Proposal

I will be basing my magazine on the indie genre; the indie genre has been around for a very long time and came about in the 1980's in America and England, it's known as individual music and recorded on independent music labels. Indie bands are known for their independence with their music, lyrics, clothing and organization, that contrasts mainstream bands. 


Mainstream radio stations like Radio One and Galaxy FM don't often play indie bands like The Drums, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CeZbbx5SPTs, and The Nationals, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgRsYkKb1eI; they stick to set play lists as the indie genre is too specific to certain people. However NME, the leading indie magazine, as well as Indie magazine and Q magazine have a radio stations, websites, a magazine and a TV channel; making them some of the most popular companies to broadcast indie music in the UK. 


NME is run by IPC Media (Time inc) who sell around 350million copies of magazines a year, they also publish many other magazines including Look magazine, Marie Claire, Uncut Music Magazine and many more. NME is their main music magazine and most popular one, the only magazine they produce related to music in Uncut, however this is based more around movies than music. 
Indie magazine is run by Koala Bears Studios who also run a record label for independent music artists.
Q is run by Bauer Media Group, based in Germany who operate in 15 countries worldwide; Kerrang is also run by the same company showing how both magazines are aimed at the same genre of rock, however Q can have a more varying audience. Q magazine began in 1986 and has done so well that the magazine even has it's own awards ceremony called the Q Awards.


Weekly features such as 'News', 'New Music' and 'Reviews' are fixed features included every week for NME, Indie and Q magazine, as well as the main stories that vary each week too. 


At the moment NME costs £2.30 and is published every wednesday, usually the magazine has around 70 pages. Q magazine is £3.50 an issue and is published once a month. Indie magazine is published four times a year and costs £6.80 an issue. 


NME and Indie are aimed at people, varying in age but usually quite young, who like music and bands that aren't featured in day to day radio / television; this audience is similar to the bands including their fashion sense and that sense of independence. Q has a more varying audience, it can appeal to a lot of people as the bands featured aren't all independent, it features rock bands to as well as mainstream, Coldplay are an example of this. 

These are three examples of each magazine, each one appeals to a different type of indie audience; EG the Pete Doherty cover is appealing to people who are interested in the Libertines as well as his life story and how he's coping. Indie magazine features someone who is purely a model, this may appeal to more of a female audience as its focusing more on fashion as well as music. 

The Last magazine features Coldplay who are a mainstream band that appeal to a very wide ranging audience, their attitudes are more indie than anything else as their type of music is catchy and famous but nothing that sounds so unique. 

NME has a readership of around 369,000 a week; 69% of these are males while only 31% is females; NME, standing for New Musical Express, also has a circulation of about 40, 948. The name is expressing the point the genre, New Musical Express is an obvious name.
Q magazine has a readership of well over 700, 000 people monthly and is renowned for it's good quality of printing. 
Indie magazine is quite small therefore I couldn't find the readership anywhere. The title of the magazine is to support the meaning on indie, independent and the music they support.


Q magazine was originally called "Que' until the company decided to change it in fear that it would be mistaken for a snooker magazine, it's not clear what the magazine title stands for but now has a big fan base. 

Having chosen your genre of music magainze, how does it represent anyone accosciated with the genre?

Since I have chosen to base my music magazine on NME, this includes the bands that go with it; a lot of bands are put into genres straight away when they become famous, this corners them into only being played with certain people, at certain places and on certain radio station. Indie music isn't usually played on big radio station like Radio One unless it's with the DJ's that are late in the night.
Bands such as The Drums, One door Cinema Club, Local Natives etc are examples of this, they're often featured in NME but because of this are not played in local radio stations because such a small minority of people would like to hear them comapred to the nation who are more into mainstream music.
When your classed as "indie" you can be thought of in different ways, to indie kids your thought of as the best thing since sliced bread, but to people who shop in Topshop and H&M, your thought of as pretensious and "wannabe"; therefore trying to be pushed into this label can be risque as you do reduce your potental audience.
The Drums became famous when the song "I wanna go surfing" was released in 2010, NME got hold of the band and because of this, they were immedietly classed as "indie"; they didn't go against this though and fitted to that stereotype with the clothes they wore and their attitude.
Being pushed into the indie stereotype isn't such a bad thing though, the indie audience is very large and NME has a very big audience with their radio station and magazine; and indie following can be just as big as the mainstream.
To be class as indie a lot of people see you as stuck up and withdrawn but this can be the case with a lot of bands these days, the clothes they were, what they say, the hairstyles, friends, events etc are a big part of being in the NME magazine; although its not like a fashion music, it all counts.

Research into NME

I have decided to base my music magazine on the popular indie/rock magazine NME, The New Musical Express; I've bought NME for a few years now and I like how different the front cover is; they're colourful and quite opposite to the typical "indie' style magazines, their crowded and busy compared the normal indie features of being bare and minimum, this is why I like them. The colours are always bright and shots of the bands on the magazines are always different, usually making  a statement, like the Beth Ditto on the front cover of one NME cover, where she made a big statement by posing naked for the magazine. The background colours always match the bands cloth colours/ their skin colours; I think this causes them to blend in with the background forcing the fonts to contrast and jump out at the reader. 
I love the camera angles used to shot the bands, they always vary and suggest something of the person; for example the Beth Ditto cover has her covering some parts of her body, this suggests that even though she's willing to bare all on a wide spread selling magazine, she still has something to hide; this will be something I will aim to use in my magazine and I will test out different camera angles to try and achieve this. 
The font used for both the Title, "NME", and the subtitles use simple fonts with a light outline to make them stand out, I like this as the magazine has quite a lot going on anyway and using decorative fonts would cause the cover to be over crowded and too much when first looking at the cover. The bands names are always in the font they use for advertisement, I like this is it's the only different font on the page but never overwhelms the reader...
I prefer the magazine cover with vampire weekend as its busier and has more going on compared the Beth Ditto cover, I will use many traits of NME magazine, but will add my own design too it; this will include having an original picture with simple fonts etc.  

Contents page

My contents page took less time than my front cover because I knew what fonts to use and what layout I was going to use; I used a white background with a black and purple theme which made it stand out. I put the pictures in last and based them around the fonts but was wary of where the text was going as I wanted everything to fit together. 

I prefer my contents page to the front cover as it's simpler, the font reflected the whole idea of it being an acting magazine; I wasn't that keen on the font but thought that because actings expressive then the font should reflect this and shouldn't be as plain as using a font like Helvetica. I didn't edit the four pictures on the contents page because I didn't think they needed it, they were well taken and are quite small so you couldn't see them however next time if I did  have more time then I would edit them. Overall I thought my contents page came out well and I was impressed with what I produced in a few lessons; because I also take graphics I already had a base understanding of Adobe Illustrator which helped and gave me an advantage but I think it's a good program to know how to use. 

Final

This is my final version of the front cover; I created it in Adobe Illustrator and edited the picture in PhotoShop, I started by editing the picture and then moved it into Adobe Illustrator.  I created it step by step and after putting the image on I created the title; I played around with the title and the colours, this is shown on the previous post. I originally had the background white but decided the image merged better with the black background because how the picture was cut out on Photoshop; after this I changed the font colour to white to make it stand out and shaped it around the picture. After I had played around with the fonts and where the picture should go I added the final details and then my magazine was finished. I was happy with my finished piece and thought it came out well considering I came into the class late, I thought i chose the fonts well and they reflected the genre of the magazine well; however next time I think I would spend more time editing the pictures as they were quite roughly cut on Photoshop. I gained a good understanding of Adobe Illustrator and I think this will help in the future with media. 

When in the year will it be published?

The magazine would probably be published monthly, to give you the latest updates; it would be thicker because its monthly and not weekly so theirs more to include. The seasons would have an impact on the monthly releases too, I would make them themed for holidays like Easter, Christmas and Summer which would appeal to students. 

What fonts do you want to use?

Since I also do graphics I've learnt that fonts are important, so through out my magazine I would want to use readable but modern font that stays the same throughout the magazine; I don't like it when the font varies on every page of a magazine. But I will use different fonts for my titles of each page and for the main title of the magazine, these are more important and need to be eye catching.
I like modern, simple fonts like Helvetica etc.

What title have you decided on and why?

Possible names for the magazine:
Staged
Drama
Southdowns Music and Acting = SMA


The name of a magazine matters as it grabs the audiences attention, I had a few idea's on what I could name the magazine which had to do with the drama and music section of the college and decided on Staged. I think the name links to what the magazine will be mainly about and is also quite witty; which I think is important when your aiming a magazine at teenagers...

Screen Shots of my development for the title:
The first set of screen shots are initial ideas
The second screen shot is of my final two

Idea

What title have you decided on and why?

Ideas:

CT & M

CT&M

Staged

What are your ideas for cover lines?

What will your magazine be about?

I will aim to widen students knowledge or the college; this will include specific A levels and whether they have any events coming up. Film Studies for example always have previews of their short films up for viewing; similarly the music and theatre students are always keen for an audience and I will aim to widen peoples knowledge of these events. I will also include students achievements in these areas.

Who are you aiming your magazine at specifically?

I will be aiming my magazine at college students, both male and female, aging from 16 to 19 years old; the gender is something thats usually bias and causes the audience to choose the future of the magazine. I get the impression college students aren't very interested in what goes on around college, these people would be my specific audience.