Evaluation

Evaluation on Prezi

Front Cover, Contents Page And Double Page Spread;

Production Of Hip-Hop Magazine Double Page Spread

Production Of Hip-Hop Magazine Contents Page

Production Of Hip-Hop Magazine Cover

NME Case Study

NME is a magazine that has been around since the 50s. They have been making weekly editions since March 1954. Their popularity increased week to week and in the 1970s they became Britain’s number one magazine.

Two thirds of the UKs women read magazines from NME’s publishers, IPC media. Around 46% read IPC media magazines, which is almost 26million people.

The total circulation figures from January- June is 33,875. This was down 17.3% from the year before. A huge drop, this is mainly due to the online features NME now offer.

From recent research this is what I have found about the audience for NME –

·         65% male

·         50% 16-24

·         23% 25-34

·         ABC1 79%

NME made its first published issue all the way back to 7^th March 1952. Since then NME has grown and grown and become one of the leading UK magazine producers. They mainly base around punk rock and indie.

NME distributes there magazine weekly to people that subscribe to them. The subscription is also at around 31% of their total readers. They are also distributed to stores and they are then sold from there.  A digital version is also regularly sent out to subscriber emails.

NME also sponsor other brands; 

Advertising will raise the awareness of NME and advertising increases the audience because of this. 

Due to the introduction and raise in Internet users the amount of readers for NME magazines has dropped significantly. Many other magazine companies have decided to go fully online whereas NME still have their loyal customers that choose to continually purchase the magazine due to their high quality publication and stories. 

Flat Plan For Double Page Spread

Flat Plan for the Contents Page

This is a conventional flat plan for hip-hop Magazines. A large main image along with a large Masthead is supported by the text which is accompanied with page numbers. The layout is also of the letter O as it will see the image first then read the Masthead, then the text and the features at the bottom of the page. The page numbers will be put in so it is more user friendly for the audience. The text will also be simple and just give a vague point on what the page will feature, e.g. 'Interview with..'.

This Flat plan looks very similar to the first flat plan however the features are placed at the top of the page and there is also a supporting image for this flat plan. Also for this flat plan the Rule of thirds is applied as the image will be taking up the first third of the page. Like the first flat plan the text will be vague and contain page numbers. The supporting image will be used as a teaser to see who an article may be about. 

Masthead

The Masthead for the magazine will be 'Hustle'. The reason for this is because the word hustle is often used in and around the hip-hop industry and also many of the artists themselves use the term. The word itself is linked to money which is the main reason most hip-hop artists try and make it big because of the money. That is why I thought it would be necessary to use a Term that links to Hip-Hop rather than a meaningless word.

Moodboard 

Moodboards are used to give people an idea of what sort of things a certain genre consists of. The moodboard I have made is for Hip-Hop. Using this Moodboard will help me with the conventions that I should base my Magazine Cover, Contents and Double Page spread on. 

All the things in the mood are usually based inside the magazine. Starting from Left to right; The image of Megan Fox is used as images of Females like her are consistently featured inside a magazine. They are used because of the target audience Hip-Hop magazines consist of, which is Males. The Escalade (car) is used as it is usually the featured as the gangster muscle car. It is big, bulky and gives an intimidating feeling to those around it. This is what artists like to do to others as they mainly come from a gangster background. The Watch (left) and Ring (right) is used mainly by hip-hop artists as they always want to show off there money and jewellery is the best way of doing this. The images of the two males is mainly used for three different reasons. The male image on the left is used to show off his body and his bling. Many hip-hop artists are very muscular and they try to show of there muscles in order to be intimidating, which is as said before a very common convention. The two images on the right, both the same person, is used to show of the tattoo's and him smoking. This is also very common as they like to display different things to do with there life. The shoes and cap are also mainly used to show an Artists 'Swagger'. The headphones are used to show passion for music of an Artist.

I hope after creating this moodboard that it will help me with ideas of images and backgrounds that can be used for my hip-hop magazine. I have identified the ideal conventions for a magazine and this will make it easier to choose the type of image I want to have in my hip-hop magazine.

Conclusion Of Questionnaire

1) I had asked an equal amount of Males and Females to answer questions from my questionnaire.  

2)

As we can see from the results from the 2^nd question, Hip-Hop is the most favourite music Genre. This will be ideal for my questionnaire as now I can see what the audience want as they will be the ones that I want to sell the magazine off too. 

3)

For number 3 I chose to do this type of question because many people wonder if hip-hop magazines are specifically aimed towards just Males. I knew I had to include this question because there is no better way to know if hip-hop magazines are just aimed at males and females than the audience themselves knowing.

As you can see the majority voted yes, however the majority of males had chosen this as they will probably feel that hip-hop is just targeted towards males. Nevertheless there were also females that did vote yes, they will concede the fact that hip-hop may be one dimensional, but some will not.

4) The majority of people for this question had voted YES. It was very close however and all the females had said these images are not acceptable. There were few males that said these images were not acceptable also.

I included this question as there are many male magazines, excluding hip-hop magazines that have these types of images. They are very successful magazines as they aim towards the males as they are obviously sexy. However there are also females that are curious to the story/image also. That is the reason for the magazines success.

5) The majority of the people that done the questionnaire are the target audience for my magazine; 15-24. There were two however that was out of this age group.

I chose to put in this question based on my interest. I wanted to know if the age group should be extended and if there are older readers that tend to buy hip-hop magazines. 

6)

 I chose two completely different types of magazines but just as effective. The clothing, lighting, colouring, layout was all different. There was almost the opposite. So the reason why I included this question was too see what clothing, lighting, colouring and layout structure they like but instead of asking them about each bit, I chose to indirectly answer. I got the same results as I probably would have had I asked the audience about each topic but I done it differently by just asking them which magazine cover they prefer.

Magazine A was significantly the more popular magazine cover. I will obviously now take this question into consideration as this will have an affect how my magazine should be presented and created.

7) Price is a big factor for a magazine. If it costs too much then people will not buy it. The price must be just right to get the best amounts of profits. Nearly every person said that prices from £1-£2 is the best.

8) This question will have a huge effect on my front cover. I needed to know if having one image is better than having two or more images. 90% of people thought that having one large image is better. I have also looked at previous popular hip-hop magazines and the majority of them usually use one image.

9) 95% of people think that having a celebrity on the cover of a magazine influences them buying a magazine. This will have to make me work harder, knowing that 95% of people only buy a magazine because of who they see on the front cover not because of what they see and what’s on there. 

10)

Most people thought that D would be the most likely font to be used in a magazine. This was due it being more bold and aiming towards the male audience. Nobody voted for B and E because they were not bold and didn’t seem very masculine. 

Questionnaire Results

Questionnaire

Conclusion Of Research

I learnt many things from my research of real magazine covers, contents pages, double page spreads, fonts and types faces, all of these tend to aim at a male audience. They all include the likely conventions that are likely to appear inside a hip-hop magazine which are; Often a male rapper, with jewellery, caps and tattoo’s. However you can find females featured on the front of the cover, these will aim at a male audience due to the female usually showing a lot of there skin. 

Also the colours that are used often for a music magazine are dark. This is mainly to show the hip-hop artists ‘gangsta’ side of there life. The background will also usually be black or white to make the person on the front of the cover stand out more. Black and white are usually the best colours to pick for a magazine, they work very well with each other due to the contrast in colours. 


However it is important to have that 3^rd and maybe 4^th colour, just to break it up.

The fonts used for all the parts of the magazine aim at males. They have that rough and gangsta look to it, which is a usual convention also for a hip-hop magazine. They are not always just targeted towards males, as some can be curvy which tend to aim towards females also. So it is important to get the correct Typeface for a magazine.

The conventions are also a main part of the magazine. These are the sort of things that will make it obvious that it is a hip-hop magazine, the mis-en-scene that can be used are; Hats, Scarves, Tattoos, Jewellery and also showing the physique. These will all be key elements that I will be thinking about when designing my own magazine.

All the images used in the analysis are all necessary and have meanings. They must link to the story and must also be effective. I must know where to place the imagery and make sure it is as affective as possible. The text layout must be thought about also, so that it meets the layout letter which can be T, Z and I.  


Lighting is also important. The angle, colour and brightness will all have to be though about on the imagery to make it as effective as possible. 

I will be thinking about all these things when designing my magazine after looking at popular magazines there is a consistent convention, layout and imagery used. I shall try and make it like them too get the popularity and make sure it is as affective as they are. 

Type Faces

This font looks very urban and street type. The blocked lettering makes it seem very masculine and also because the font has not been written in a straight line it makes it seem more Masculine. This font would be appropriate for a Hip-Hop magazine because of this and as it aims at a specific target audience that is most likely to purchase a hip-hop magazine.

Though this font has rounded edges and it would most likely appear in a female magazine, however it does look modern and funky. Nevertheless if it was to appear in a music magazine I feel it would most likely appear in a pop magazine. This font would mainly target young males and females from the ages of 15-24.

This is the type of font most likely to appear in a hip-hop magazine. The spiral lettering and partially blocked lettering all aim towards the male audience which is necessary for hip-hop readers. It looks like graffiti and also very street type, so it would be good for it to feature. It would aim towards just men and from the ages of 15-24. 

This font is very good for headings and mastheads in hip-hop magazines. Due to its scruffy and battered look I feel that it would aim towards the male audience. Males are not always the cleanest, especially the Teenagers; which are the target audience. This would be a great font type and could feature in a hip-hop magazine. 

Double Page Spread Analysis

Colour Scheme

Colours are an important aspect you must consider when designing a magazine. The colours will give the target audience a simpler view for your magazine. For example, if you was designing a magazine for children you would expect to have red, yellow and green, as they are the more happy colours that will give of a friendly vibe towards there targeted audience. I am designing a hip-hop magazine so I cant use these brighter colours as hip-hop usually features more street wise people and aims at a teenage and young adult audience. The colours I should be thinking about is the darker colours. However I cannot make the colours too dark because I do not want to give a negative vibe of to my audience.

Colours such as red give of a different interpretation. When we see the colour red we can think of different thinks such as love and blood. So when your using red you have to use it wisely and make sure it fits in with the theme of your magazine. Green and yellow are bright colours, so would not be expected in my hip-hop magazine. However for my school magazine it could be used. The reason is I would be aiming at the younger audience and bright colours will appeal to them and catch there attention.

Flat Plans

This flat plan is suitable for a magazine that can have a large image on the front cover. The layout would be of the letter I. This flat plan would look very processional as it can cover the whole of the page. You still have the necessary requirements of the cover lines, large image, features, bar code and of course the masthead. 

This flat plan has the masthead, main cover lines, large image, features, the bar code and the flash button. This is a good flat plan as the layout for this would be of a backwards C. It would cover the necessary things a reader would be looking for and should get them interested in purchasing the magazine.