Music Magazine Analysis

'Q' Magazine

After reviewing the front cover for this edition of 'Q' Magazine I spotted many magazine conventions that have and haven't been used with the first being the masthead. On most magazines the masthead covers the entire width of the page, however on this magazine the masthead which is just simply the  letter Q is based in the top left hand corner. This 'rebels' against normal magazine conventions as most magazine readers will be expecting to see magazines with the masthead spanning the width of the page.

However, if the magazine was the width of the page the whole layout would have to be changed because the masthead would end up covering the person's face so the image would have to be lowered with the end result being the photo won't have the whole of the guitar in it which would sort of defeat the object of the photo as it's a music magazine.

The next thing I found on the magazine was the colour scheme used, the red background of the logo contrasts with the green/blue background of the rest of the magazine making the magazine stand out from the rest, I'm not sure if I think the colours used work as even though they contrast they don't look like they should be on the same page.

The colour of the background works well with the guitar as it is probably the most important part of the image so it needs to be easily visible, and the green/blue background contrasts with the red guitar.

The makers of the Q magazine use various fonts and font sizes to make the magazine look eye catching, appealing and interesting to look at and read.

School Magazine photos

Original Photoshoot

One of the tasks for my magazine was to collect some of my own photos to use that would relate to the school and the content inside. I asked some people if they would mind me taking photographs of them hard at work as I thought it related nicely to Sixth Form and what it is all about.
One of the main aims of this task was to gather a number of varying photos, for example a difference in what the four of them are doing or the angle of which the photos are taken from.

The photo above was the first one I took and is just a simple one of the four of them, I am planning to use this on my use on my front cover as it gives off a positive and happy image of the Idsall Sixth Form.

 

 

This second photo I will be using on my Contents page as it is very similar to the first one in terms of where the four of them are positoned and what they are doing, because of this I didn't want to have two photos on the front cover that look relatively similar and give off the same image of the Sixth Form.

 

 

This next photograph is also used on my Contents page, unlike the two before it this is an 'over the shoulder' shot which I think is effective as it shows the reader a lot in the photo, they can easily see all of the people but also what they are doing, in this case reading a magazine, studying etc.

 

This photo above is the final of the four that I took and is positioned on the front cover, this is different from the others as it was taken from a high angle, likewise to the one before it shows the four girls reading, studying and working hard which again gives off an image of hard working at Sixth Form which is why I went with this photo.

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Magazine Layout

For my first project I have to create a school magazine cover and contents page. I have researched the codes and conventions of a magazine, and from there I have planned how I think my front cover should be layed out.

Here is my plan.

 

Mood Board

Mood Board

In preparation for making the school magazine I had to create a mood board where I had to collect images that have colours etc. that I want to use front cover. When deciding the colours that are to be used on the front page I decided to stay along the same lines as the school’s colours, which are predominantly green but I also wanted to add white and black to make sure it’s not all green.

Sci-fi films and programmes

In sci-fi we expect fictional science and abnormal situations and characters as they tend to be very imaginatively and creatively made, a good example of this would be in Star Wars- a completely made up film which has hardly if any similarity to real life, one of the characters is Chewbacca, a big bear like creature but with the intelligence to communicate effectively with its human colleagues.

In many Sci-fi films because of the lack of realism viewers tend to use the characters in the film as ‘narrators’ in the sense that they use them to tell them what’s happening in the film and why it’s happening. This brings a closer connection between the viewer and the characters in the film as they using them to gain a better understanding of the film allowing them to enjoy the film without having to go through the whole film not having a clue what is going on.

In every sci-fi film the viewers are still able to connect to the characters, both human and fictional characters as no matter no matter how far fetched a film is compared to real life the viewers and on screen characters still feel the same emotions and feelings, happiness, sadness, anger etc.

Some sci-fi films reflect what is happening in our lives so viewers are able to predict what will happen further on in to the film and the story line/plot. The film will usually relate to the goings on of real life for example, a big part of the world today is war so you tend to see many films being released that involve war but are fictional.