Target Audience (College magazine)

I will specify my choice of audience using Demographics and Psychographics.

Demographics are used to group using quantitative data about their age, gender and Socio-Economic Group.   The age groups included in Demographics are:

·         15 and under

·         15-24

·         24-35

·         35-55

·         55 and over

As college students are aged between 16 and 18 none of these groups are very specific for my target audience, I will use the age group 15-24 and my magazine will target both genders to appeal to a larger market of students.

In terms of Socio-Economic Groups the majority of students are unemployed or have part time work therefore they fall into E Social group where casual labours, unemployed and state pensioners are held. Resulting in a lot of students having a finance budget, after taking all of this into consideration i will make my magazine free to attract more students who previously wouldn't buy a college magazine as they couldn't afford it.

Psychographics are about people’s views and personalities. This system collects data called (IAO) variables. The VALS system (Values And Life Styles) can categorise in terms of physiological characteristics. There are 4 main categories:

·         Group driven by needs: Survivors, Sustainers

·         Group who are outer-directed: Belongers, emulators, achievers

·         Groups who are inner-directed: I-am-me, experientalls, society conscious

·         Groups who are outer & inner-directed: Integrated

In terms of VALS, I will be aiming at interesting those both outer-directed and inner-directed giving me a larger audience.

Magazine Photographs Prezi (College magazine)

Photographs for my College Magazine on Prezi

Brief (College Magazine)

Preliminary exercise: using DTP and an image manipulation program, produce the front page of a new school/college magazine, featuring a photograph of a student in medium close-up plus some appropriately laid-out text and a masthead. Additionally you must produce a mock-up of the layout of the contents page to demonstrate their grasp of DTP(Publisher)


The presentation of the research, planning and evaluation will be completed using a blog!

The conventions of a Magazine cover (College and Music magazine)

• Masthead Title Piece - This is the magazines title and is usually found in the top left corner of a magazine.
• Left Third - This is the most noticeable part of the magazine where the title, advertisements and main features of the magazine are shown. This is very important as it ensures customers can notice the magazine more than its competitors. Also the top 5th corner is important for similar reasons, it is vital in supermarkets where magazines are displayed differently.
• Cover Lines - These are distributed around the main image without detracting the emphasis from the masthead. They can advertise other topics featured inside of magazine and are usually found on the left and right sides of the cover.
• Sell Lines - These are short, sharp descriptions of the title's main marketing point. The magazines motto. 
• Bar code - A standard code used by retailers to tell what the product is. 
• Dateline - Shows the month and year of publication within the print.
• Splash - This is the front cover of a magazine.
• Credit - This is presented on the magazine and tells the reader who wrote the article.
• Kicker - A short phrase found above the mast head, it is used as an introduction to the magazine, a punch line to get the reader interested in the article.
• Teller - This is a subtitle that tells you what the article is about.
• Screamers - A phrase on the front of a magazine that shouts at you, this can be determined by the colour, font and whether the writing is bold/underlined etc. 
• Skyline - The skyline is the section of the magazine above the mast head; here is where what the magazine is about (celeb gossip ... food ... exercise) is usually featured.
• Flash - This is like an advert which appears to be raised above everything else on the page, it often advertises free products and may be in the shape of a star (for example, Win a FREE holiday!).
• Graphology - It flashes at you.
• Anchorage - Giving the picture meaning, for example if there was a picture of Barack Obama, the anchorage would be text saying something like 'Obama's big speech'.
• Colour Scheme - This if generally three or four colours that are used on the front cover; for example the background may be purple, some text red, some green. Any boxes or Flashes on the page would stick to these colours.
• Vocabulary - The words used.
• Images - Self-explanatory; photographs, animated pictures (clipart).

Pricing and Publishing (College Magazine)

Relating back to my LIIAR Analysis of the Brief my research has shown that the students attending Wyke College will be lacking in terms of finance, therefore I have chosen to make my magazine free. This is appropriate as my magazine has not been created for personal finance benefits also it means the magazine appeals to more students who previously couldn’t afford to buy other competitors magazines and now can buy this magazine.  I have decided the magazine will be published every half term/ holiday in the year, this is appropriate as when the students return to college it informs them of events coming up. The student body at Wyke will cast votes with the students at Wyke and inform the results to magazine publishers; what the students want the magazine to feature thus appealing to more students.

LIIAR Analysis of the Brief (College Magazine)

Language
The front page of my collage magazine will contain a masthead, this must be a dominant icon so it is easily recognisable to the target audience (students). A main background image, in my case I think I will use either a extreme long shot of a building at wyke or a medium close up of a student. The colour scheme used has to be bold and appealing as i want the final appearance to be interesting and full of ideas. For my collage magazine i am considering using the colours orange, yellow and blue. I haven't particularly taken any inspiration from another magazine however u want my cover to stand out from all other competitors on the shelves in shops. The vibrant colour scheme will portray a young stylish feel for the magazine which will appeal to my target market, young students at collage. Inter-textually could be used to add a personal connection with the reader, possibly interjecting humour but this will rely on mutual cultural knowledge and understanding. As my target audience is students i am going to use cover lines to distribute different quotes from famous actors (Robert Patterson) and quotes from popular TV programmes (Skins) so more young students buy the magazine, it appeals to them.
Institution
The institute I am going to use to produce the magazine is Wyke. This would make the research into to my chosen college much easier, also as Wyke is familiar to me therefore I can use the Wyke campus to take my photographs of the buildings, facilities and the students.
Ideology
For my collage magazine I have decided to focus the main article on Wyke parties and the fun atmosphere the collage creates as well as the excellent grades it achieves. On my splash I will convey these articles by using screamers to shout out at the audience and refer them to pages in the magazine explaining the different activities you can take part in. The moral that I am wishing to discuss is that Wyke isn't all about hard-core revision and the student body create different activities and nights out for the students to unwind, have fun and socialise with their class mates. This will influence teenagers which have a bad attitude towards further education to continue their studies at Wyke as in the process of attaining grades for the future they will also create memories of their days at Wyke College.
Audience
Obviously my target audience is students aged between 16-18 studying at collages in the UK. More specifically there will be further information for students studying at Wyke, telling them upcoming events (the fresher’s party). After compelling research I discovered the majority of students studying at colleges in the UK are either unemployed or have part time work, meaning finance will be limited. Also as EMA has recently been cut by the government for the majority of students their finance is further restricted- therefore I will be making my magazine free.
Representation
The main article may portray the students as party animals who don't concentrate on their studies however in the magazine I will also add some facts and figures about Wyke’s A level results from previous years and explain how students should be entitled to a break. My aim for my magazine is too attract as many students as possible therefore I must try and make the splash appeal to lots of different personalities of students. I will offer advice in my magazine about how to organise students timetables so they have time for revision and too socialise.

College Choice for Preliminary Task (College magazine)

For my preliminary task i am going to feature Wyke collage, I have chosen Wyke as the new facilities featured as a background image for my magazine cover would present the overall appearance as modern and fresh. Also Wyke has a lot of extra activities going on which i could feature as a cover lines down the left third of my splash. I could also use a screamer to present the high grades Wyke has achieved in the past few years as a way of attracting the readers attention and gaining interest in the magazine.