to stand out, with bright colours and bold images, minimalism can have a big effect as well. Vibe is where most of the inspiration for my magazine is drawn, and to 

this video features alot special effects and the overall appearance is very interesting, and the way timberlake appears in the video inspired the final product front cover. the blue effects were very influential in my draft and final version.

The final product

 my front cover was done in the style of a vibe cover that involved the models face being made to look unreal and even artwork like, the use of the colour blue throughout promotes continuity, and its part of the brand identity the magazine is supposed to have. The size of the word vibe is very big and bold which is linked with masculinity as the target audience is male they will find it appealing. the magazines codes and conventions are based upon those of vibe magazine, a lot of the  aspects that make vibe a good magazine i have hopefully adopted but i have changed a few of these things like the use of a mix of minimalist and heavy detail. 

vibe magazine ussualy has the models shoulder and head in the shot, but do occasionally do a full body shot, i chose to to do a shot of half the body.

Vibes colour scheme is a convention of theirs that i chose to copy and employ in the magazine, the contents page is very different to that of beat magazine, while it has a primary image that is very outstanding in the page, the contents is in the corner and quite small. i went for a different approach where the word "beat" was in capitals and very big with the word contents inside the letter "t" which i did in the hope that is unique and interesting and will thus appeal a lot to any audience the target included.

For this genre the artist on the front cover represents the target audience and their interests, as mentioned before, the target audience has high aspirations to be the best and they will only want  to here about the best and what they did to become the best, that is why I think I picked a suitable image and style for my magazine, the smile shows they are happy and ready to take on anything. the magazine is meant for the serious of the music fans, not those looking for a quick read or pictures of women, though the objectification of women is a tool used to raise sales, this wont work on all members of the audience, some may feel that that over saturation of women in compromising poses is ruining the way music is represented, and so it is this magazines aim to go about it differently, that being said the sex appeal that women bring is not ignored there is still a large segment of the audience that wants to see beautiful women and to "appreciate" their beauty, the main reason of them reading the magazine is to find about the music scene they are interested in, and that will always be the primary hook of the magazine so the prospect of finding about new artist in their favourite genre and list of songs that they may not know of is very appealing to them.

the magazine will be published by intermedia partners, they are the company responsible for Vibe, so they have a lot of prior experience with this type of magazine, parallels can be made between Vibe, beat and Cosmopolitan and company magazine, though they are completely different magazines the fact that each one has one that is similar to it is unique, 

with a company like Intermedia at the helm, this magazine will definitely take off and reach a very wide audience and accomplishing its aims along the way.

The target audience of this magazine are young males 16-24 who are working or in education both secondary and higher, they have big dreams a love of the RnB genre, they always want to look as "fly" (cool) as possible, they are always listening to their music and even working on their own, they have no interests in commitment but are interested in women. casual relationships are more their speed. they are very social, always out with friends keeping up appearances, they are into action films, the romantic comedy is just not what does it for them.

this magazine on the other hand is meant  to be here to deliver unto them what they seek, a mix of music, fashion, staying "fly" and women to keep all their needs engaged, it will always try to go for the success story and how people in the industry have risen to the top, to give them a sense of hope, to raise their spirits even with real life success stories. it will cover all points of interest and intermedia will likely release surveys to find out if there is something missing.

The prospect of new music and exclusives are very good at attracting an audience, it will tempt them to find out when only a little is revealed at the start, and it will the little to get them interested in what is next. in the same way vibe attracts its audience, the idea of the music and the feature promoted such as a list of the top songs of a certain time period and updates about what is happening in the music industry, insider information is always appealing to people regardless of audience.

the audience will have needs and those need to be known before anything; those needs are a need for new music, exclusives and information, this magazine aims to provide all of that all wrapped up in a nicely presented package.

Post-production research

when the final products were completed i had to ask what people thought of it. i had to send copies to others, to get their verdict, i asked people i know have an appreciation of this genre;

they were asked to try and describe it in the most formal way possible but can deviate to informal language if necessary.

Andrew: "this is really good, the best was the contents page i like how you had "beat" at the top with contents inside it, that was really good, the cover page is a little simple and the last one is really well layed out.

im a fan of the colour scheme its pretty cool, and its consistent to the whole thing."

Vikash: i thought you did a good job with the cover image, it is really good, but i would like to see more like it personally, the contents page is pretty sick, the way the word beat looks is nice the way the colours fade into each other. the dps looks like a real one in a magazine which is pretty sweet, it has a good set of pictures and the bonus album art bit is cool addition."

Dan: well i thought this was pretty awesome, i thought the front page was pretty sick, i loved the effect you did to your picture, and the contents is my favourite like it could actually be in a magazine, the last peice was really cool cause it looked genuine, like it was a real magazine page with pics and stuff, i like that you used a quote in the middle like in real mags."

The things i have gained from this project include a knowledge of what truly goes into making a magazine, i had prior skill with the editing and creation process for the final piece but i still did not know much about the planning and preparation that goes into it, it is a tough project that i found challenging in aspects such as content analysis and media text, i had to draw on those points i made to get a good idea of what my final product would look like.

Before this project i had never used a blog, and it is a very interesting platform to work with, it allows a lot of forms of media to be showcased in one place which is a very useful feature. 

I had no knowledge of how this would work but i figured it out in the end, it isn't that difficult to update with work.

My preliminary task allowed me to have a taste of what's to come, I drew from the experiences of that project to make this one, I used the knowledge I gained with this project to help me make the final project, I had used a various number of techniques to get the effect achieved in this preliminary, and I had to refine these techniques in order to produce a better standard of work.

in the preliminary I chose to go with a convention inverting picture, as I prefer to go against the grain in my work and forgo the ideals of the masses and do things my way which i feel worked out in this instance and gave my products a sense of individuality amongst the various competitors that all are essentially the same thing, in the end I felt the unique factor is a element of brand identity. with all of these ideas in my mind I went to work and created the final piece essential like a spiritual successor to this piece of work.

Final cover

Final contents

Final DPS

Costume ideas

For the costume, I am intend on using a suit, suits aren't typically associated with RnB, but the artist in the article is meant to have a success story to tell, and suits are always associated with success and power.

for reasons of the nature of the cover, the suit wont truly be visible, so items like wrist watches and cuff links wont be needed. though the picture has very nice shoes in it, those too wont be necessary as feet wont be in the shot.

Reconnaissance

The location for the cover picture wasn't necessary as it is a white background, i chose this as I'm going for a different style of cover model design much like the Vibe magazines featured so a white background will compliment it harmoniously . The pictures for the DPS were taken in the school, near the fence, in an attempt to give an almost industrial look. the fence against the concrete, in regards to the featured artists back story.

like in this cover of vibe with Rihanna on the cover she is against a blue backdrop while she is in black and white, both of these elements go together very well. 

the colours used in this example are very appealing, the flow well together. which is what influenced the colour scheme i plan on using. Blue and White.

Analysis of media text

This is a front cover of an issue of vibe magazine; it features T.I as the cover model, the photo is a headshot.

T.I is a very successful rapper who has many fans the world over. And because of this fact, fans of his music and even those who just appreciate and the target audience will be intrigued and want to find out why he is on the cover.

T.I’s expression looks as though he is very serious, which is a reflection of the interview he is giving to the magazine. The black and white of the photo is to show that the issue is quite serious and not the typical issue that readers will be used to.

This issue has the mast head in front of the model which is breaks convention for a lot of magazines, which tend to have the mast head covered by the model’s face or any other body part that is near it. This is shown in many other vibe magazine covers but this grabbed my attention as it has a very unique look to it, vibe magazine has been noted for its clever use of colour schemes, the Red and Black colours compliment each other very well.

 The mast head is always at the top of the screen an every issue promotes a different colour which reflects the colour scheme of the rest of the magazine.

Vibe has created a sense of brand identity with its own convention of having only the cover artist. This makes the magazine more recognisable and easier to find for readers. There are additional pictures, its mast head font is a very outstanding bold which reflects the genre this magazine covers, and the audience will find it appealing as they are going to be a predominantly male readership. Those who read this magazine are also likely to be drawn in by the ambiguous quotation in the main sell line; “ain’t no such thing as a secret snitch”, following that the line “the untold story behind the deal” this is an ambiguous statement which will draw the audience in as they want to find out what the tag line means, it doesn’t rely on using an attractive and clever line to draw the readers unlike other magazines.

There are no feature article photographs, instead there are artist names “50 cent, Prince, Lauryn Hill, Dr. Dre, Jay-Z & Biggie” this has become one of the ways in Vibe has created brand identity as this is common in many of its issues. 

This is an issue of Billboard magazine, like vibe it is predominantly an r&b magazine which features artists like Drake who is on the cover of this issue.

Billboard is an American magazine issued weekly. The Billboard name is highly recognised, along with the music chart, it promotes.

The choice of musician is Drake a very successful rapper who emerged on the rapping scene in 2006 from a career as an actor, he wasn’t very well known in the main stream but he made he arrival onto the worlds view in 2009, with endorsement form other artists. Since then Drake has been climbing the popularity ladder with the success of his music, “the new face of hip-hop is evidence to this fact.

Drake’s expression is that of a man who knows he has made it in the world; it is a mix of serious and calm with a hint of accomplishment, which is fitting for a man in his position.

This magazine is known for its trademark logo colours of red, yellow, blue and green, only ever changing to celebrate a special issue etc. the colour scheme of black and lime green is interesting but fall in with everything else without clashing.

The mast head is also in front of the artist which may symbolise a hidden meaning of the magazine believing itself to being better than the artist on the cover. This is a convention that is very rare in media publications but as the example above shows it does happen.

The language used is very easy to understand, it would be a stretch to call it casual, but likewise it would be a stretch to call it formal, it is straight to the point of the text.

Contents page

This is the contents page for the issue of Vibe magazine featured at the top.

The style in which ‘contents’ is written will grab anyone’s attention, it has been divided up into three segments which aren’t a clever way of making three new words as it would appear. This contents page is very minimalist essentially 3 colours and the contents themselves at the top in a very stylish simple order. This is definitely something I'm going to emulate. In this page the artist is the most important thing on the page, much like a front cover. This is quite plain which can be seen as a risk, but I think it works well and is solidifying itself as a convention of this magazine.

This is a billboard magazine contents page. it is drastically different to the Vibe one, reasons for this is that it has a lot of text and more pictures, it actually appears to list all the articles within it, rather than the major ones. it features a main image which is linked to a page as are the smaller images above, this contents is also one that has a specific colour scheme, but also features more colour than Vibe.

Double page spread

The Double page spread feature the main article of the magazine, which is often an exclusive with an individual or group. in this case it is Usher, way in which Usher is posed shows him starring off outwards while smoking and wearing a big wristwatch this is  a style exhibited by a number of black males. this appeals to the audience as they are likely to be black or those who are appreciative of the culture and style. 

Cigar that he is smoking is associated with success and wealth, as they are very expensive in comparison to cigarettes, and are either smoked on special occasions or just by the wealthy, which is what it is implying about him. in his quotation the word "Greatest" is highlighted in bold capitals as to draw more attention to it. which is obviously something this interview is aiming to relay to the audience, Usher feels he is doing extremely well in the music industry. the way in which he is looking off screen makes him look like he has something very important on his mind or that his is of a higher status when in combination with the cigar and the quotation, which can symbolize superiority.

There is an abundance of informal language in the text, this is so that the reader can associate with it more fluidly, if it was all formal it would not sound realistic, the informality gives it a touch of personality that readers will appreciate.