The Time I Made My 7th Diary

As a result of technical issues and stress, I had not made consistent production diaries in the past couple of weeks. I decided to sum up everything I had accomplished within these 2 weeks and produce a diary. 

I shall now continue to create my magazine and will keep updating my every change(s) towards the magazine.

The Time I Visioned My Front Cover

The model I am going to use for my front cover and double page spread is called Joyel and I have named him 'Jay G' - a play on words from both artists Jay Sean and Jay Z. Due to Joyel's availability, I initially planned to take his photos first but couldn't. This meant that I had to start editing my contents page. However, now that I have taken his photographs, I have narrowed them down completely. 

Below is the photograph I am going to use for my front cover

This is the image I am going to use for my double page spread..

The Time I Started Making A Magazine

With my lowered knowledge of how to use the software Photoshop, I first watched many tutorials on YouTube. However, I discovered that the art of photoshop was to explore the different tools and features for yourself in order to build your knowledge of the software. I decided to start creating my contents page. The reason for this was because I had not yet taken photographs of my main cover star, Joyel, so I did not want to decrease my work pace. 

This is what I have accomplished so far. I am positively keeping my colour scheme and I personally think that the colours look aesthetically pleasing when together. 

I wanted to make my contents page background black so that my front cover could be white. I realized that the orange/yellow colour was the boldest out of my colour palette so I am going to use this to title my pages. White and grey are very appealing highlight colours that I can use to place behind my dark blue texts. Overall, I feel that my contents page is coming together very well and I am hoping that I take my other photoshoot very soon.  

The Time I Chose My Pictures

I have finished narrowing down Rachel's photographs due to technical issues with the memory card off the camera.

Below is the image that I am going to select for my contents page.

The Time I Planned My Photoshoot

I used one of my models from the school magazine photoshoot, Rachel, to be the star of my contents page. Because my magazine is subverting the stereotype of Hip Hop, Rachel had the qualities I was looking for: fierceness, confidence and beauty. I wanted my magazine to consist of a rival so I decided I would create the artist "Raeanna" - a play on words by existing artist Rihanna, and create a rivalry between her and Jay G (Joyel). The photographs below are the sort of poses that I would like Rachel to do.

As my front cover star's availability is limited, I am going to take Rachel's photoshoot first and create my contents page. Joyel is aesthetically suitable to be my front cover star because of his overall look and personality. Joyel carries Hip Hop traits such as the way he dresses and the confidence he has. In addition, Joyel is the only Asian male student in my year that I think is suitable. I plan to present him in a stereotypical pose for the front cover but less serious in the double page spread. Below are the types of poses I would like Joyel to do. 

The Time I Analysed 6 Magazines

In order to mind map the different poses and content I could potentially post on my magazine about my Hip Hop artist, I decided to analyse 6 magazines altogether - 4 genres different to Hip Hop and the rest Hip Hop magazines. I used the artist Rihanna, and showcased how she was portrayed in different genres of music magazines. 

Rolling Stone is a hugely successful magazine that specifies in different genre's of music. The masthead itself uses a masculine "rock and roll" type font and the colour red makes it stand out. Due to the unique formatting of the masthead, this could potentially be the main reason as to why Rolling Stone is popular. Rihanna's pose is quite provocative and is essentially aimed towards a male audience. Her promiscuity entices the intended audience as she is a well known RnB artist. The background colour is white so this makes the masthead stand out even further. Her clothing is simple so overall, her pose is the most dominant aspect of this front cover, creating a huge impact towards the type of audience that Rolling Stone are aiming towards in this issue. 

NME stands for New Musical Express and is a widely recognized magazine. Their genre also caters to many genres but is generally known to showcase indie and alternate artists. In this case, however, they have used Rihanna with the intention of widening their audience to allow new readers to buy their magazine. The masthead's font is very basic, with all attention leading to the main image (usually for all NME magazine covers). Rihanna wears a completely different type of outfit from what her usual style is (borderline hip hop). Her eccentric makeup allows the 'indie' aspect of the magazine to come into play, however, Rihanna's dominance (as always) shines through. Although she appears to look more modest than usual, the attention goes directly towards the prop used on her shoulder, giving the magazine more edge. Overall, the simplicity of the magazine in terms of colours and font is something I would like to take on board whilst creating my magazine. 

Billboard magazine is arguably the most popular music magazine worldwide, as it showcases all different types of musical artists. Billboard is intended for music professionals, such as record label executives, artists, music retailers, and radio DJs. On this cover, Rihanna is dressed in a cropped top but her makeup and hair styling indicates a more feminine side to her style rather than her usual edgy-hip hop look. Her red hair matches with Billboard's masthead and compliments each other very well, whilst at the same time, the colour not becoming too overpowering. In addition, her pose is not as promiscuous as other front covers she has done previously. Overall, the most dominating aspect of this cover is her hair, as the cover line indicates a 'reinvention' of her look, style and development as an artist. 

'We <3 Pop' is arguably one of the most successful pop magazines today. The magazine tends to use the same colour scheme throughout all of their issues: pink, black, white and yellow. The colours connote femininity as the target audience is aimed towards young females aged 10 and above, possibly lower. In this photograph, Rihanna's facial expression shows happiness and a carefree attitude. Her red hair also displays a feminine side to her as well, highlighting that she is not always serious. The image of Rihanna takes up the space of the magazine which signifies her importance. Overall, this cover is the least serious that Rihanna has taken a part in and symbolizes femininity.   

I will now begin to analyse two Hip Hop magazines.

Vibe is a very popular Hip Hop magazine which showcases many different Hip Hop artists. In this issue, Eminem is the cover star. His simplistic attire is not washed out by the gradient background colour which is very positive as it contrasts well with his skin colour. The masthead is also of a gradient format but does not consist of many colours. The dominant colours on the front cover are black and red. The red cover lines highlight the importance of each article. The way Eminem is posing infers his high status and popularity. Overall, this magazine is the type of style that I am hoping my magazine would look like.

This Hip Hop Magazine is called XXL and is hugely recognized, which leads onto the point of the masthead being cut off behind 50 cent's head. This is a popular method which many magazines use. I personally think that magazines with huge recognition should use this method which is why this issue is very appealing. The fact that 50 cent's head is covering part of the masthead suggests his importance towards the Hip Hop world. I may potentially use this method for my magazine but not completely cut off a whole letter like this front cover. Overall, this front cover uses a similar colour scheme to the Vibe magazine which indicates that these colours are most effective.

The Time I Made Contents Page Flat Plans

As a part of my research in creating the most realistic looking magazine, I decided to create flat plans for my contents page. I looked at existing hip hop magazines to seek for inspiration as I did not know what would look best for a contents page. 

This is Vibe magazine. 

This is XXL magazine

In both magazines, there are many similarities such as the positioning of the main image and articles. I decided to design my contents page similarly to these two contents pages because it looks aesthetically pleasing. In addition, if these hip hop magazines have similar layouts and are successful, it would be appropriate to take on similar elements of it. 

 

The Time I Created Front Cover Flat Plans

As a part of my research in creating the most realistic looking magazine, I decided to create flat plans for my front cover. Initially, before I created them onto Powerpoint, I used cut outs of a magazine and placed them in different areas in which I thought were suitable. 

These are the cut outs that I had produced. I then transferred them onto Powerpoint .

The Time I Created a Double Page Spread Flat Plan

As a part of my research in creating the most realistic looking magazine, I decided to create flat plans for my double page spread. Initially, I drew on paper a flat plan before I created it on Word.

The Time I Pitched My Magazine Idea

In my Media Studies lesson, the class and I had to pitch our magazine idea in order to entice potential buyers/readers.

If you were not able to view the PowerPoint properly, below is a video of the presentation.

The Time I Made Decisions

After asking 10 Hip Hop magazine readers what masthead I should choose, the two top names were Rise and The Uprise. I then decided to go with The Uprise due to the fact that my magazine is based on introducing a new genre of Asian Hip Hop, essentially creating an 'uprise' for Asian artists. I then decided to narrow down The Uprise with 3 fonts and experiment with the colours to see which was aesthetically appealing. 

After asking the same 10 people which font they preferred, 6/10 went with the font '8th Cargo'. This is due to the design and the fact that it's easier to work with when creating a magazine cover. In addition, I narrowed the colour scheme options to 2, and the majority went with the second option with the light orange.

I had to explore masthead ideas against the colour scheme and this was the outcome.

With the exception of one student, everyone chose the last masthead idea. In conclusion, my chosen masthead and colour scheme for my magazine is below. I decided to brighten up the blue colour slightly so that my magazine cover will not be very dark. Below is my final scheme.