Question 2

Question 2

How does your media product represent social groups?

Other potential front covers

When I constructed my front cover, I looked a how my artist looked in terms of style and maturity. When I was developing the cover I tried several different photo (3 examples below) with the example I've shown you can see an obvious difference between these covers and my original one. In these photo's my artist looks more unusual and Gothic as in my final cover Chloe looks attractive and gentle instead of dark and aggressive which the photos below may suggest. After changing and constructing my final cover I researched that my target audience preferred the Chloe that is more sensitive and calm instead of the blood a gorey images.

Contents page

Front cover

Front cover CHLOE

In my contents page I felt it was important that I chose specific images so that my genre shows through within each artist. When following the conforms of the contents page I wanted to have my focused artist to largest so it is the first thing my audience look at. In the photo of Chloe she is hiding her face this presents Chloe differently than in the front cover, I did this purposely as I want Chloe to look more mysterious in this image ‘Chloe uncovers all’ this image presents Chloe different using the hair this makes it more dramatic so the audience want to find out more.

As Chloe is my focused image I needed to be sure that she came across as different to the others this is why the image with her in is black and white, using the black and white filter it shows the Gothic theme, my artist is portraying without having this she would look very similar to other artist not making her stand out.

When I was constructing my contents page I took into consideration what filters I used on each photo and the sizing of the images so each image could be presented differently (more important/less important).

I wanted my other artists to follow the same audience as my focused artist, by this I mean my target audience like/enjoy that genre of music/ them artists. It is essential that all my artists have a connection with my main artist, so the magazine looks professional.

The use of color is important when I was developing my contents page this because it needed to match the front cover and share the same representation types. For example Tom (52) is also in the same age category my focused artist is in, this is beneficial because the it follows the conventions and keeps the magazine looking professional, if Tom the artitst was a middle aged that dressed old and made folk music, it wouldn't be suitable in my magazine. Without being able to follow the theme of the magazine natural color scheme the magazine genre would be confusing, what was important when I constructed the magazine was that the nude colors all worked well together.

From looking at the contents page and the use of coloring and images, it highlights there's a pattern in the theme following on from the front over, the connations suggest that the magazine/contents page is exciting I wanted to construct it like this so it looked more interesting and also because of the coloring it follows the shuttle look given from the front page but then the visual side because of the dramatic emphasized photos.I think looking at the contents page we stereotype what the look is needed for a magazine targeted at young people, for example using Beyonce, we understand this is appropriate for a magazine of this targeted age because from Beyonce's fan base we know that this is the category most accounted for.

My front cover features Chloe, Chloe fits into a social group of young (16-20 years of age) women. Looking at the front cover Chloe is represented as soft yet serious. The use of make up makes her look different because it reflects what kind of style she has as an artist. Even though in the front cover we see nude smooth colors we get the impression from the exaggerated make up that she is more than a dainty fragile women.

I've made my artist look fairly serious in the front cover photo this is because I think it captures more of a maturity within the magazine instead of it looking childish and outrageous. We see from the photo she is a young attractive women that looks interesting and unique instead of a character that looks over the top and in your face. I wanted my artist to look shuttle in my front cover and not outrageous because buyers might think the magazine is messy.

When I was planning and developing my magazine I found some photos I'd took for potential front cover images looked too overdone for a front cover.

I feel that Chloe is presented as innocent yet serious in this photo, I wanted her to look like this so she would capture people’s attention. I wanted to make my audience understand Chloe’s style however in this photo I specifically chose it shows Chloe as dramatic because of her make up yet gentle because of the filer on the photo.

I felt when I was constructing this front cover that I wanted my front cover image to match the text so they worked well so it presented a more professional look to the magazine, by doing this I had to ensure Chloe suited the right genre with music. In this image she suits indie genre of music as she looks different, however because of the dark make up, pale skin and dark hair she could be presented as Gothic.

In terms of Chloe fitting into a social group, I would say that when I constructed the cover I wanted the her to fit into many different categories so she applied to a wide audience instead a very limited audience. I did this by not making her look to over the top, if I did this she might look very stereotypically Gothic and buyers may avoid this issue. When I researched what stereotypical goths looked like I found this image, from this particular image we understand that I haven't presented Chloe as over the top, even though they share some norms for example pale skins, dark hair and interesting make up as noted the goth shown looks a lot more emphasized.

When contructing the front cover I took into account how the photo was going to look for the audience, this is why I used a close up image of my model so they get the sense of intensity from Chloe as you can see she if looking directly into the camera, this represents her as strong and confident if she was hiding and didn't have eye contact with the camera/audience she might look shy.

Other attempts at contents

What are social groups?

Double page spread

A group in society, they become a group if they some social relation/norms and values.

How do we categories these groups?

We can use a range of variables.

Age

Gender

Race

Ethnicity

Religion

Culture

Able bodied/ disabled

Sexuality

Interests

Beliefs

Do they fit other categories or stereotypes?

Are they goths, emos, rockers, indie, ravers etc.

My media product represents CHLOE as confident from the photos used, I wanted my audience to see Chloe differently this why I expressed Chloe in different ways.

From the photos I intended to make Chloe look young and fun to fit her social group, by this I made her make up look over the top and her pose in photos to look fun instead of over posed and boring. As Chloe is representing a young age group I wanted her personality to be expressed within her photos this why I used a strip of photos showing different sides of chloe this also allowed the audience to become more familiar and personal with her.

In the photos Chloe is shown to be in many social groups this is because in some images she looks Gothic but in other images where she is not wearing make up and smiling she looks young and happy instead of the emphasized make up. I wanted Chloe to look interesting a fun to fit her social category 16-20 tend to be students enjoying their student lives. I wanted Chloe to look as if she was happy yet serious about her career so she was seen as a role model to others.

I wanted the double page spread to look interesting and creative and represent Chloe as unique and hope she didn't just fit the category stereotypically. I did this by reinventing her appearance by making her look unique in each photo.

I chose this particular contents page amongst my other contents pages because I felt that there was a solid follow through from the front cover and the this layout and color. For example looking at the other contents pages I have developed they don't look interesting, they have a very basic layout and lack color. The genre of the magazine also doesn't show through because of the lack of images/artist and text, what is good about the final contents page is that it has many different artist but shows a lot of interest however with the development contents pages there's only two images.