Front cover plans and layouts

This is my second idea, I decided to alter the bacckground, I used the star as it was featured in an existing magazine, I also thaught it suited the style of the magazine. The text and colour scheme will not change, pink, black, white and grey (explained bellow). However I rejected this plan as it didn't have much structure and I could not find a space for the main background image.
This is my first plan for my music magazine cover. The text for the Mast head will be, white and the font style will be '28 days later' a cracked Goth like font which relates to the genre on magazine. For the text body, I will use a mixture of colors such as, pink, white and grey to give the mag some colour, the text will be in the font style of 'impact' a bold powerful font. I will have 3 images on my cover, two live images of bands and an image of a local band, all of which feature within the magazine. The colver will follow a strict colour scheme of pink, grey, black and white. This will also be the main colour scheme for the contentce and double page spread.

Masthead designs

I will adjust the colour of the text depending on the colour scheme of my magazine cover.

I think the CRACKED font is the best as it symbolizes loud dangerous music. I think the font suited my style of magazine as i am aiming to achieve a rock themed mag.

I choose the name of my magazine by looking through 'technical' terms related to music. I found a couple of terms which I likes such as 'Eco' and 'Voce', I felt that Tune suited the style of music the best.

My Music magazine photos

This pic is too dark, however I could use Photoshop to lighten it.

This photo also shows the band The Dead String Brothers. I like the worms-eye view angle of this shot as dominates the guitarist over the viewers giving him power. I also like the contrast and depth of Field between the guitarist, the singer and the drummer.

A picture taken at Tingewick Hall 2009, the picture here shows the lead singer of the band Two Fingers Of Fire Water. The composition is accurate however I could lighten and rotate the image to make it suitable of my cover.

This is a picture of Richard Ashcroft playing at Stowe School 2009, I like the colours used here as the blue shines down on Richard illuminating him from the backdrop. I will crop the left of the image as this is disrupting the balance of the image.

This is a picture of the lead singer (Joel Pott) from the band Athlete, Again the lighting here is very vibrant which makes the picture stand out from the background, however it is unclear who the singer is and from what band.

Text

Relevant Information about written content for our covers

Anticipated Albums

Vampire Weekend-Contra, 12/1/09

Editors-In this light and on this evening, 19/1/10

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club-Beat the devil's Tattoo, 9/3/10

Linkin Park, 2010

Metro Station, 2010

Panic! At The Disco, 2010

(NME music awards take place in London in February 2010).

Rage Against The Machine, Number 1 Christmas single.

All Time Low, Young Guns, The Blackout and My Passion feature on the Kerrang! and Relentless energy Tour, 2010.

Analyzing the leading music magazine pages.

View more presentations from Chenderit School.

Target Audience

Here are the target audiences for similar music magazines:

kerrang! Magazine: "Individually minded, independent of thought and musically experienced, an audience defined by attitude, passion and loyalty."

Q Magazine: "Open minded experience seekers, the Q audience don’t define themselves by the music they listen to. Music is an important passion, but their love of music will never be to the detriment of their other passions, such as film, sport and comedy."

MOJO Magazine: "Discerning and passionate music aficionados, the MOJO audience is predominately male (72%) and affluent (36% AB). These heavy consumers of music see their passion as discovery without boundaries, genre and decade being secondary to quality."

My target audience will male with a passion for rock/indie bands. The age group I have chosen are teenagers+ (18-25). As I am aiming my magazine at a thin range of age groups, I will sell less copies, however, I will have to plan my magazine so that it suites the life style of all the different ages that fall between 18-25.
A few facts about my target audience:
What do they drink? Alcohol, tea, coffee
How do they travel? Cars or public transport
Are they fashionable? Yes
What genre of music do they enjoy? Rock, metal, indie, electronic rock.
What films/TV do they enjoy viewing? Comedy, horror, sports.
Favorite locations? pub/club, with friends.
I have chosen a target audience of the ages 18-25, who are laid-back, funny, intelligent, fashionable and enjoy most types of rock related music.

Media studies magazine development.
Rock Mags:

Q magazine
A Different Take On Music
Q is a music magazine published monthly in the United Kingdom, with a circulation of 130,179 as of June 2007. Q was first published in 1979. Originally was to be called Cue (as in the sense of cueing a record, ready to play), but the name was changed so that it wouldn't be mistaken for a snooker magazine. Another reason, cited in Q's 200th edition, is that a single-letter title would be more prominent on newsstands.

Kerrang magazine
Live life loud
Kerrang! was first published on 6 June 1981. During the 1980s and early 1990s the magazine placed many thrash and glam metal acts on the cover (like Mötley Crüe, Slayer, Bon Jovi, Metallica, Poison, Testament, Venom) but later discarded them when grunge acts such as Nirvana rose to fame.

Mojo magazine
Mojo is a popular music magazine published by Bauer, monthly in the United Kingdom. Mojo was first published on 15 October 1993. Often criticised for its frequent coverage of classic rock acts such as The Beatles and Bob Dylan.

Other magazines.
Classic Rock is a British magazine dedicated to the radio format of classic rock, published by Future Publishing, who are also responsible for its "sister" publication Metal Hammer. Although firmly focusing on key bands from the 1960s through early 1990s. It recently published its 100th issue and now has a higher circulation than the NME.

Raw Magazine was founded in the summer of 1988. Producers came together to create Metal Hammer magazine having split from Kerrang! The first issue went on sale on August 31 of that year as a fortnightly publication and steadily grew to become a serious rival to the more established Kerrang!. Rock Hard was one of the first songs released by the Beastie Boys, released by record label Def Jam on 12" in 1984. The song contains samples from the AC/DC song "Back in Black"; the Beastie Boys used this sample without legal permission.

Ray Gun was an American alternative rock-and-roll magazine, first published in 1992 in Santa Monica, California. The result was a chaotic, abstract style, not always readable, but distinctive in appearance. The cutting-edge advertising, musical artists and pop culture icons spotlighted were typically ahead of the curve.

Final pages

This is my front cover for my school magazine. Here you can see the image of my classmate and the images of the kids used as a background. I got a dozen chenderit students to run down the hill screaming at me while I took their picture. I used a variety of fonts here, cracked, impact, and georgia. I used red and white for the text as it relates to the school colors and it is easy to read. I have placed my mast head in the centre in-front of the image, I really wanted the text behind the arms of the kids, for this I would have had to cut the arms from the image then placed them directly over the old arms of the original image.

This is my contents page, for my school magazine. I created the background, which I am most pleased with, using photoshop, I stared by coloring the the background grey and used artistic tools, mosaic, to create the grid style. I then placed a text box over the grid and typed my text. I used white and red which relate to the front page, the school colors and they are easy to read with the black background, I created the black background by editing the text box and filing it in with black. I then created a glow, in back which fades the black out. I did a similar thing with the contents title. I created a glow 'red' and increased the radius to 3 cm.

Here is one of the images used on the front cover, I have used my classmate to pose as a Britain's got talent winner. I have photoshopped her face using curves, levels, brightness and contrast, the plaster tool and the dodge tool. I also used the paint brush to bring out the red in her cheeks. I have placed her over the top of a background created my using 'artistic tools' and selecting mosaic. I also used the gradient tool to create the circular patterns in the top and bottom corners. I blurred around the face, emphasizing the point of interest, which is her face.

School Magazine photos

This is the image I photoshopped and used as the Front cover of my magazine, I used curves, levels and the dodge tool to increase the contrast and to ensure the focus is on the children rather than the background.

I like the image as the kids are wearing the Chenderit school logo, which I brightened using the dodge tool, the image has also got a nice composition, almost like an arrow, which leads the eye to certain pieces of text. The image has a very strong impact on the front cover but does not disturb the reader from the text or make the page too messy.

This is one of the pictures I rejected from my final magazine cover and contents page as I had taken better shots which were composed slightly better. I found also that I had a similar image which had more drama and impact.

Using Photoshop; Image manipulation

This is my second montage of image modification using photoshop. I have focused on the contrast of the images, using curves, levels and brightness and contrast. I have also adapted the artistic styles.

I have experimented with a picture on photoshop, I have used a few artistic layers such as, pastels, sketch and neon glow. I have also liquified the image and removed the color to create a grey skate image.