Creative Critical Reflection

How does my product use or challenge conventions and how does it represent any social groups or issues?

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• As a magazine producer it is very important for me to create or produce my magazine to be different and unique from other brand magazines and this is because audience would want something that is new and appealing from my magazine than other magazine brands that they had come through.

• My magazine production has also followed some of the conventions that are usually found in a magazine. Here are the comparison of my magazine production and one of the magazine from my research analysis:

Cover Page

 

Masthead

My masthead is shorter and the size is bigger but has an elegant and thin style of font and all text are in capital letters which is what normally all magazine masthead looks like, also the masthead font is bold which makes it stands out and draws audience’s attention.

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Tagline

I had followed the position of my tagline the same as my magazine research which is below the masthead but I used capital letters instead.

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Cover Lines & Featured Article

All of the cover lines on the cover page are related to jewelry and the fashion trends, also most of the cover lines are on right hand side of the page, which is the same as my magazine research as it is what normally people look at first,  which is why I had put my featured article on the right side of the page instead of the left side The font for my featured article is slightly bigger than the rest of the cover lines text.

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• Other than that, for my cover page picture, I had used a mid-close up shot and mine have a set of jewelry which is a necklace and a pair of earrings. The color scheme is almost the same as my research analysis but I add an emerald green and this is to add a pop and a bright color to my cover page. Also the lighting for my picture is different which is a warm lighting compared to my research analysis which is a bright lighting                                                                                     

    

Double Spread Page

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• I had followed some of the conventions of what a typical double spread page magazine conventions looks like, such as the used of large image in a double page spread, and this is because young people prefer a less wordy magazine and with more images and this images could also draws audience’s attention.  The image of the young female girl is on the right side with the interview Q&A.  Another convention is a drop cap, is the where the first character of the first paragraph is made larger, taking up several lines of text or the first few sentences. The photo shopped bracelet is an inspirational from my research magazine that I had also incorporated in this page.

 

• Next is a drop quote, selected quotes from the article that are used to entice the reader and make them want to read the article to find out what the quote is about. This is the person or the model that I had interviewed. The headline, ‘Pearl Accessories for daily wear!’ is on the left side of the page and this is because audience will know what they are reading about. Next is the caption which is on the left side below the large image of pearl accessories set that the model is wearing.

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• On the right side of the page is an interview Q&A with a young female teenager. Normally, on a typical double spread page jewelry magazine, they had interviewed a famous or world known designer or a celebrity to advertise the magazine and the above articles ,but I had interviewed an ordinary young teenager girl who shares her loves for jewelry and sharing tips on how to style her daily look. Lastly, page numbers for my page that I had also followed the conventions of a typical magazine, with the masthead of my cover next to the page number.

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Contents Page

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• My contents page appear to be very simple in comparison to the front covers and double page spreads along with the rest of the magazine but they are just as important as they tell the readers exactly which page they would find the corresponding articles.

 

• Based on my research magazines, normally the background color of the jewelry contents page is white but mine, I used a colored background (beige brown) that matches with the color scheme of my cover and the fonts I used for the magazine and this is because I want my content page to have a unique feature from the magazines on my research analysis.

 

• The conventions I had followed, such as the ‘Content’ title, the sub headings, the large images, page numbers and lastly, extra descriptions below the sub headings.

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Social Group Representations

My magazine represents the social groups associated with the genre of fashion in a quite stereotypical way. Because as you can see the cover lines and main cover lines revolve around issues in the accessories fashion world trends and as in what to wear for daily look and solutions for every events or festive.

 

The social groups that are more likely to buy and read my magazine, are young female who loves fashion trends and loves wearing accessories to complete their look and men are most likely to not enjoy this magazine as they prefer a sport or fitness magazine.

 

In the past the representation of women in magazine as sexual object through the male gaze, and female model are wearing an outfit that are almost as naked and I wanted to show that nudism and its beauty does not have to be a synonym for vulgarity and submissiveness. However, these had changed and magazine such as ‘ACCESSORIES’ are portraying women in a respectable, normal and formal way. The models in their front cover are not too overly dressed despite their big with bright color jewelry but they are well covered up.

 

In my country, the largest population is ethnic Malay Muslim which is why I decided to use a model, who is a Muslim, young female teenager, who wears hijab to refer the ethnicity representation of my country.

On my research analysis the models are wearing big jewelries but I had used a simple and minimalistic accessory and I had also told the model to pose as such but more of less try and relax and have fun.

The model for my double spread page are wearing something what the same age as her are wearing which is a modest looking blouse, and wearing a white hijab that is called a syawl a kind of hijab, what young female teenager Muslims would normally wore.

 

I also wanted to represent how the creative youth nowadays, especially for the Muslims young females group who wears hijab that have to cover their hair and think they cannot wear any accessorize jewelry such as earrings as they have to cover their hair as well as their ears. My model wears the earrings outside the shawl and by hanging it on the shawl and this is a new trend that every hijabis had followed and enjoyed!

As for the price, I tried to put on a lower and an affordable price for my target audiences, which is why I had put $6.90 as it is in the range price for magazine in my country.