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Centre Name: NORBURY MANOR BEC

Centre Number:14343

Candidate Name: Dawn Gallant

Candidate Number:9514

Unit: G321

my final products

question 7

question 6

question 5

question 4

question 3

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

R&B is a hard music genre to compete with, this is why I think an independent label would be less likely to sell as many copies of my magazine than a more established company would. The competition would difficult but, because my music genre is old skool R&B it may give it an advantage, sales wise.

 A good company that I think would create sales for my magazine is IPC. IPC distribute to a range of different stores such as, WHSmith, HMV, Esso, Tesco. So if my target audience don’t shop at one store they can find my magazine at another. Also because there is a slight age gap between the youngest and oldest audience they will be able to access the magazine easily (i.e.) a 23 year old buying ‘UPTOWN’ at Esso when he/she is filling up petrol-so it has a certain convenience for them.

   

 IPC is a global company so they would be able to distribute my magazine across the world, this would make the sales increase. Because the magazine may be well known it can create an international platform and get more established artists to appear on the cover and this will have an profit increase.

The target audience also made me realize how I would price the magazine; as most would be in education money would be limited. My magazine would retail at £2.50 with 72 pages without ‘freebees’ however, it did have extra pages as an alternative. I thought that the pricing was reasonable and that there would be consistency as readers may continue to purchase the monthly issue.

       At £2.50 I think that my magazine is reasonably priced and will increase profits. At £2.50 for a monthly issue my target audience will be able to access it every month. I considered the pricing carefully as my target audience will most likely be in education and due to the economy the older audience may not be able to afford it.

  

question 2

Question 1

double page spread feedback

Double page spread development

This is the development of my double page spread. This piece is where I tested out a lot of new things such as, backgrounds, images and layout. 

double page spread linked to the front cover and contents page

Brightness and Contrast

Ctrl+A to select the layer that the image was on

Image/Brightness and Contrast 

increased the contrast and brightness to make the
image appear less murky 

final product

more photoshop

I firstly duplicated the image

then enlarged it

replaced it

then reduced the opacity of the enlarged image

Image/Adjustments/exposure

increased the exposure and gamma concentration

the eyedropper tool

I found it difficult to incorporate the pink into my double page spread. I decided to move the translucent  artist name that was behind my text and use it with the heading as a subtle way to use the pink. The pink also matched my artist's lip colour and the blue matched the colour of her dress and shirt. 

I got the eyedropper tool to get the same colours (blue and pink)
I had 2 layers to fill in

I then used the paint bucket to fill in the layer

This is the first filled in layer

I then filled in the second layer

when both layers were filled in I made the pink one look like a shadow so I placed it
behind the blue layer. 

more photoshop

I thought that my page looked quite bare with just the image on the right so I wanted to create a 'shadow' to make it look 'fuller' and create more depth to the page.

I firstly duplicated the layer where my model was

then enlarged the new layer

then reduced the opacity 

Image/Adjustments/exposure

Increased the exposure and concentration

the Liquify tool

I watched a liquify tutorial on youtube to see how I could make my model appear appear thinner and smoothen out certain areas.

Filter/liqidfy/change the brush information/forward wrap tool/push in some areas.

The finished product

Reducing opacity

First I duplicated the layer with the artist name

Then moved the new layer 

Re-sized the layer

then reduced the opacity of the layer

After I decided to re-size it again

the lasso tool

I copied the original image from windows to photoshop

then i grabbed the lasso tool

and started to draw around my model

when I finished copying around her I pressed Ctrl+C

then pressed Ctrl+V

I repeated the process around parts of the image that I didn't get beore.

Final double page spread flatplan

This is my final double page flatplan.

I feel that this flatplan has a better layout that my initial, there is more dimension and the eye follows it better and it has more stucture. I wanted the quoteline to be more dominant on the page as that was the main topic. 

I chose to subvert away from normal conventions and have more than 1 image on my page because I thought that the image of my model sitting on the floor would look like shes sitting on the bottom of the page. I think it links back to my contents page as well; as my model on the contents is also placed similarly. 

From my feedback I choose to change the way I presented my text as Jessica said 'it looked too much like a newspaper'.

Image choices

Artist Interview

-“ In Minerva I trust”. (QUOTE)

Everyday more and more people are joining Jaci Mone’s fan base.- MINERVA

It has been a successful year for R&B star Jaci Mone and things are about to get better for the UK artist as she releases her new album ‘Minerva’.

The 18 year old has already had two chart toppers with ‘I’m into you’ and ‘In my head’ featuring hip hop star Nelly featuring.

The UK star has also been busy when she was opening concerts for ‘The Weeknd’ and ‘Beyonce’.

Jaci grew up on the outskirts of Central London and attended St. Martin’s Grammar school. When she was at school in the day she was at the studio at night.

At 16 an independent music label ‘Simply Soul’ sat in on one of her studio sessions and signed her straight away. Later that year she set up a twitter account and got over 5000 followers in the first 14 hours. Alone here Dawn Gallant interviews Jaci as she speaks about her what her fans can expect from her this year.

-“I spent as much time in the studio as I possibly could”. (QUOTE)

Questions

So Jaci your releasing your debut album ‘Minerva’ where did the name come from?

Minerva is the roman goddess of music but, my choice is deeper than that. At school I did classical  civilisation GCSE where we learnt about Greek mythology and Roman God’s, The Goddess was said to have a lot of intelligence and understanding and; my teacher said that Minerva reflected me... so yeah that’s where the name came from.

When did you first realise your love for music?

From as long as I can remember; my parents always played old Motown CD’s. My siblings were always

playing old skool pop music upstairs-It’s something I’ve always been good at. In fact some of the tracks on Minerva are produced with a Motown beat.

People nowadays would class you as a R&B artist, what do you class yourself as?

My genre to say would be old skool R&B, it differs from Contemporary R&B which speaks about sex and drugs, and other stuff that I wasn't brought up around and I still believe that some people still have the old skool mindset. I decided that I would make music that I would enjoy listening to and making.

You say you like to paint pictures to accompany your songs, why is this important?

I think that singing the song isn't just enough. You need to make the lyrics have meaning and the listener should be able to visualize something and they should be able to interpret the lyrics in many different ways; I learnt this when I listened to other artist’s tracks and it’s what I've always wanted my songs to be about.

Who’s been inspiring you lately?

I’ve been spending a lot of time with other artists one of them being Beyonce, her album was amazing. She told me that she wanted to put her emotions across and make it relate to every female. So I guess my emotions and feeling are inspiring me at the moment.

Can you share any other details with us?

Umm.. I’m not sure what my label would say about that. But I’m shooting my third music video tomorrow and it should be out in a few weeks and I’m planning to go on tour next summer also for my fans... follow me on twitter @JMoneMusic to keep up with my latest news.

Double page spread research

         I used web 2.0 to research some double page spreads. I firstly looked at how the eye would follow a double page spread and also looked at the conventions of it. 

         I noticed that most had a bold title that was either a phrase or the artist's name, however some deviated  away from this norm. Also most double page spreads only had one image and if they had more there was a main image that was big and the other that was smaller and more discrete.  The images also related back to the artist.

         The text that is used is very small in size and had a simple font; it also only worked in horizontal columns and there was not more than three on 1 side of the double page spread.  If there were questions that were being asked it was either in a different colour or in bold. If there was a statement it was either in a different size, font or colour. Another point to add is that all double page spreads had a page number.

                 

                  I also watched some interviews by Ashanti and Aaliyah on youtube that I thought would inspire me to                                write an artist interview.

       

       

Contents page Feedback

contents page feedback

Features

•UPTOWN: I used the masthead on the contents page to link the front cover and the contents page together. I made it smaller so that it would not over power the contents page.

•CONTENTS: I made the contents big and bold so that it would stand out I didn't fill in the O’s as I thought that it would be too overpowering and that it looked better simpler especially because it is the biggest piece of text on the page.

•FEBRUARY   2014: I put the issue date directly underneath the ‘contents’ to again link it to the cover as I had also done this on the front cover.

•FEATURES: I put the features in a different font to make it stand out also because I wanted all my text to be in black I thought that this way it still had a chance to I also used this font on my front cover. Most of the features on the contents page is on the front cover. I chose not to have a lot of features on my contents page so that it would be very minimal and only the main features would be on the contents page.

•PAGE NUMBERS: the page numbers are the same font as the ‘features’ to link both of them together and so that the ‘features font’ wouldn't look out of place. I made the page numbers big and bold so they would stand out but, also for the headings and subheadings to be in line with it and so that the sizing wouldn't be too different. The starting page is Pg7 and, the last page is Pg76.

•JACI MONE: I used my artist interview as my first feature as I felt that she is the main story and that the readers may just want to find her article first.  The subheading is supposed to mimic a ‘plug’ so that some detail is given about the interview but not to too much so they would have to read the article.

•DEF RECORDS TOP 10: Def jam is a parent to DEF Soul records, one of the biggest R&B companies in contemporary times; this is why I chose to make a playlist by them.

•DRAKE FT.AALIYAH: I chose to have this feature to mix music genres in this case R&B and hip hop and to keep up with contemporary music as we see a lot of different collaborations.

•Uptown’s playlist: I took this idea from billboard who have a music chart in every issue of their magazine. The subheading below shows a few old skool artists.

•26 TRENDS FOR SUMMER: most magazines have small fashion features so I took that idea and incorporated in my magazine.

•MONEY HONEY: this feature is to show more into artist’s personal lives and controversial issues that arise in the music industry.

•KAYNE WEST: Kanye is a very dominant character in the music industry and has made a lot of hits with past songs, I included this feature because of his massive statement in the music industry and him leaving such a big music label and making his own as, some people may find this inspiring.

•UPTOWN.COM:I used to make a clear statement that this section was only for online information. I used the same the same colour filled masthead instead of leaving it plain because it linked back to the front cover.

•TALK TO US: I enforced the use of social media (twitter, Facebook) in this section because it would make positive publicity for the magazine and keep people talking about it, this way the magazine would make profit. The email address is there is there are any complaints and most likely to enter competitions as stated.

•EDITOR’S NOTE: I used the term ‘note’ instead of letter as most Editor’s letters are fairly long and I only wanted to give a brief introduction on what the issue was about and the events that took place during the month.

•T.HILL: I chose to put the heading and subheading new to the artist to show the link. If the heading was with the rest of the features I would feel like the image would have no meaning.