Rough Cuts and Analysis

Rough Cut Analysis

After I had completed my first drafts for my magazine, I set out to retrieve some audience feedback in order to get different opinions from various people. This was a benefit to me because I could get they were able to immediately notice areas for improvement that I hadn’t noticed which I could change to do develop my magazine. 

Front Cover

In the early stages of creating my magazine, I decided on the name 716. I found this would be an effective name as it isn’t immediately obvious what that number means; it fits to the hip hop genre I decided to form my magazine around as it is the area code for West New York, which happens to be one of the places where hip hop was ‘born.’ After looking at my style model Q, I decided to use a coloured box to place my magazine name into in a similar way that they had; because I think it is gives the magazine an overall professional appearance.

Above this name, at the top of the page I created a black banner which I used as an area to inform readers about freebies included in the magazine. I feel banners on magazines are one of the areas that draw reader’s attention, and if it includes a freebie that appeals to them, it may influence them to purchase the magazine. I received positive feedback for this element, so will be keeping it in when developing to create my final cut.

After taking my photos and editing a few, I placed one onto my front cover. I decided my model would wear a blue hoodie as I felt it corresponded to the style and personality of my artist. I used the same blue as one of the colours in my colour scheme, which I used as the box containing 716. I think the colour develops the conventions of hip hop magazines, which you may usually see using colours, related to violence like reds, by using a more feminine pastel colour. Much like my magazine researches involving Nicki Minaj, where pinks are used to show her individual style and personality.

I had my model on my front cover stand with her chin slightly raised with a serious expression looking down toward the camera. After researching covers I found the ones where the artist looked toward the camera the most effective as they make a connection with the reader drawing them in to pick up the magazine. The picture I had chosen will be kept for my final cut as my feedback stated that it was a good quality and fits in with the hip hop genre; although it would look more professional if it filled the page more and slightly covered the title.

I had decided to include a quote from my double page spread as a ‘Taster’ of the story that was on it. But after receiving feedback I realised that the quote was far too long and had to be shortened for my final cut so that it didn’t take up as much room on the cover. After placing my stories on top of my picture I found it hard to place the text where it could be read easily, so I will have to enlarge my image for my final cut I will have to rearrange the text, shorten some sections of text and even alter the sizes of some pieces making sure they still stand out.

Another piece of text I added was ‘Voted No.1 music magazine of 2011’, as I’d seen similar things in my magazine research and though it would attract the eye of potential readers. But my feedback didn’t think it was necessary to include therefore it won’t be a feature included in my final cut.

After looking at Wonderland magazines, I noticed a common feature of theirs was having the barcode fit in with the black and white colour scheme of the magazine. I utilized this in my magazine and received positive feedback on it, although the barcode needed to be smaller in order to be more realistic.

Contents Page

After putting together my contents page I received feedback about the photo I had used suggesting that because it is a good photo, it should maybe be placed on a different page and that I should have a photo of a different person on the contents to add variation to my magazine.

I had included a quote from my main artist on the side of the page, which would remind the reader who the main attribute was in the magazine. This is a feature which I plan to keep for my final cut as it was approved of by my audience feedback. I was told the rest of the text on this page should be squashed a little more to the right and that I should add other additional contents so that the magazine would contain more. I included the magazine name in the corner of the page and the website, just like in my researched magazines which I will keep for my final cut; I plan to remove the page number of the contents page itself to eliminate the possible confusion readers may have with the already existing numbers on the page.

Double Page Spread

After setting out the boxes for my contents page I began by placing in the 3 images I wanted to include, and then followed by placing the text. Due to the way the page folded in the centre I ended up having 3 columns which weren’t of equal size, this was something that I was advised to change by my audience feedback. Although the use of the drop capital and the enlarged quote was approved of as it breaks up the text to make it look more interesting as I intended, I plan to set lines above and below the quote to make it stand out even more.

I wrote a brief introduction to the article and made it bold and italic to add diversity to the large amount of text on the page. This is a common feature that I found in my magazine research; it makes the text look a lot more professional and lets the reader find out what the story is about.

I added credits to the photos I included in my magazines to make the audience aware of whom my model was and who took the photos. This is a convention within magazines which was approved of by my audience feedback.