In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and

conventions of real media products?

In

terms of a music
magazines to use as references in my research
and planning stage of this project I decided to look
outside of my chosen genre (Billboard, Q and
Mojo) as well as take examples from within
(BROMIDE, NYLON, Ce Ci, Sparkling and KPOPLIFE).
From these magazines, I chose simple conventions to
adopt and apply to my own methods of design;
those conventions
consisted of graphological features such as page lay
outs, font types positioning of the text and ideas for
positioning of my models.
Firstly, I focused on magazines within my genre
(kpop) which were high selling brands and ones I
knew had an attentive audience and a successful
reputation: for example, I used the magazines
BROMIDE and KPOP LIFE because in my research I discovered that these
magazines had a highly-rated readership- therefore it was obvious to infer that if
I applied the qualities from these magazines it would
help to develop my product into something with the
opportunity of success or thereabouts. The magazines
that I used also had the same audience of which I
wanted to appeal to (15-20 years old of both sexes)
and this was vital as it allowed me to focus of simple
conventions such as which types of artist to use, what
formality of English I should incorporate in my writing/
the tone of the article as well as other conventions.

BROMIDE magazine which is identified as within my genre was a major

inspiration for style because of the colour scheme used. In my audience research
the use of google forms), it was evaluated that the preferred colour scheme was
roughly approximated to be blue and white. In the issue of the BROMIDE
magazine I used for my textual analysis (2015, April) the colour scheme offered
coordination of a blue white and yellow theme and so I decided to base my
magazines colour scheme loosely off the blue and white theme. The shade of
blue I used I used for my final product and draft I used the exact colour by
applying the colour select tool on Photoshop during my design process. In further
research I chose BROMIDEs double page spread as my inspiration for a text
format as it was simplistic and easy to read- It seemed like that idea would fit
with my genre and appeal to my audience as I did not wish it to be too
overwhelming and loud- if it did have these features it would unfortunately not
appeal to the desired audience of my magazine and would also come across as
too commercialised.
The use of my title was also important as it had to be snappy. All the other
magazines I had researched held some relevance to the genre and they were
either direct and to the point of short and snappy- in the best cases they were
both. This is the convention I applied to my title when thinking of the word
JUNTA. When it comes to successful and memorable titles they have to be
short- for example, NYLON and BROMIDE and CE CI are all short and snappy. In
the case of junta is short and sweet and hold a hidden relevance of a political
group forcing power. Instead of a political group I wanted to convey that this was
a genre that would hopefully take an unfamiliar world by storm.
Secondly, I researched into the use of bold and capitalised titles on front pages of
magazines and I found that the majority of magazines do, in fact, adopt this
feature and apply it to their covers. For example, BROMIDE and NYLON tackle the
kpop genre in a more main stream and direct style- focussing on the latest
releases and the biggest artists and this was the approach and sort of content I
wished to base my magazine on. Not to mention the fact that there are British
magazines outside of my chosen genre such as; MOJO, VIBE and KERRANG also
adopt the convention of capital letters in their titles. I decided to use a clear
masthead which would typically be the biggest text on my cover page as well as
aim for it to complement my uniform formation of my cover page by implicating
an organised structure. Therefore, the idea for my masthead to be in capitals and
bold letters appealed to this idea. Another idea to have it positioned at the top of
the page in the left- not only combined my research into the conventions of text
layout appealing to the natural eye line and readers gaze- it allowed me to apply
the idea used by Q to have their title segregated using a box and made more
prominent.
The style I wanted to incorporate through the cover
of my magazine was subtle one. I used placement
photos of an artist called GDragon and attempted to
coordinate that style used in the photo shoot for the
magazine KPOPLIFE. I also applied and attempted to
develop a well-known pose from the artist into my
photos but in the end I did not use the as it
challenged the inviting and respectable look I
wished to give my kpop magazine. The struggle to get the correct image for my
genre was down to supplicated style and a colour scheme which applied the
natural photogenic pose. I kept in mind whilst taking my photos that the
magazine KPOPLIFE focuses more on the genre through a commercialised state
and they are more about celebrity gossip as well as the music element and this
was not an element I wanted to communicate in my magazine. Consequently, I
decided to have my poses as animate and inviting including simple things like
smiling and laughing- this therefor challenged the usual conventions of a
commercialising kpop music magazine.
 Researching the style for my models was
difficult for me as there are not many kpop
magazines with a minimalistic colour
scheme (which I wished to adopt). The
reason I wished to adopt a minimalist style
was due to the fact that professional
makeup, coordinated high end fashion
products were simply not something I could
apply due to the lack of availability. Usually
kpop magazines are very loud and eye
catching and I did not have the elements to adopt this convention. This is where I
discovered and used the magazine Ce Ci- focusing only on the cover images- I
took into account that they use minimalistic covers and their photoshoots only
usually have one or two artists. When I began to look at Ce Cis actual magazine
style I saw that the text used and the formatting of the text was uniform and
used guide lines- and this was the style I saw and wanted to develop as I aimed
to achieve a concept where my text was all on one side but flowed together like
it did on Ce Cis cover. When it came to my cover page I like to think adopting
the text convention that Ce Ci used I was also challenging the convention of a
busy text layout of my cover page. The concept of it being a well thought out
layout of text was important as it had to be aesthetically appealing for my
readership as it was going to be a difficult magazine to sell as it is due to its
genre.
When coming up with shots for my
cover page researching the
photographer Mike Massaro came
into play as I had discovered the
idea and concept of including the
manipulation of lighting and
shadows and how to apply this
convention when taking photos to
be featured. Within my photo shoot I
attempted these concepts and
convention but unfortunately did
not come to using them for my final
piece.