MY CHOSEN GENRE

There are several genres of music which I could choose to base my magazine around. For example I could use jazz, country, heavy metal, house, dance, pop, etc. 

However I have decided to use the genre indie rock as I feel this can be explored in several ways. The term indie rock is derived from “independent” as it is used to describe the small and low-budget labels which release the music and the bands or artists with the do-it-yourself sort of attitude. “Indie rock” was first used as a way to describe the music artists who did not gain commercial success. The music which often falls under the category of indie rock is a combination of punk, rock and roll, and heavy metal.

Indie Rock music comes with an individual style which has evolved over the years. Bands or artists who fall into the indie rock category have a different style to other musicians, for example

• Sky Ferreira
• Grimes
• Wavves
• Diiv
• Arctic Monkeys
• Crystal Castles
• Swim Deep
• The Cure
• Mystery Jets
• Haim

Each artist has an individual way of dressing as well as music style and therefore i must consider this when i take the pictures to feature in my magazine. 

CONVENTIONS OF A MUSIC MAGAZINE

When creating a magazine I must consider the conventions which I must include. On all magazines there are five key things which aid the audience in knowing that it is a magazine: 

• Photography- Most magazines use an A4 image of an artist who is inside which features as one of the main articles when designing the cover as this will catch the audience’s attention, other magazines use multiple images on the cover in order to widen the target audience 

• Headline- Usually short and catchy, this will link with the main artist and therefore be something related to whoever may be in the main image

• Price/Barcode-  Including a price and barcode makes it clear that this is a magazine, a barcode appears on every magazine, also if the magazine is on offer they will often make this stand out to gain more buyers 

• Masthead- All magazines have a masthead; this is the name of the magazine. This is always written in the same font and on the same area of the page so it is easily recognised 

• Colour Scheme- Several magazines will use a colour scheme when designing a front cover to enable the reader to see continuity when flicking through, and also so they have the ability to easily distinguish the main features to other areas of the magazine

COLOUR THEORY

It is important that I ensure the colours used in my magazine compliment each other as colours which don't go well together will cause it to look messy and will not be aesthetically pleasing. 

A colour wheel based around the primary colours is often used in the field of art and design. It was first developed by Sir Isaac Newton in 1666. 

The colour wheel below was introduced as The Natural System of Colours by Moses Harris between the years 1766 and 1770. In the centre you can see a diagram formulated of 3 triangles where he demonstrates that superimposing the three primary colours on top of one another will create black. 

The colour wheel may be organised into different categories however it always begins with a 3-part colour wheel. 

In traditional colour theory, which was established by the use of paint and pigments, primary colours are the three which can no be formed by combining other colours.

Secondary colours are created by mixing two of the primary colours; for example, red and yellow will make orange, blue and yellow will make green, red and blue will make purple.

The tertiary colours in the wheel are creating by a combination of both a primary and a secondary colour. 

Analogous colours are three colours which are found next to one another on a twelve part colour wheel (one containing primary, secondary and tertiary colours), normally one of the three colours is more prominent than the others. 

A good example of analogous colours is the logo for the oil and gas company BP, in this logo you can see that yellow-green colours are used and that the darkest green is most prominent.

A variation of analogous are split-analogous colours  which are taken from every other colour next to them on a twelve section colour wheel. 

Complimentary colours are ones which are found directly opposite each other on a colour wheel and are used as pairs. They work as they naturally work together to make the other look more vibrant. In a complimentary coupling a cool colour (blue, green, purple and any variation) is paired with a warm colour (red, yellow, orange and any variations). They work well when emphasising a certain colour, to create contrast, or to draw attention to several areas simultaneously. 

Again there is a variation of complimentary colours known as split-complimentary colours. These colours are formed of one colour then the colours found on either side of the colour which compliments it. 

A colour scheme of neutral colours would be formulated solely by shades of black and white (and sometimes brown) creating a monochrome style.

An accented neutral colour scheme would consist of a neutral colour scheme along with a few shades of any other single colour. 

It works well in the same way a monochromatic one does as there is only one colour added which creates a sense of unity. Also black and white enable the colour used to appear brighter. 

It would work if I wanted to draw attention to one particular spot.

For example in this image black white and grey are the main colours but there is also a small amount of different shades of red which stands out agains the neutral colours. 

TYPOGRAPHY

Most everyday fonts may be generalised into the two categories serif and sans-sherif, these categories can be easily identified by whether they have curls or small appendixes at the end of each letter. 

Generally, it's believed that serif fonts are easier for the readers eye to follow, especially if said font must be small like in magazines, newspapers or books. For example in 1931 The Times newspaper commissioned the serif font Times Roman for readability  

Sans-serif fonts are most commonly used on websites as they are much easier to read on a screen. 

MUSIC MAGAZINE PUBLISHING HOUSES

Two main publishing houses for music magazines are Bauer Media and IPC meadia.

               

Bauer Media is a publishing company based in Hamburg. It was founded in 1875 and has since been privately owned and under management by the Bauer family

Bauer Media publishes well known music magazines such as Q, Kerrang and Mojo.

                               

IPC Media, who is owned by parent company Time Inc. and based in the United Kingdom, is a consumer magazine and digital publishing company with a large portfolio, selling over 350 million copies each year. 

IPC Media is known to publish such music magazines as NME and Uncut. 

The primary target audience for a music magazine is males aged 18-27, however there are specialist music magazines such as We Love Pop (published by Egmont) who's primary audience is girls aged 11-15. 

WHAT IS A MUSIC MAGAZINE?

A music magazine is a magazine dedicated to music and music culture.

Music magazines typically include music news, interviews, photo shoots, record reviews, concert reviews and occasionally have a covermount with recorded music.

They come in all different genres and have completely different genres.

 

INTRODUCTION

My name is Rosa Barratt and I am a media studies AS student at Beaverwood Sixth Form. For this secondary task I will be creating a music magazine, this will be moderated and all my progress will be shown on this blog.

My preliminary task was to create a magazine for my school. From creating this I gained a strong understanding of the main features of magazines and also how to use adobe programs such as Photoshop and InDesign. To see the blog I created which contains all my work follow this link: www.barrattrosa.blogspot.com