Tuesday 23 November 2010

Uses and gratification

In class we learnt about Uses and gratifications. It is a popular approach to understanding a wide communication, with, for example an audience for a magazine.
i watch Skins, a program on channel 4, because its good. It gives my something to talk about with my friends and is a diversion to school work.
there are 4 main reasons we consume media, the audience have a set of needs which the media meets in one form or another.
the 4 main reasons why we consume the media:
1. diversion - a form of escape or release from every-day presures for example music, film, T.V or video games.
2. personal companionship - through identification with T.V characters and sociability through discussion about T.V with other people for example Skins, talking about it with my friends about what happened last episode.
3. personal identity - the ability to compare ones life with the characters and situations portrayed and explore individual problems and perspective e.g comparing your own life with people less fortunate.
4. surveillance - information about what is going on in the world for example magazine stating the latest news and gossip in the world.

planning of the coursework

this are the images i drew to give myself an idea of what image/images i want to use for my front page of my music magazine. i thought about shot type, shot angle and lighting when drawing these pictures. i need to think about these conventions because they are key to meeting the psychographics of the target audience needs.
i will organise a photo-shoot based on the images i drew down below. In organising my photo-shoot i will need to think about the correct codes and conventions of my images for example the lighting, the time of day, where i want it, the scene. shot type, what the image will represent or mean and the uses and gratifications that it implies. Also the framing, i will need to think about what space i want to fill with text. By thinking about all of these important aspects of my photo-shoot and the images that i have draw below my photo-shoot will take place at around 06:00 PM when it is dark as i want a dark background to show that it is in the evening i will have 4 actors but not all will definitely be used.

Prelim task

Before I constructed my main music magazine, I had to create a preliminary magazine based upon my school as an arts collage. The reason for carrying out the preliminary task was to trial test the production of a magazine and get used to the photoshop and other programs. it gave me a better understanding of the coursework i am going to do. Therefore, I approached it in a way of a plan, this included me familiarising my self with photoshop, photography and designing.

Friday 19 November 2010

masthead research

Masthead research
I have done research of 4 different mastheads to give me an idea of what conventions are used and why.

Tuesday 9 November 2010

3.1 textual analyses of codes and conventions


 Uncut readers spend an average £47 a  month on CD’s,  £21 on DVD’s, £23 on concerts/live events, £14 on cinema tickets and £8.50 on downloads.

Uncut is a music and film magazine, attracting a middle aged male dominated audience ‘96% male’ with an average age of 41. 82% work full time this shows that a large majority have money to spend on luxury items. 79% of readers say it is important to keep up to date with the latest music. We receive information about the reader’s lifestyle  habits. Just under 100% of readers are passionate about music.   Just under 50% of readers go to the cinema at least once a month.

Sunday 7 November 2010

So far in media studies we have been analyzing magazines. the magazine i analyzed is 'KERRANG!' i have counted the pages and the content inside the magazine for example how many pages of the magazine are adverts, how many are letters pages, how many are content pages and how many pages are TV/radio listings. i further my research by explaining what the adverts are, what is dominant and what the average cost of the products they are trying to sell are. by applying this task i aim to find out the demographics and psychographics of the magazines target audience.






kerrang is a rock/heavy metal magazine. the target audience is people who have an interest in rock//heavy metal music. the magazine reaches its target audience by giving news on events, bands and new releases.
kerrang uses demographics to lure gender, of which  60% are males and  40% are females which means the magazine needs to meet the demands of a very mixed gendered audience of boys and girls. kerrang uses sychographics to find people who aspire to be respected among other people and people who wish to have a high paid jobs. by studying and applying these 2 important conventions the publication successfully find its wanted target audience because its appeals to certain peoples lifestyles and there aspirations.

Tuesday 2 November 2010

research into music press

there are lots of different music presses. NME, Kerrang, Top of the pops are just some of the many music magazines in the UK. all magazines cover different genres of music and they use different fonts to convey them.