Drafting my evaluation - before presenting in various different ways

I sent my teacher an email on our schools system explaining that this is the draft essay version of my evaluation before I begin the presentation: 

Hello,

I have created an essay style draft for my evaluation, and I just wanted to send you both it to double check that I have written enough and that the content is applicable before I start the final evaluation, and before I start to present it in various different ways.

Thank you so much for your time.

Bethan Gilmore

This is the draft version of my evaluation: 

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

My media product ‘Zeppelin’ develops various different conventions of Classical Rock magazines, keeping with the theme and conventions. My magazine focuses on the music side of the ‘Rock Scene’ for example I have featured various different rock bands that are not all the same genre, which magazines such as Kerrang focus on, for example: the band Enter Shikari would not be considered Classic Rock, but it would be considered Electric post-hardcore or metalcore, through me featuring this particular band in contrast with a band such as Suicide Silence which would be considered an extremist black metal band, shows that I feature all variations of Rock music. Also interpreting the rock conventions in the context of colour, such as sticking to one colour throughout and focusing on various ways of interpreting that colour through shades and tones. For example, my magazine focuses on the colour purple, however I also feature blacks and whites. This is a convention that many Rock Magazines keep to; this also links the various other components of the magazine together.  My double page spread I think reflects the conventions of a real Rock magazine; my double page spread features form of a typical double page with the picture of the cover model on the left hand side, and the article/interview on the right. I think this makes the magazine look more official and it looks realistic.

How does you media product represent particular social groups?

‘Zeppelin’ is a conventional rock magazine aimed at young adults and teenagers between the ages of 17-25; through my personal experience of being part of the modern day rock movement I believe that the conventions that I have chosen to use in my magazine will appeal to others of the 21^st century rock movement. My magazine represents this social group by choosing particular bands that this social group would listen to and perhaps consider going to see Live, such as: Enter Shikari, Slipknot and Metallica. These bands are very big in the rock industry and they appeal to many fan groups. I have also placed a puff/plug of which advertises ‘FREE DOWNLOAD TICKETS’ this particular festival appeals to the same social group that I am aiming for, and it is inevitable that at least one of the bands I have mentioned will feature there. The use of the adverb ‘free’ would appeal to the audience of ‘Zeppelin’ and make them want to inspect the advertisement.

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

Considering that ‘Zeppelin’ is a classic/newwave rock magazine I have considered three different magazines that are similar to my own, these are: Kerrang, Rock Sound and Classic Rock. Through carefully considered research I would want my magazine to be published and distributed by Future Publishing, which is the same publisher as Classic Rock; this is because of the magazine circulation that they have managed to achieve for their magazine since 1998 which is 71,242 issues; this is an impressive figure, and considering that Kerrang has been publishing since 1981 yet they have only circulated 42,077 issues.  I believe that going with Future Publishing will allow ‘Zeppelin’ to distribute more copies and it will increase sales dramatically, allowing it to become bigger. Also, considering that ‘Zeppelin’ is a new wave rock magazine, and it appeals to all different genres in the field of rock and alternative rock, including electric, I believe that sales would be constantly increasing. To compare Classic Rock to ‘Zeppelin’, Classic Rock has much more of a ‘rocky’ feel to it, where as ‘Zeppelin’ has a ‘rocky’ feel to it, yet it has more of an alternative aroma.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The audience for my rock magazine would be alternative readers, and listeners all around the world, however I particularly wish to target British readers and listeners, this is because through my research into rock magazines many of them are published and distributed in the UK, which makes it easier to access for British readers. Also, throughout the rock magazines that I have researched into, they choose a particular place, for example Britain, and they publish the tour dates and festival dates for that entire country; this process is much easier than publishing for the entire world. I would also like to target festivalgoers, such as Sonisphere and Download because stereotypically they tend to read more magazines, and they keep up-to-date with their musical knowledge and their magazine collection. I would also like to target both young adults and teenagers, from the ages of 17-25, I have chosen these particular ages because this is when I would say that a persons music taste is at it’s strongest, so I would say that I am also targeting extreme fans of rock music, people that know good music and good merchandise of which I would be advertising.

How did you attract/address your audience?

My rock magazine ‘Zeppelin’ attracts my audience by using non-standard English throughout the front page, contents page and double page spread, such as: ‘A LITTLE CHEEKY ADTR’ or ‘SHIKARI SPILL THE BEANS’ this appears to the audience that the magazine is not as controlled as others, and that we like to relate to our audience. Also, the use of the wide variety of bands will appeal to the target audience, and other social groups.

I have also kept with a colour theme throughout my magazines, which are tones, particularly black and greys, and I have also placed some purple, which coincides with the cover models clothes. I think that the colour purple is a unisex colour, therefore appeals to both the sexes making my magazine appealing to both men and women.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Through creating my front page, contents page and my double page spread I have learnt how to use certain applications properly, and I have learnt how to manipulate text correctly. At the beginning of the process I did not know how to use the applications that I would have needed to, such as Photoshop or Fireworks. Through creating my magazine I have learnt how to remove a background on a picture by using Photoshop, and selecting the Magic Eraser Tool, which I have used a lot for this project, also I have learnt how to change the colour of objects that I do not like, such as the blue object on my double page spread that was distracting the audiences attention from the cover model. I have also learnt how to use the application Pages properly, although at the start transferring pictures appeared to be a challenge, I have now mastered this skill, which has allowed me to complete the task at my desired time.  During this task I have also picked up a preference, which is Photoshop over Fireworks; before the creation of my media product I did not know that much about Fireworks even though I was attempting to use it, I learnt that Photoshop is a much easier application to use, and through reading and watching online tutorials I have managed to learn how to do lots of different things that will be quite useful in the future.

By manipulating the text I have used some fonts off the website       and I have then changed the colour of the text according to the colour theme, which is tones and the colour purple. On this particular website, when you ‘SAVE AS…’ the image and open it the background is still visible, therefore I used the Magic Eraser Tool on Photoshop to remove it, this has allowed the cover model or the desired background to be seen through the text, yet the manipulated text still appears bold and clear to read.

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Throughout the process of the creation of my full product I believe that I have truly developed my skills in many different aspects. Firstly, the technical side of production has been made a lot easier due to me researching how to use various applications properly, and learning how to use the applications considering the training was not available, which made it more difficult to ask for feedback because I did not know how I could actually change things using the applications. After creating some initial drafts I believe the process became a lot easier, because I was only getting negative feedback this made me change various things that was wrong with my magazine, however this made me focus on my magazine so much and I was spending so much time trying to make it look better that it actually ended up looking worse. However, I do believe that I became more resilient to this; therefore I became better at changing aspects of my magazine to suit the feedback.

I also believe that I have not only learnt how to be more creative, but how to use my creativity to the best of my ability, henceforth learning more about myself. This became much clearer to me when I was creating my double page spread, where I realised that I was using my creativity properly and I was relying on not only my research into other magazines but my experience of reading so many rock magazines.

After completing my draft version of my evaluation  and sending it to my teacher, I gained positive feed back, of which I will develop my evaluation and make sure that it answers all the questions relevantly and contains information that links to the question.

Hi Beth,

Q1 – not sure all the band stuff is relevant  - You need to be more specific with the conventions you have used or challenged using media terminology.

Q2 – you haven’t really answered the question – consider how you explore ‘representation’ in section A of the exam – how have you represented a social group?

Q3 and 4 –  seem fine

Q5 – explore your use of images, fonts as well. Audience research and questionnaires etc.

Q6 – be more specific – what applications, technical skills etc.

Q7 – Aim to demonstrate how your skills have progressed.

Hope this is helpful. Remember to consider how you are going to upload your evaluation as you must use a range of technology in an imaginative way. Use images and screen shots, audio etc.