Evaluation and Audience Feedback

Evaluation

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Through the use of models dressed in dark colours with piercings in awkward places e.g the tongue, I've represented the punk and gothic social groups. These are the groups that actually listen to this sort of music and stereotypically dress in dark clothes and have unique hairstyles or long hair which my front cover model has. The facial expression of my model is extreme which also represents the social group as its people normally dress extreme, act energetic and extreme and do not classify themselves as normal average people.

My contents page model has his shirt off which reveals a very masculine side which can be associated with many artists of the same genre and many people in the punk/gothic social group. The idea is to look rather dark, scary and strong which I feel is done well through the white mask and the intimidating body frame.

What media institution might distribute your media product and why?

The maedia institution I have chosen is Gordon and Gotch as they aer the distributors of 'Kerrang!' thus will have a lot of experience when distributing this sort of product. They will know where it should be sold attract audience's attention and they may have customer loyalty which brings more customers to the magazine because of who it is being distributed by. Magazines may be sold all over the country in places like HMV and WHSmith.

How did you attract/address your audience?

By using conventions of real media products such as dark colour shemes and bold titles and using models who were dressed like people from that social group I attracted my target audience as they would find similarities in their clothing and musical tastes and the tastes of the rockstars in the magazine. The use of guitars would immediately show that it is a music magazine and the clear image of the rockstar would attract her fans and would the large titles would attract loyal customers of the magazine. I made the price 3.50 pounds which is not too cheap but is still affordable. I didn't want it too be too cheap so it wouldn't devalue the magazine andyet not too expensive so that people would still think the free items are actually free and not that I am tricking them by making them pay higher prices for the magazine as a whole whilst still saying there are free items i.e. posters.


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

Through construction and blogging I have learnt how to use certain websits and programs more effectively. I used Photoshop and InDesign to edit my pictures. I've used youtube and google as research sources and have used blogger.com to write a journal on my products. In all programs and sites I am now more familiar with.

Google is the most popular search engine in the world and it is used to gather information about anything and everything. It is used by typing a word into the search bar and then it brings together all the information that it can find relating to what was typed. I used it to find out more about magazines and contents pages. I searched on how they looked, the most popular ones and their distributors. I have learnt better ways to research media products and good media product websites through usage of this site.

Photoshop is a program that is used to manipulate images. Through this program one can change a digital image in almost any way possible and fuse them with more than one other image. I used Photoshop to add effects like text and barcode pictures onto my image after taking it a on digital camera. I've learnt how to use this program well as I had no skills with it before this course.

InDesign is another program used to manipulate images. Through this program one can change a digital image and fuse images together although this program is better than Photoshop at laying out and organizing more than one different image on one canvas page especially for magazine contents pages. I've learnt how to use this program well as I also had no skills with it before this course.

Blogger.com is a website where people can write their ideas and views about anything. It can also be used to write stories and, in this case, journals. You can write anything in your blog and post it so it is available for the world to read. I used the blog as a journal on the process of creating my media products. It proved very useful and I have learnt to use it more efficiently and organize my thought better when writting.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

My magazine is aimed at both males and females from around ages 14-25. It is adapted to have a slightly bigger male fan group than female fan group as does the genre. The magazine is directed at these ages because they are the main ages in life when people associate themselves with the punk/gothic social group and are thus more likely to listen to metal rock music. Before 14 most children would have not entered such a phase and usually after 25 adults would have started moving out of such a phase and may develop new interests.

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

Since completing my preliminary product my knowledge on Photoshop has increased a lot. I have learnt different ways of fading and cutting out images. I've learnt how to place images on other images and change the colour, brightness and filters of the pictures. I am now able to do a lot more complex things to make my products look more sophisticated and realistic. I am now more confortable with programs such as Photoshop and InDesign.

Audience Feedback

At the end of my work I conducted a short questionnaire to see how my audience responded to the magazine. I asked questions to people between the ages of 16-18 who listened to this sort of music and brought magazines like 'Kerrang!'

Question 1: What are your thoughts on the title and the colour schemes?

Most of the audience liked the idea of 'Fuse' and the connection it had to electrical inst6ruments and the way of life of its performers. They also liked the way it glowed on the page but suggested that the 'u' should be a little more visable as it is being blocked by the models head. The audience felt that I had successfully used conventions of media products as I had used a dark colour scheme which enhanced the darkness of the genre and goes well with the dark clothing of the models.


Question 2: What did you feel about the model's dressing, poses and facial expressions?

All of the audience agreed that the two models looked like rockstars, not only because of the guitars but because of the facial expressions, dark dressing and 'bad-ass', controversial poses that are conventional to the social group and the genre. Many people liked how the female model stuck her tongue out as it futher enhanced her crazy character.


Question 3: What do you think of the band names?

Rock band names are usually very strange and unique so I tried to keep to this trend when naming my made up bands. The audience laughed at some of the names and liked them as they were very creative. A personal favourate of a certain person's was 'Pharoh's Slavez'.


Question 4: Would you pay for this magazine?

Many people said they would due to the variety of content shown on the contents page. Quite a few didn't mind paying 3.50 but there were a few that felt they would by it for at least 50p less. I, however, stuck to the original price as I had quite a few people who would still buy it at that.