Coursework review Q1

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? (i.e. of music magazines)

My masthead ‘Grime Culture’ challenges conventions, as it is a long magazine name as opposed to traditional magazine names where it is usually a few letters that may be abbreviations for something such as is the case with ‘NME’, ‘MOJO’, ‘XXL’ and ‘Q’ magazine. Therefore by having two long words my masthead spans the whole top of the page where as these other magazines are usually in the top left hand corner of the page. Also I used the font ‘Plane crash’ which was downloaded from an online font website, it developed conventions as it was generally a bold, block type font similar to those used in ‘MOJO’, ‘NME’ and ‘XXL’ but it also has a slightly eroded appearance which is an adaptation and further development of traditional masthead conventions.

 

 
Fonts used throughout my magazine include ‘Coconut express 01’, ‘Geneva CY’, ‘Jack Frost’ and ‘Plane crash’. I used ‘Plane crash’ for my masthead and the name of my artist on both the cover and double page spread, I also used it for the article title on my cover, I chose this font as it stood out as it was bold but also because the eroded look was unique and would help me avoid producing a generic looking magazine, therefore this font was used for large pieces of text that I wished to be most visible on my magazine. ‘Coconut express 01’ was also found on dafont.com and I used it as the main text for my magazine as it features as the font for the main bodies of text such as the information on the contents, the cover lines on the cover and for the article on my double page spread. I tried to keep the same font consistent for most the magazine to prevent the final piece looking messy. ‘Geneva CY’ was a less used font and was only used for the magazine issue and price, as it was easy to see for important information. ‘Jack frost’ was also only used once and was used for my contents, as this uses conventions in a lot of magazines where the contents title is a different font to the rest of the magazine. These use conventions for music magazines as it is traditional to have a limited number of fonts with each font serving a single purpose in the magazine, examples from my magazine and other magazines are shown below.

One outfit was used consistently in my magazine but it was carefully chosen to best represent Grime artists and give a realistic feel. The general theme was black clothing which uses conventions of Grime music and grime artists, the clothes themselves were branded by North face and Nike who are very popular with fans and anyone involved in grime music.

My artist was also of an African ethnicity which is similar to a lot of grime artists, while this is not a necessity for Grime artists to be of African ethnicity, the way most songs and verses are written and performed suits the Nigerian accent which is why many successful Grime artists share a Nigerian or close by African countries background therefore I followed conventions by using someone with Nigerian descent. Finally I used props by having some photos taken in certain locations such as a rundown skate park in Lutterworth which gives a feeling of lower class backgrounds which are shared by many artists through the rough nature of the surroundings in the photo, this combined with the picture being taken at night also adds an element of danger which follows conventions of this type of music genre and similar ones such as Rap.

The camerawork and framing of the pictures I did provided a range of different shots including, close ups, mid shots, two shots and low shots. This uses and develops conventions for grime music as I primarily used close ups which is seen with many hip hop or rap artists in magazines but I have developed this by combining it with low shots to give a greater sense of power for the artist. As is seen in on my cover page.

The genre of my magazine defies conventions, as it is the first Grime specific music magazine, and even most big multi-genre music magazines do not cover any grime music. The magazine shows repeatedly what genre it is and proves it in a number of ways starting with the title: Grime Culture. It is a basic name but gets straight to the point of what the magazine will contain which is useful to the reader. The contents also suggests it as all the articles make reference to Grime artists or related things to the genre, also the title of the magazine can be found at the bottom of every page and written frequently throughout the magazine.

Throughout my magazine my artist is represented as a self-made successful person who faced a lot of challenges growing up in a difficult neighbourhood which follows conventions of how most artists are seen in Grime music as the majority grew up in rough areas and achieved success without a music label to produce for them. This is shown in my magazine primarily in the double page spread article, but despite this he is represented also in a way that commands a lot of respect, which uses conventions of many popular artists not just in the Grime genre but also in every music genre and this is done by the information in the contents describing him as running the grime scene. 

The colour scheme I used was mainly monochrome with different shades of red throughout my magazine, by having these hints of red I was able to keep certain pictures in colour which I think contributed to the overall success of my magazine by allowing me to be more flexible when combining different elements. This uses and develops conventions by using the monochrome colour scheme popular in many magazines and developing it to add hints of colour spread throughout.