Photography Plan

The front cover of my Magazine will Contain a Large MCU of a group of people. It will resemble the band photos that are often seen on Kerrang! and NME. The photo will take up the majority of the page and also will be the Mainsell. The location will probably be similar to a Studio photograph with either a white, or Black backdrop. The people included in the photo will be wearing indie clothing similar to that worn by bands such as Kasabian. The Actors included in the photo will be friends of mine that are a similar age to myself. I will need an SLR camera and the use of the photography suite in college. This photo will not take long to capture and can be done in college time easily.

The photographs for my contents page and centrefold will take a lot more time. The centrefold will contain photos of the same group of people as on the cover. This is because the mainsell will be the article that will be included in my centrefold. For these photos, the plan is to travel to the seaside (Possibly Weston) where effective photography can take place. The costumes for the actors will be similar, if not the same as what was worn for the front cover photo. The photos may be taken at either 1 of 2 times. There is a possibilty of taking them in the day time, where I can get a pale backdrop. Either this or I will take the photos at night time and create a dark colour scheme for my Centrefold.

The contents page will contain photos of people not necessarily on the front cover. Whilst a photo of the same group of people will be included, some more people will be needed. This is because contents pages always contain information about the whole magazine, not just a single article. This means that several photos of different people will be needed. The locations for these photos may vary from person to person, but the majority will be taken with an SLR camera in the Photography suite.

Pre-Production Plans / Ideas

Before producing my magazine, I thought it would be useful to create some designs. I decided to do 2 diferent layouts for each page I would be creating. This would be cover, contents and centrefold.

This was my first design idea for a front. It contains a large MCU that would be of a band. Also, it contains an unsual layout for the masthead. I believe this will attract audience members as it is unusual and interesting. Also, the band name is listed below the photo and is being used as a mainsell.

My Second Cover idea has a smaller picture of the whole band. In my drawing the photo is smaller then I intended but still portrays what will be on the cover of this design. Also, the photo's seen on the right have a Poaroid design.

Of These 2 designs, the feedback that I got was that The Title of the first design was more appealing, also that the photo used was far more conventional of my genre and would connote the message I am trying to create better then the 2nd design.

My first contents page design got more positive feedback then the second. In my opinion I thought the 2nd would be more appealing, but after audience research I found out that this design had more appeal. After my research I found that the 2nd design had too much going on and was seen to be "too busy". My final Design may includ festures of both designs as both have Pro's and Con's. For example, whilst the 1st design seemed to convey more features that a typical Indie magazine would include, the 2nd design idea was seen to be more interesting as the photos could create a lot of appeal if the right ones were taken.

These Next 2 design were for my centrefold. The first design contained less photos and more information, similar to the of NME. This could be a successful design if the text used was split up more then the design i have created. After Audience research, i discovered that the design was seen to be boring, and too informative.

The second idea contained a lot more photography. This means that the article is being spread out far more and many people who saw this design said that it seemed far more interesting and was more suited towards my genre. One criticism I received was that if the wrong photos are taken then the colour scheme won't be effective. A reccomendation was to take the photos with a pale background, i.e. an overcast day, so that this would create the correct colour scheme on a page with a white background.

Audience Research

I uploaded my moodboard onto facebook. After doing this, I posed 3 question which were as follows:
1. Are these images appealing?
2. What genres of music would you associate with the moodboard?
3. Do you have any constructive criticisms?

Question 1: Are these Images Appealing?

Often, in response to this question, many people who answered said that the images are appealing, or would be for people who are interested in this style of music.

Question 2: What genres of music would you associate with the moodboard?

Almost every person left feedback that said the images connoted an Idie/Rock Genre. This is the feedback that I was hoping to receive as this is the genre that my magazine will be.

Question 3: Do you Have Any Constructive Criticism?

I didn't tend to get much criticism that could help me make changes to my mood board. I got several comments answering the questions posted, and all of them seemed very positive about the images in front of them as well as the way they were layed out.

From these responses I have got, I have realised several things. Many people mentioned that the images were appealing and interesting. From this, I can tell that I should include similar photos on my cover and in my magazine. Also, they convey the genre/genres that my magazine will contain, making them even more useful for a magazine like mine. The lack of constructive criticism shows to me that the viewers wer satisfied with the images and fonts they could see, hopefully by using this for my magazine, the same satisfaction will be had.

Audience Profile

A typical audience member of my magazine would be in the Age Range of 18-25, it could appeal to either gender, but possibly more so to males.
Also they would be very interested in Indie and Rock Music. Their favourite band might be: Kings of Leon, Arctic monkeys etc.
Typical Magazines that they may read would include: Kerrang!, NME & Rolling Stone. The music in these magazines is similar to mine, even if they are produced by mainstream companies rather then independent ones.
My typical audience member would be pretty casual with Television, but when they do watch it, it would probably include programmes such as "Jackass" or "Inbetweeners".
When using the Internet, social networking sites would often be used, such as Facebook, or Myspace. Also Youtube and iTunes would often be used as a way of listening to music.

Brands they would purchase would include Allsaints, Blood is the New Black, LRG etc.

The readers of this magazine would be very interested in keeping up to date with fashion and a lot of the money the spend would be on clothing.
On the Jicnar scale, my audience would probably fall into the C2, C1 categories.
C2 = Skilled manual workers - eg, plumber
C1 = Supervisory, clerical, junior administrative or professional - eg, labourer

Typical Features Of My Genre.

• Typically, the target audience for my genre is normally high teens to low 20's.
• The background colour is often white and involes a sans serif font for the masthead.
• Indie magazines are often to the point. They contain information that the target audience will care about, music related.
• The mode of address is almost always informal and casual. allowing the audience to feel relaxed and laid back when reading it.
• The photos used are almost always related to music, whether it be artists, bands or performances. The people featured in the photos are normally quite aggressive looking and are standing in powerful stances/poses.