Creative Critical Reflection

Creating this magazine has been quite a journey, but now as it comes to an end I'll be critically reflecting on my work keeping certain aspects in focus with the help of  questions posed to me.

Q.1 How does your product use or challenge conventions and how does it represent social groups or issues? 

While magazines wholly dedicated to music are already a rare sight in Pakistan, a magazine of my genre, Indie is even rarer. Despite the lack of availability, there does, however, exist a niche which my product would ideally fulfill. Said niche, however, according to my research exists mostly in the upper and middle classes, the aspirer and explorers demographic ranging from 20-35 year olds predominantly. Indie as a whole is a genre which has a lot to say, mostly due to the freedom allotted to the artists over their creations and the messages they incorporate in it. This characteristic is not typical to the magazines that cover them since they're usually looking for sensational cover stories they think will act as a selling point, especially since indie music magazines have a comparatively smaller market. I chose to both use and challenge this convention, the former by opting to use Emily Demona, a rising indie star, and the latter by talking about her music through a social lens. 

How My Product Uses And Challenges Conventions:

Magazine Cover:

Like most indie music magazine covers my magazine cover has three cover lines including the main cover line, leaving enough space to frame and direct focus onto the artist on the cover, a definite selling point. However, unlike most music magazines, I haven't used the names of the artists featured inside the magazine as the titles of my cover lines, something typically done to capture the attention of possible consumers. The title of my main cover line also conventionally uses a different colour than the rest of my cover lines, but breaks convention in the way I've used it to highlight a certain word 'Rise', bringing more visual emphasis on to it and hence it's message. 

     

Like most magazine covers, my cover features the artist featured in the cover story and uses one bold colour as the background, so the typography is clear on the cover. The camera work also follows conventions, making use of a mid shot following rules of symmetry, with the artist looking into the camera to engage audiences. The cover does deviate from the usual, by the lack of musical paraphernalia and the low key warm lighting I decided to use to build upon the narrative of my product, coming out of the shadows.

     

Unlike most magazines, my magazine cover does not make use of any puffs or buzzwords, keeping it's air of sophistication matched to it's audience. Other elements such as the mast head follow conventions strictly in the way it uses one colour, is the largest text on the page, and is related to the genre, music. Unlike most music magazine covers which let the artist obstruct the mast head, mine does not as its a new indie music magazine (a niche) and needs to be established. While magazine covers being edited is not out of the ordinary, most music magazine covers are devoid of special effects like the prism reflection effect I've added in my cover to build meaning.

Content Page

My content page continues to follow the colour scheme I selected. While my content page follows the rule of dividing the page in columns, it goes a step ahead of the conventional 3 columns to add another for aesthetic purposes. The increased number of columns also allows for interesting overlaps of various elements such as the cover story taking over two columns to stand out. Like most magazines I have used some sort of difference in the article titles and their descriptions namely font, size and boldness. My content page has more conventional elements such as an editor's note, utilising the artist's name as article titles, social media links, and credits. The descriptions are in colloquial tone and use puns and word play which is typical in magazines, especially music magazines. While music magazines often use 3-4 pictorial elements, I have challenged this, going a step further and adding more pictures and even art to enagage the audience and give them visual cues about what or who the features are about. My indie music magazine content page is also unique in listing the touring artists on the content page. I felt this was important since by looking at the content page, people would directly know where to access the touring artists should they be looking to learn about them or the details of their tour.

      

Double Spread

My double spread continues to utilise the colour scheme and follows alot of conventions such as having an anchoring image, having secondary images, different from the anchoring image, usage of quotes, drop cap, having a content box (with the tour dates). While having these elements present is a use of conventions, some of these elements are used unconventionally. The anchoring image is almost never an over the shoulder shot or uses lowkey lighting, but I chose to use one for artistic purposes. She can be seen holding her musical instrument, a ukele, which is quite common in music magazines. By adding special effects such as the prism reflecting colour element, I utilise conventions by continuing the theme of the magazine cover and build cohesiveness in my project. The quotes, like most magazines, intercept the body copy. The stand first is the biggest textual element on the page with the anchoring image, but unlike most double spreads the description does not stretch under the stand first and there is no By Line. This is especially done since its a new magazine and its writers will not be what makes consumers pick it up but rather the artist.

How My Product Represents Social Groups and Issues

Social Group

The target market, young adults, played a large part in the decision of what social groups should be represented in my product. For better sales, I needed to hold up a mirror to the audience so they would be able to either relate or pick up the magazine because they want to be like the artist. This is why I chose an artist of the same age group and ethnicity (Pakistani) to be the cover story and be on the cover of the magazine. My products also represent women by using a female artist being featured and on the cover, of particular significance due to the male-dominated music industry that continues to be perpetuated. The content page of my product furthers the representation of women of colour and different skin tones in Pakistan through pictures of featured artists such as Janae Hope and Jessy Wrayburn. This diversity creates richness and is healthy representation due to which more people of the same and overlapping social groups will be tempted to pick up the magazine. The Pakistani indie community is also depicted in my product.

Social Issues

One of the major social issues discussed in my product is ignorance and the fight against it. The most obvious element representing this is the body copy of my double spread which through the lens of Emily Demona and her experiences speaks out about how we need to rise from ignorance and once we do only then can we begin to change our society. Other issues the body copy discusses are the rehabilitation and reformation of society, protecting one's individuality, creating a safe environment where freedom of speech can flourish and education in the liberal arts. However these issues are also portrayed in a more conceptual and symbolic way in both, my magazine cover and the double spread. The shadows that shroud the artist in the cover, done with the help of lowkey lighting, are symbolic for ignorance. She, as a representative and in this case leader of society is emerging from them. Much like a prism when a white light shines on her she reflects the colours of the rainbow, symbolic for opening the world up to see their own colours and potential rather than following blindly.

Q.2 How does your product engage with audiences and how would it be distributed as a real media text?

For the consideration of both aspects presented in the question it is important to understand our target audience, young adults, predominantly Pakistanis, aspirers and explorers who, given that they like and are willing to explore indie music, are suitably open minded.

Audience Engagement

I managed to engage the audience by conducting a market survey, understanding their needs and preferences and even managed to come up with unique selling points for my product which would appeal to them. To get more specific data and include the audience I created a questionnaire survey on survey monkey which managed to isolate their general tastes e.g what indie artists do you listen to? and some which would later help us distribute the magazine better e.g where do you usually read magazines? This survey gave me enough information as to what my target market wanted to see in an indie music magazine and I decided to tailor my magazine to some of these wants while ignoring a few for creative purposes e.g in the question 'what content do you prefer to view in a music magazine?' most people answered with Song/Album Recommendations while I chose the second most popular answer, Features of Artists. 

The cover story is largely relatable to the young generation and is hope inducing which will insentivize them to enagage with the magazine. Elements such as secondary pictures gives the audience more exposure to the featured artist and the colloquial tone used in the body copy and the content page is welcoming. The content page caters to the regulars, a comfort tactic and has elements such as the social media links and the editor's note which increases communication and feedback between the product and the it's audience. 

How My Product Would Be Distributed Were It A Real Media Text

According to the survey I conducted most of my target audience prefers to read magazines online. If my magazine was a real media text it would pre-dominantly be distributed online as emags on websites such as Issuu.com or available through the app of our publishing company, DAWN. Physical copies would be printed through my chosen publishing house, DAWN which would supply it to local bookstores young adults frequent such as 'Readings' and 'Liberty Books', record stores such as 'Radio City' and a few to general stores. I would also donate a few copies to local cool cafes my target market frequents such as 'Books n Beans' to gain more exposure for the magazine and maximise the word and mouth effect. 

Q.3 How did your production skills develop throughout this project?

When I first joined the media studies course I had no experience with photography other than perhaps clicking a few images with my phone. This changed through practice and classes in which my media sir gave us a run down of different shots, angles and certain rules such as the rules of third and symmetry. Becoming acquainted with the basics, by the time I had to take pictures for my preliminary task, I felt way more comfortable with the camera. By this time I sincerely think my composition had gotten significantly better, I was still too afraid to experiment with lighting, opting to use sunlight. Going through the images I had captured and becoming steadily confident, by the time I had to conduct my own photo shoot for my final product I was bolder and knew what sort of pictures and lighting I wanted (especially thanks to a class we had where we just experimented with the lighting)
and captured them accordingly rather than taking random pictures and choosing whichever one I found aesthetically pleasing.

Right alongside my photography skills, my Photoshop skills were also developing. I was first introduced to the program in a class my media sir conducted which taught us basic functions and tools we would need in the construction of our magazine such as the transformation tool, the text tool etc. I first practiced through our preliminary exercises which was to design a magazine cover and content page. While I managed and at the time even the preliminary exercises looked impressive to me, as I continued practicing I improved. By the time we had to work on our final task, I knew how to use a wider array of tools, could navigate Photoshop easily and work more swiftly due to these factors. The difference in my skill is showcased by the difference in my preliminary and final content page.

Other general skills such as planning, planning for photo shoots (props, costume, make up), management of time and schedules also improved. Most of these skills simply improved through trial and error. 

Q.4 How did you integrate technologies (software, hardware, online) in this project?

Many software tools were used at various stages of the project. The most prominent is perhaps Adobe Photoshop CS3 which I used to ultimately construct my final magazine cover, content page and double spread. Other Microsoft softwares such as Power Point, Excel and Word were used to make presentations, schedules for the photo shoot for the final task and to draft the body copy respectively. The snipping tool was used often in the research phase of the project as well as later during the making of the product to capture the various steps taken in making the product. An application called Video Show was also used for some quick editing for videos I added in my blog such as the video for choosing the name of my magazine. 

For my photo shoot I used a Canon 100D camera with three different lens, 1:1.8 STM EF Lens 50 mm, 18-55mm EFS and 75-300mm Lens. For the lighting I used spotlights overhead at the location and the torch in my phone which acted as a rim light. Besides these computers provided by the school and my personal laptop was used to work on. Essentials like chargers, memory cards and data cables were things used often.

A plethora of online tools were used throughout this project. Perhaps the most important out of these was the WiFi I had at home and the WiFi provided to us my the school in the media lab. This allowed me to work on other online technologies like Blogger which I used to make my blog on. Besides this Canva, Scribd and Survey Monkey were used as a presentation tool, used to embed high resolution copies of our body copy and magazine pitch and to create a survey so we could get well acquainted with the wants of our target market respectively. SlideShare was also used to link my powerpoint presentations.