Evaluation

Q1 from james_mccarthy

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Q3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

In an ideal world, I would have selected an independent publishing company to distribute my magazine because my magazine contains so much inside it that it could easily cover three or four magazines alone. If I had to select one I would have to pick one that do not currently distribute a hip-hop magazine, and for that reason I would select IPC Media because they only currently distribute one magazine, which is ‘NME’.

IPC Media were founded in 1968 and are a magazine publisher based in the United Kingdom and are a subsidiary of Time inc. They currently have 61 titles underneath their name and sell 350 million magazine copies every year. It would benefit not only our magazine but the publisher as well because there is very minimal competition on the British market for hip-hop magazines so by introducing one would maximize profits as by releasing one you are satisfying a demand from British hip-hop fans.

With regards to distribution, I would like my magazine to be sold at most chained newsagents in the United Kingdom, and all four of the ‘big four’ supermarkets (Tesco, ASDA, Sainsbury’s and Morrison’s). From there I will be able to reach people interested in magazines to buy the magazine, but to further maximize sales I would then expand to music stores such as HMV and Play.com to sell my magazine because I would reach out to a lot of hip-hop fans.

I would promote subscription as I already give the reader the option to subscribe on the contents page. I would need to utilize e-marketing as a platform to spread the use of my magazine. I would produce a website which would feature a lot of exclusive a lot of exclusive content which cannot be received via a magazine e.g. a video of an interview. I would also use social media like Twitter, Instagram and Facebook to interact with readers of the magazine

Q4 from james_mccarthy

Q6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

For taking the shots I used an SLR camera. I used two different camera settings when I was taking the shots which were dependent on the setting. When I was taking the shots in an outside setting, which wasn’t in the studio so variables weren’t controlled e.g. the weather, I wouldn’t use flash mode because there is enough light as it stands. When I was in an inside setting I would use flash to maximize the image’s potential. With lighting, I would use high-key lighting inside the studio as it would beam upon the model and boost the artist’s image.

For doing audience research I used an online questionnaire website called ‘SurveyMonkey’ which would enable a user to but a survey online and get responses from people. I used that website to get the opinion of the general public about magazines and hip-hop.  The responses I got enabled me to progress in the production stages of the magazine, and I used the responses to produce graphs so I can clearly see the most popular for each different question.

When producing the pages themselves, I used Adobe Photoshop, which is a software mainly used for editing images. The most frequently used tool on Photoshop for me was the magnetic crop tool which would enable me to cut the background out of the images that I took in the studio. I used the text tool very often also to implement the text in my piece. I also used the grid tool to align all of images together on the page. I also used a website called ‘dafont.com’ which is a text generator and provides users with advanced pieces of text which opposes the very generic ones provided by Adobe.

Research and Planning Marks

Level 3 (Proficient): 14/20

 

Add to textual analysis, show drafts next to professional pages, add picture for reader profile.

Also post production logs and more comments/discussion for each task.  

Final Pages

Final Pages

Magazine Proposal

Magazine Proposal

The name of my magazine will be $wank as of popular demand in my questionnaire in which I distributed. $wank is a good name for a magazine because it is a rising term in hip-hop but is not extremely mainstream yet and wouldn't look too cheesy. The  dictionary definition of the term 'Swank' is "display one's wealth, knowledge, or achievements in a way that is intended to impress others", which is in perfect relation to hip-hop because most rappers rap about their achievements and boast about their image and how they can afford expensive clothes. The  use of the dollar sign instead of the 'S' is a good addition because it enhances the image of the name and the magazine, because ones wealth is constantly being rapped about in most hip-hop tracks and the simple association can  be made between an dollar sign and hip-hop (see mood board). 

$wank magazine is going to be a hip-hop magazine covering all forms of hip-hop, presenting not only the big names of the genre, but underground artists on their ‘come-up’ which will not only aid the artists as they may gain some publicity from being featured in the magazine, but it will aid the magazine as it will introduce a whole new branch of the hip-hop genre to the hip-hop fans who will be reading the magazine, which will ultimately make the magazine become a source for good hip-hop music to the reader, which is what I want to achieve by releasing this magazine. Due to multiple areas of the genre to be covered in the magazine, the magazine will have multiple sections and a lot of content for the reader. Different sections in this magazine will include interviews with artists, tour dates, bios on artists and album reviews. One feature I would like to include which will separate $wank from other hip-hop magazines such as ‘XXL’ and ‘Vibe’ will be something that has been used before by other magazines, most notably, men’s magazine ‘FHM’ who faced intense competition with male magazine giants ‘nuts_­’ before they began to release an annual list known as the ‘FHM top 100’ which lists the top 100 beautiful women in the world, which not only enticed men but also women as the topic was their gender, then FHM was on a much higher pedigree to other men’s magazines. I too want to construct an annual list of the top 100 rappers as the whole world of hip-hop would be interested as there is currently nothing like that on the market, there is a top ten made by MTV but it only covers artists who are big and currently popular, whereas the $wank top 100 would cover all rappers, and their fan base size will not be a factor.

With regards to my audience, realistically, when making this decision it was quite simple, I had to take the public representation of the genre into account, which is quite negative. Most hip-hop artists came from rough backgrounds and rap heavily about their actions in the past whilst incorporating a lot of bad language which you wouldn’t hear in other genres, meaning the music isn’t usually played on radios and is rather restricted and reaches fans by true hip-hop fans hunting down an artist’s music rather than the music coming to them (over the radio and television). This magazine cannot appeal to the higher class of people as the higher class of people do not like the genre, most of the time, meaning this magazine with appeal to lower and middle class. $wank will appeal to this class as the price of the magazine will not be extremely expensive like the pricy magazines for the upper-class such as fashion magazine ‘Vogue UK’ which costs around £4.10. I would like $wank to appeal to men mainly because if you look at the genre, most rappers are male, and they rap a lot about girls (see mood board) in a very masculine way. Baring this in mind, hip-hop is slowly becoming the largest genre on the market, and a lot of female rappers are breaking through such as Nicki Minaj and Iggy Azelae, and their fans are mainly girls, meaning they are bringing girls to the hip-hop fandom and further showing how some girls will purchase this magazine. Considering hip-hop is a relatively new genre, making its major breakthrough in the late 80s with artists such as Eric B and Rakim becoming the first rappers out, the rappers inside are young, meaning it will be very rare seeing someone 35+ being a hip-hop fan, so I will make my magazine appeal to 17-27 roughly, by having young artists who are the same age as them being presented in the magazine. 

I have previously spoke about the public view on hip-hop and how it is looked upon differently than other genres, I plan to embrace this strange look and make the artists seem like they are quite powerful beings and are able as individuals, which represents the genre as quite an individualist genre, contrasting other genres where they will need a band to make music. The representations of others I will use will be negative to those outside the genre, but inside the genre they will seem positive. If female rappers are covered, the stereotypical female will be challenged as they too will look as powerful as the male rappers because all rappers try to make themselves to be represented as powerful, recent examples of this can be seen in the Kanye West BBC interview where he claims he wants to become a massive clothes designer and an architect and he claimed that he will be as big as Michelangelo, showing the power rappers nowadays believe they have. They are people that can influence millions of people through what they rap, and are idolised, an example of this is was the hologram of the late Tupac which rapped at the Coachella festival and the video of it went viral, showing how influential they can be. $wank will challenge the stereotypical rapper, most hip-hop magazines will show black rappers, only recently there have been only a few white rappers breaking through and making the covers such as Eminem, Mac Miller and Macklemore. I want to include some white rappers on mine so it will appeal to a wider audience and not only the Afro-Caribbean community 

My magazine will be an independent publication rather than part of a publishing group because the content of the magazine could easily make 3 or more full magazines if separated, so it would be easier if it was in a lone publication. The main competition with our magazine would be regards to the relevance in rap music, would be ‘XXL’ because ‘XXL’ is regarded as the premier hip-hop magazine and it has been referenced in many songs, most notably J.Cole and Kendrick Lamar’s ‘Forbidden Fruit’ where J.Cole says how hard you have to work just to get on the cover of the ‘XXL’. But with regards to versatility in the genre and the surrounding genres, the other main competitor is definitely ‘Vibe’ because ‘Vibe’ covers not only hip-hop but occasionally R&B and even pop once, meaning their audience is a lot larger than other hip-hop magazines. I would like my magazine to be sold firstly at all newsagents and major supermarkets, which would place it on the same level as all magazines and newspapers, I would then like to stretch the distribution levels further and sell it in all major music stores such as HMV and Play.com, as I want it to make the readers be extremely engrossed in it and rely on it for all information regarding their favourite genre, hip-hop. 

Reader Profile

Reader Profile of $wank Magazine

Shawn, 19, lives and breathes hip-hop. He doesn’t listen to any other genre but hip-hop, branching off into all forms of it, enjoying the latest stuff on the market and the old-school classics. When he is  not listening to music in his free time he is either watching hip-hop movies, his favourites being ‘Get Rich or Die Tryin’, ‘Notorious’ and  ‘8 Mile’ or reading up on the internet hunting down album/mixtape  rumours, concert news or new up-and-coming artists. He has a job with a rather low-pay salary, meaning the low cost of ‘$wank’ appeals to him greatly. When he is not spending his money on concert tickets or albums he is always ensuring that his wardrobe is in prestige condition. Although his income isn’t great he needs to make sure that the clothes he is wearing are perfect, he aspires to dress like some of his favourite rappers but is restricted sometimes financially when his favourite rappers are wearing 20,000 dollar gold chains. He likes ‘$wank’ magazine because it provides him with all of the news he needs in one place, saving him all the internet browsing time he uses. The magazine will provide him with a monthly summary of everything in the hip-hop world and he needs to be staying up-to-date.

Draft Sketches

 DRAFT SKETCHES

(Captured on a camera not a scanner due to technical errors)

The cover is good because it follows standard conventions of a music magazine e.g. the masthead at the top of the page and the barcode in the bottom corner. It also uses all the space possible and presents all of the main content inside the magazine which is what is going to sell the magazine upon the first glance. The magazine cover also uses bold writing for the masthead and the name of the main artist. There is one image on the cover of the artist in question and he is dressed in very typical hip-hop attire.

The contents page is very different to other contents pages as the layout is rather revolutionary in the sense that it includes more pictures that most hip-hop magazine contents pages. Conventions that it does actually follow are the size of the title of the page as 'contents' which is the largest piece of text on the page. It also has the page referenced number next to the article. There are four images of artists on the contents page, all of which have been referenced on the cover page with their name as an artist.

The double page spread is good because it follow the conventions of common double page spreads as the picture takes one side of the two pages and text takes the other page. It also has an individual quote in larger letters and highlighted than everything else from the article. The image used presents the whole body of the artist and depicts him in a setting, contrasting the previous two images on the cover and contents pages

Double Page Spread Article

Double Page Spread Article

Eazy J has taken hip-hop to new heights after the release of his latest album, Eamatic, which went platinum in record time. We caught up with Eazy J and asked him how he got to where he is today- "Being a kid in the city of Compton, life was hard. I have had a lot of friends who died and ended up in jail due to the evils of gang life, I knew I needed to escape. I always liked English in school, particularly poetry, and when I got entered into a rap battle by my friends that is where the story began. I was exposed to hip-hop, living where we were, so I always loved it. I won and got asked my rap name and a sample of my mixtape, I responded that I didnt have neither, they asked me how I won and I just said it was easy, and that  was my first ever rap name 'Easy'. I made the mixtape, entered more rap tournaments and then got scouted by a representative from Sock Nation and the rest was history, I left Compton now I live in LA, and I have never looked back." 

"After I dropped this album I have no choice but to live-up to my potential and become the best artist I can possibly be." Eazy went on to saying how he is very careful about his approach to the hip-hop game, he said: "I have seen many artists not make it or be torn apart financially by agents who take all of their money, not me. I'm here to stay. When I die I want to be remembered like my idols are and I want to be remembered not as a rapper, but as an artist or a revolutionary. I want them to think, Leonardo Da Vinci, Pablo Picasso and then there was Eazy J, the young kind from Compton, USA." Eazy J definitely has a lot going for him right this moment and we can see a lot of potential in this young man, what we have seen already there is definite talent, but will he live up to his potential? Only time will tell.