Q1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

I used primary colours which included Red, Blue, Black and White for my magazine, I figured this will give my magazine a firm and bold presence. However my original magazine seemed a bit dull and felt like something was missing.

As my Photoshop skills enhanced I was able to use different effects such as ‘Stroke’ which gave a bold outline of your chosen colour, this helped bring my magazine to life, the black stroke really played off well against the other colours brightening up the entire magazine.

Another convention which I used would be including a Medium close up as the main image of my front cover, which most magazines do and the reasons why I did is because even though its following conventions, its still representative of my music style which is what the magazine is based on.

On the double page spread I followed the conventions of a hip hop/R’n’B magazine of having a single picture of the artist on one page and writing an article on the other page. This represents my music style as there is not too much going on the double page spread.
Another convention I incorporated was the use of columns for my article, this girls a genuine feel that someone is getting interviewed. In most articles the sizes of the columns were important usually fitting three or four and the full length of the page.

In most hip hop magazines the contents of the magazine was very specific and almost told you what was in every section, I used this on my contents page, giving a brief of what was in the magazine and what number you could find it.
Also in a lot of contents pages I came across an editor’s note with a little message to the reader, so I decided to use this in my own. At the time of the magazine I wanted it to represent real life and include current issues such as the Japan earthquake I added a tribute to give it a sense of realism.