Second Draft (Front Cover)

This is the second draft of the front cover for my AS Media coursework. As you can see, I have significantly improved aspects of my front cover to improve its quality.

I have decreased the size of the essential information and now, it doesn't overshadow the rest of the front cover. Generally, I have decreased the size of the font to include more cover lines to offer a broader choice for the target audience. I have also changed the colours to determine a clearer colour scheme to my magazine. That colour scheme is black, red and white. Q and NME follow a similar colour scheme and these are the magazines that have inspired mine.

I have also completely changed the main cover line. I have changed the content to give a clearer indication to the target audience as to what the main article is about. I also changed the colour of the text so that it fitted in with the colour scheme. The previous colour was yellow and it stood out like a sore thumb.

The most distinctive change that I have had made to the front cover is the masthead. I have changed the colours so that it would fit in with the background colour and I have increased the size of the box and the text to make it look more professional.

Overall, I am very happy with the finished result of this front cover. I should receive better feedback and better marks for my coursework.

Double Page Spread

This is the first draft of the magazine double page spread for my AS media coursework. This is the third and final component of my coursework. I had to write an article that was suited the theme and the target audience of this magazine. My magazine is inspired by the likes of NME, Q, Kerrang.etc and its content normally consists of musicians of a rock/indie/songwriter genre, slating other people in the music industry and bragging about their drug and alcohol lifestyle.

Surprisingly, I found the double page spread the easiest to develop out of the three components and that was because, I didn't have spend a large amount of time placing boxes in certain places. All I needed to do was write in the text, which I got from my double page spread draft on blogger. I wrote a draft because, it was a forum where I could type down ideas for the article.

Overall, I think that I have done very well in this aspect of my coursework. I think that the double page spread looks very professional because, of the colours used. The inspiration for my magazine, NME possesses similar colours to the ones I have used. I also think that you would find an article that looks similar to this in a professional music magazine.

I think that the only thing I would improve upon is the way I edited the image into the page. This is because, you can still see parts of the background of the original photo so it is more obvious that it is edited. The image doesn't really look professional. I edited the background by dragging several grey coloured boxes onto the page.

In order to undertake this task, I researched professional double page spreads from NME, Q and Kerrang for inspiration. I was researching what the layout of a double page spread looks like and what the content is. I found that in a double page spread, the image was located on one side of the page and all of the text was located on the other side. I decided to use this format because, it has appeared in most music magazines. The content mainly consisted of the act telling the interviewer about his/her upcoming album and I have stuck to this content for my article.

Double Page Spread draft

This is the draft for the article in my double page spread. I am undertaking this task because, it is a platform of ideas for the final product. I have decided to use the question/answer format for my article because, it is straight to the point and it provides the reader with more clearer and direct information.

How does it feel to be nominated for the Critics Choice Award at this years Brit Awards?
It feels great because, I see this award as a springboard for a successful career. Although I do appreciate the fan base I already have, but its not exactly going to earn me millions or send me around the world on tour is it? I won't be necessarily bothered if I don't win because, I'm already signed to a label and I'll still be releasing my album anyway. This award is basically a cheating method for artists to break into the charts, but you can't exactly deny the facts.

Tell us about your upcoming album.
It is called Worldwide to represent my hopes of becoming a worldwide success and I also think that the name has a good ring to it. It's full of songs that I've written over the years that have all been inspired by the likes of Oasis, Coldplay, as in their first two albums, and the Red Hot Chilli Peppers. I've spent the last year hiding the wilderness of a London studio, which has been an absolute nightmare for me because, London is like a holiday destination to me. I was surrounded by all of these pubs and nice restaurants and so on, so me and my band had difficulty concentrating.

What are your hopes for the future?
The ultimate goal is to have billions of dollars, my own flat in a spaceship, a spare room in the Playboy mansion and play Batman in his three hundredth film. Talking in terms of music, I'd like to have number 1 singles, number 1 albums, sell out tours, arenas or any establishment where people gather to see live music. I also want to be up there with the likes of Bob Dylan, Nirvana, Oasis, Coldplay, Robbie Williams and so forth. I wouldn't mind winning a few Brit Awards, have a few drunken rants and call those acceptance speeches and I think that would really liven that place up because, it hasn't made interesting viewing at all these past few years since nobody can get drunk anymore. However, I would still like to achieve the ambitions outside of music of course.

How has the journey been so far?
Well, it hasn't exactly been a walk in the park as I am not a popstar. I am a serious musician, but for some reason, we're not very well liked by the music industry. Maybe, it is because, everyone is jealous of our talent who know's? Subsequently, I have been rejected by countless major labels and it has really knocked my confidence, but you can't give up your passion, no matter how many people tell you that you're wasting your life.

What is your current take on the current direction the music industry is going in?
I don't really like it to be honest because, it seems that everyone has sold their soul. People like Adele, Ed Sheeran, Professor Green and Coldplay have all lost their way and I fear that they may never find their way back to how good they once were. I only liked Coldplay's first two albums and I liked Ed Sheeran and Adele before they became untouchable. As for Professor Green, he lost all credibility from me as a rapper when I saw him perform on the National Lottery over Christmas. I mean, you wouldn't see Eminem dead doing that, would you? I guess I have this view because, I am not a mainstream person and all of these people are now mainstream. However, I must stress that we need new groundbreaking Eminem's instead of all those rappers rapping about the same thing. We've heard enough of all of that. We need to hear rhymes that affect us. We also need new Michael Jackson's, Craig David's, new Coldplay's, a new Sex Pistols and so forth. It is vitally important that the music industry stays young and ever-changing to fulfill certain roles, certain genres. Otherwise, it would become a laughing stock, full of aging artists trying to act all cool and young.

Second Draft (Contents Page)

This is the second draft of my contents page. As of now, I have printed it out and I am currently awaiting feedback. I am now going to evaluate how I think I have done on this task, what went well and what I could have improved upon.

First Draft (Contents Page)

I have made lots of improvements to my contents page because, it didn't look like a professional contents page at all. It looked more like a very creative powerpoint presentation.

The main improvement I have made is decreasing the font size. When I printed out the first draft, the text was too big for a contents page. The other reason why I decreased the font size was to include more features to ensure that the magazine had more to offer.

I also included a 'features' and 'regulars' because, I have found that most magazines use this in their contents pages. As a result, I could include more features.

Overall, I think that this task went very well and I am very happy with the progress I have made because, this contents page does look very professional.

First Draft Feedback (Contents Page)

This is the feedback I had received for my first draft contents page.

I was told that a magazine advertises more than 6-7 articles and that the font was too big by an industry standard. I was also told to include more capital letters to make the font stand out and to make my columns straight and even.

This feedback has been a massive help to me because, I now know what I need to do to improve my contents page and get better marks.

First Draft Feedback (Front Cover)

I have now received feedback for the first draft of my front cover. There were lots of things I was told to improve upon.

Starting with the top of the magazine, the feedback stated that the text of the skyline usually covers the length of the top and I would obviously need to change the text. Similar feedback applied to the masthead. I was told that it covers at least 20-25% of the page. For the text below, I was told that it was too big for just essential information so I needed to decrease the size of that.

For the the bottom of the magazine, I was told that the barcode required size reduction because, it is only essential information and it doesn't actually relate to the content of the magazine. I was also told that the content of the main cover line was vague and it didn't really explain what the main article was going to be about. Another aspect that I needed to improve upon was the fonts because, I was told that they were limited. Although, I used different fonts that just looked similar.

The point of this activity is to reflect on what I need to improve upon to get better marks on my coursework.

Preliminary Task Feedback

Preliminary Task Evaluation


The link above takes you to the blog, where I evaluated the preliminary task that was such an essential part of my coursework. This was the task that counted towards nothing in relation to my coursework, but if I didn't complete it, I would lose around 15% of my final mark.

I have now been given feedback for that task. For the preliminary front cover, I received an E grade and for the contents page, I received a U grade. Since this task doesn't actually count towards my final grade, I am not overly concerned about these grades, especially since my main front cover and contents page are a lot better and I should get higher grades for the main task.

I do understand why I received these grades though.

The preliminary front cover doesn't look professional at all and I wouldn't buy this magazine if I saw it in a store. It looks a design brief made on powerpoint. The only essential information that I included on the front cover was the barcode, which didn't really help in making the front cover look professional. I did include the date of the issue, but again, it didn't really help. I also didn't take advantage of the space and I only included few articles with basic text and font that didn't look like text you would find a professional magazine. Not only that, the different colours of the text made it difficult to read.

The preliminary contents page was worse. It looked unfinished and it resembled something you would find on powerpoint. The image I used for the contents was the same image I used for the front cover. Again, the image and the text made it difficult to read. There was also no clear colour scheme because, I used a variety of different colours which all made the text difficult to read. None of the text stood out apart from the text that wasn't ingrained into the contents image.

If I was to undertake this again, there would be several improvements that I would make to both the front cover and the contents page.
For the front cover, I would have a more clearly established colour scheme and an image that was less busy to allow the text to stand out. I would have also used more article suggestions to take advantage of the space because, the front cover looked bare and lifeless. I would have also used a more bolder font and perhaps a different colour and I would take more time to ensure that the text was readable. I would also include more essential information (issue number, magazine website) to make the magazine look more professional.
For the contents page, I would use another image and I would also use more text with different fonts. Like with the front cover, I would use a more clearer colour scheme to relate to the theme of the magazine and I would construct the images better because, the end result of the image looked unfinished and basic.

However, the feedback is going to help me massively for when I undertake this task again because, I now know what improvements I need to make to increase my marks. I suppose it would have helped with the main task if I had received this feedback before I started it because, I would have known not what to do in advance. However, I do think that the front cover and contents page for the main task is a lot better than the preliminary task.