Question 1- In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

These are the conventions that I have followed;

Within my magazine I have followed these specific conventions in the interest of keeping my overall media product to be easily recognisable as classical whilst still maintaining a unique twist on the genre mainly so my media product stands out from other classical media products. The first convention that I followed was on the front cover of my magazine, the fact that the masthead was an eighth of the page. I decided to stick with this convention as I felt that it made the appearance much more engaging to the audience through my understanding of research. Another convention I tended to follow was the use of my model
looking into the camera on the front cover by shooting the model in centre frame, this was also to further engage my potential market. Mainly because it made the appearance of the model more visually appealing. I personally feel this links to Mulvey's male gaze theory in terms of attracting an audience with the engagement of females. Thirdly, I chose to use pull quotes within my magazine pages, this is because they are often what attracts an audience- due to the fact that they get a brief idea of the context of the article- also,  most of the time, the pull quote is taken from the most interesting part of an article- this also aids to gain the attraction of my audience. I also used a colour scheme of White/Gold/Blue/Black which are considered rich colours, it is a reflection on my target audiences status and the magazines quality. Another convention I followed was the use of puffs on my contents page; it easily allows the reader to find the article they want quickly. The font type I used was also in the convention of classical music: (Times new roman) this further links to the quality of the magazine and my intellectual audience. I believe the conventions I have followed have been successful as it gave a good representation of what the genre without losing its identity, but not so traditional that it has no creativity.  I initially aimed to use an element?sign that is post modern but I chose not- this is the reason of my magazine losing its identity to certain degree.

My Developed conventions;

I chose to use a banner across the top of my magazine this is because it is one of first hook that draws the reader into the magazine this allowed me to give the potential audience a slight reveal of what my main articles of my magazine entails. Usually the main articles is where the magazine is most interesting, it would enable me to attract my target market which I need to do in order to create a selling, successful magazine.

I also chose to place the images from my contents page in a Polaroid format, this was because it suited the retro, unique stereotype of an classical genre. I developed this layout by creating a frame around the images as well as adding a puff with the page number. Furthermore my images appeared much more dynamic on the page and almost appeared to be placed on top of the paper rather than them being printed onto it, once again adding a more unique and visually appealing magazine. I also used modern, more youthful, energetic images which draws more people into my target audience as it is more engaging.

My Broken conventions

My images have completely countered this, linking to Steve Weak, it doesn't fully follow the convention as it isn't repetition to attract the same audience. This is the reason of my youthful, modernised, energetic images that are against the convention. This broken convention was that I didn't use a stereotypical "classical" colour for my masthead, instead I chose to use white, one of the main reasons for this was the fact that it created a bold and dynamic contrast with the black colours used within my front cover. I also felt that the use of White made the magazine at first appear gender neutral which was one of the main appearances I wanted to create within my magazine as it meant that I would attain a wider target audience. Likewise i used puffs in my magazine which allures a younger audience as they can relate to it. I also used competitions in my magazine which would result in a trip to a festival which again appeals to the younger audience (14-24).

Overall I feel my magazine connotes the genre, and I feel it definitely fits the niche market of modern classical in which case it meets my target audience.