My Evaluation - 1) In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

All magazines follow forms and conventions of how a magazine should be portrayed, for example the form of a magazine is a rectangle shape that contains numbered pages. A magazine that doesn’t contain any pages, or was circle shaped would definitely challenge the form that is a magazine. A form could be seen as what the ‘norm’ of a magazine should be. For instance it is normal for a magazine to be in the shape of a rectangle. A magazine that is not rectangular would be challenging the form of a magazine, such as the picture (right).

This is a cover of the magazine “Little White Lies”; it breaks the form of a magazine as it is shaped in a square. A magazine convention is something that is always on a magazine such as a tagline, a headline, a title etc. However, the conventions are codified in order to create a mode of address that is appropriate for the target audience. For example I have changed the conventions of my magazine design in a way that will hopefully appeal to my demographic. Due to my audience being young I have chosen to construct my magazine in a conventional way, if the magazine was not laid out in a conventional manner then my young demographic may not become attracted to it.

I have followed many of the forms and conventions of a magazine, one of them being a tagline on the front cover of the magazine. I put this on the front cover of my magazine because I thought that consumers would be more willing to buy my magazine if they knew that it was the ‘best selling’ magazine. I think this is because the consumer will automatically think ‘if this magazine is number 1, then everyone must be buying the magazine and therefore I will be the only one NOT buying it, and I’ll be missing out!’

Another convention that I have used on the front cover of my magazine is to have the issue number and month on the front cover. I have done this so that collectors of the magazine can keep track of what issue they read.

I have also added a banner with four listed famous male artists and groups to entice consumers to my magazine. It informs the consumers who else features in my magazine. Due to the young girl demographic of my magazine they will no doubt be attracted to the males because they are young, fresh and contemporary.

I have an additional incentive to attract customers to my magazine; the additional incentive consists of two bottles of nail varnish. This links very well with my magazines demographic due to young teen girls not having a lot of money to spend on nail varnish so getting two free bottles is a bargain for them.

 

One more convention that I have included in my magazine is to give the opportunity to my consumers to win JLS tickets. This also works really well with my demographic as JLS are a very popular boy band at the moment especially with young girls. Furthermore live music is becoming more and more popular, as most artists are losing money through people illegally downloading their music. A definite way for artists to make money at the moment is by putting on concerts and shows that will provide a big crowd and a big profit. However, the music aimed at my younger audience is very popular at the moment, and a big reason behind this is that the younger audience are a lot less likely to download their music illegally.

When applying for the tickets the audience will be engaging with the magazine, this could be through the website or through posting letters into the magazine. My aim is to get the website and the magazine working together in order to promote the brand of my magazine, this is an example of synergy.

All magazine creators believe that magazines should be portrayed in different ways. Personally I wanted my magazine to be portrayed in a believable way; I wanted to show real life pictures, to real life girls. A lot of issues have arisen due to how women are portrayed through the media, and one of the biggest issues are size zero models. This is an extremely sensitive subject that is irresponsibly waved away; it is seen as an insignificant issue. This is a ridiculous view as it has a huge number of self image concerns attached to it.  Because of this, I haven’t photo-shopped any photos that appear in my magazine. I believe this challenges the forms and conventions of a real magazine. I have purposely done this because I do not agree with young girls comparing themselves to photo-shopped females. Photo-shopping promotes idealism; it is fake and the producers of the magazine are essentially lying to the consumers of the magazine. I believe that this advertises anorexia, bulimia and depression on young girls. This links well in my opinion with hyperreality, this is when many digitally enhanced images create a hyppereal (not real) representation of women. These representations easily create impossible aspirations for young girls in relation to self image, this could possibly damage young girls self confidence, self image and self esteem.

 

In every magazine photos are airbrushed to hide imperfections, young boys look at these ‘perfect’ models and presume that this is what girls should look like. This puts added pressure on girls to conform to look like ‘the girls in the magazines’ and due to this girls become obsessed with how they look, and how they want males to view them. They try and become someone that is impossible to pull off because they do not exist in the real world; the pictures imitate an impossible aspiration.

However the picture on my front cover is some way linked to the theory of ‘The Male Gaze’. Even though I do not want the consumers of my magazine to be lured into the ‘Male Gaze’ look, it is evident that young girls are more attracted to females in line with the Male Gaze than not. This was proven when my class conducted a Male Gaze research project in finding out whether girls the same age as my demographic would be more attracted to woman in a Male Gaze position or in a complete opposite position to the Male Gaze affected. When we carried out this research task the girls were asked to compare 6 pictures of woman and put them in order of who they were most attracted to and who they were least attracted to. The pictures varied from the picture to the left and the picture to the right. The girls order the picture on the left as the most attractive and the picture on the right as the most unattractive. When asked why they had these opinions they said that the woman on the left looked more girlie, and that’s what they expect to see pretty celebrities pose like. The girls went on to say that the woman on the right looked ill, and that you wouldn’t come across this picture in a celebrity magazine. When the girls were told that both women are in fact models they were dumbfounded. This is proof that girls are attracted to women who are in line with the Male Gaze. Keira Knightly has her head leaning on her hand, has a lot of her skin showing, is wearing makeup and is certainly a lot more in line with the Male Gaze than the other model who is perfectly symmetrical in herself and within the page. They are both very beautiful pictures, but are clearly looked upon in different ways. 

When women pose in a Male Gaze position they seem to be situated in a weak, vulnerable look. The model will look helpless in the eye of the ‘male’ camera, and therefore to the audience. Although the camera is seen to be a male, it is the women who are in control of the gaze. The female model is seen to be good at coming across as weak and vulnerable, and the female audience aspire to be good at pulling off the look too. As found in the theory of the ‘Female Gaze’ it is thou  that the gazer directs his or her gaze to the member/s of the same gender and compare themselves to the same sex person, i.e. their body image or their clothing. Due to the theory of ‘Male Gaze’ the dominant hegemonic values within society are reinforced, this symbolises that women are weak and that men are strong.

Because of the results of my research study I have placed my model Rose in a ‘Male Gaze’ position. However they way in which Rose positioned herself in the picture is not necessarily so noticeably in line with the Male Gaze.

Rose is not looking into the camera, and her head is turned indicating a subtle shyness. This is why she isn’t obvious in line with the Male Gaze.

Furthermore, as seen in the pictures Rose isn’t a size zero model, she is a size 12, this is one size smaller than Britain’s average female’s size. I believe I have managed to construct many beautiful, real, inspiring pictures of Rose without having to shave off half her body to make her look so thin that she looks terminally ill. Like the woman in the advert above, it is not physically possible for this lady’s back to be that artificially curved. This image stands for all that’s wrong with photo shopping, and why it should be stopped. However, due to some of my pictures being in line with the male gaze I have learnt that there is a balancing act to play when trying to attract your audience by using subtle male gaze positions as well as trying to promote a more moral representation.

Along with refusing to photo-shop I have tried to incorporate a summery feel to the magazine. Throughout my main pictures in the magazine there is a brilliant blue sky scenery. I incorporated the blue skies because I thought that due to the connotations of sun being associated with happiness, joy and fun it would attract young girls. I think that all young girls want to be seen as being happy and having fun. I also think that the sun represents a social sense, many people are a lot more social when the sun is out due to there being a lot more to do when the sun is out. Because of this I think that more people will be attracted to buy the magazine and then interact with people and the magazine itself. I wanted the joyfulness of the sun and what it represents to be carried out throughout my magazine. The sun and the blue sky all show connotations of freedom, young girls do not have the authority to have the freedom that they desire, however they are starting to grow up and are starting to be given a little more leeway which as they grow older will turn into freedom. All girls want to grow up fast, they want to be seen as a young adult, and this is what I think the freedom represents, freedom is what the young girls aspire to.

I used two fonts on the front cover of my magazine; this consisted of ‘Broken Ghost’ and ‘Love Ya Like A Sister’. I used ‘Broken Ghost’ for the title of my magazine because I thought it stood out well and it was a soft font. Young girls have a connotation of being looked upon as soft and innocent and I think that the typography of the word ‘Obsessed’ shows a soft, innocent look that I am trying to signify. I also made the letters in the title lower case, I did this because the magazine is for young children, and when a child is young it knows the letters as big or baby letters, this is instead of upper and lower case. I wanted to signify the youth of my consumers, moreover I also think that because my audience are young girls the lower case letters are softer and therefore represent a soft innocent look. However, on the rest of the cover of the magazine all the words are in upper case letters. I have purposely done this because the young girls are turning into young adults, but on the whole they are still little girls which are what my magazine represents. The title never changes, however the stories around the title does, this mirrors the girls as they may think that they are adults but it will never change that they are a minor to the rest of the world. I have also incorporated semiotics, this is the study of symbols and shapes. I have designed my typography to convey meaning to my audience. I believe that my typography has connotations that my readership can identify with.

 

I have reinforced my mode of address through another balancing act as well as a business decision. I have tried to promote a soft, feminine side to the girls through my typography – using upper and lower case lettering. On the other hand I have tried to promote the girls to be authoritative and domineering by refusing to airbrush images, and yet still managing to keep the images in line with the male gaze. I am trying to appeal to my readership’s aspirations, I was aiming to do this with the inspirational pictures of model Rose and yet I was subtly offering the readership positive representations by refusing to photo-shop my pictures.  

For my double page spread the picture I used represented the beautiful scenery that surrounded my model. My model looks extremely happy and I wanted to show off the smiles that I captured during the photo shoot. I used ‘Berlin Sans FB Demi’ as the title for my double page spread, I used this font because I think it captured what Rose was trying to represent, youthful fun. Throughout the article I used ‘Arial’, I used this font because it is an easy-read font, and looks professional.

For my contents page I used the fonts ‘Berlin Sans FB Demi’, ‘Arial’ and ‘Arial rounded MT bold’, I used these fonts for different reasons. I used ‘Berlin Sans FB Demi’ as the title for my contents page because it is a bold font and it is youthful. I have used ‘Arial’ due to it being easy to read and it is professional. I only used ‘Arial rounded MT bold’ for the titles of the articles to let them stand out from the captions, I also used this for the new look voucher – this is so it stands out. I used a black and white picture of Rose on my contents page. I did this because I liked the way it was different from the other pictures of Rose, it is an example of the faint use of male gaze theory I used, as Rose’s head is tilted slightly.

I have used many of the magazine conventions on my front page, these include the masthead on the cover, I didn’t cover the main image over the masthead because I am not 100% confident that Rose will sell the magazine because she is new on the music scene. I have a tagline which indicates to the readership that the magazine is the best music magazine in Britain. I have a main image, banners both at the top and at the bottom of the cover. I attempted an ear pierce on the top left corner implying to the audience that they receive free Barry M nail varnish when buying the magazine. On the contents page I have used the magazine conventions of different sections in the magazine, for example regulars, features etc. I have also included a memo from the magazine’s editor, a voucher for money off at New Look, and a reminder on what channel the music channels are on cable TV. On the double page spread the conventions are kept simple, columns separate words, quotes are highlighted.