question 1

Question 1:

My media product is a music magazine. The genre of music I decided to focus my magazine on is Hip Hop. During my research process I found that a lot of Hip Hop magazines like to use bright, eye catching colours through out there magazines and have a very consistent colour scheme. One magazine though which was very different from the rest of the music magazines I looked at was XXL which is one of the bestselling Hip Hop magazine. I was instantly inspired by this sort of darker and more mysterious side the magazine has. This is heavily shown by the use of black and white images throughout the magazine along with a consistent colour scheme, simple yet different sized fonts and very short cover lines which give away just enough to make you want to pick the magazine up and read it instantly. As mentioned I was inspired by this, so I replicated some part and from my point of view made them better to fit and attract everyone whom BeatBox is targeted at and I did this through:

Images: XXL used a lot of images in a black and white form through out there magazine, though I thought this was good I wanted to change it up a little bit as I thought having images in black and white would to some extent make the reader lose done interest as seeing the same type of content over and over again would make them uninterested. Like XXL I made sure that the image I used on my front cover was in black and white. I also made sure the model, like those used in XXL, was giving some sort of a message through their facial expression, you could say I kept the whole edgy front cover look but when it came to the rest of my magazine I switched it up. Used a range of images which were in colour. Making sure the models give a message through the image as well as welcome the reader to their section of the magazine to make the reader feel more connected with the magazine. The whole idea behind BeatBox is that it is heavily based on its readers, giving them exactly what they want and involving them. 

Colour scheme: XXL uses a 3 colour scheme which is of red, black and white. I wanted to keep this element of the magazine so like XXL throughout my magazine I used the colour scheme of red, black and white and kept the consistency as well as a "traditional" Hip Hop magazine look.

Cover lines: Like the colour scheme I wanted to replicate this too. XXL does this really well, they make their cover lines short but very informative which makes the reader want to instantly pick up the magazine. I wanted to create the same affect so I too kept my cover lines short but informative giving enough information to engage the reader but not so much that the story is fully told.

Layout: Though XXL uses simple language, they use a very complex/interesting layout. The creators of the article always have a different layout every time and their layouts in some way tend to represent the artist or model in the same way they have been on the front cover. They keep the message they are trying to portray very consistent through different means/elements. For example by using columns that are the same size but including within them text that are of different sizes adds a more creative flare to the magazine. Though I replicated some of these elements such as the same size columns but different size fonts throughout, I added my own ‘flare’ to it. XXL tends to place their pull quotes at the centre of the article, however I began my article with a quote from the artist and added the pull quote directly under the artist’s name and I have finished my article with a quote, something XXL doesn’t do, this is because I want BeatBox to very consistent and in some ways different from other Hip Hop magazine. This also keeps the neat and orderly making it easier for the audience to read.