Drafting and Planning: Complete Article

In preparation for creating my magazine, I need to create an article to go on my double page spread. The first draft of which follows:

Second Passing is back! Fans of the British Alt-Rock band Second Passing took to twitter to welcome back the band after an almost 2 year hiatus following the revelation that the lead singer, Rachel Basset, was struggling with an addiction to cocaine.

Back in March 2015, Second Passing’s management announced the band’s hiatus to “Focus on the wellbeing of the band members and to take a break from the spotlight of the industry”. It was revealed that the lead singer, Rachel Basset had been admitted into a rehab centre to recover from a cocaine addiction. On her personal twitter the day of the announcement, he stated “yes the rumours are true I am being admitted to rehab for cocaine I would like to thank Second Passing for being with me through my recovery” followed by a tweet on Second Passing’s account saying “We are proud of Rachel for taking this step towards getting better, we ask that you all support him during this difficult time”.

Now, almost 2 years later, and with a fully recovered Rachel, Second Passing are back. On her personal Twitter, Rachel said “I would like to thank everyone who helped me during my time of need. I would also like to thank the wonderful staff at the centre I was treated at. I met some amazing people with some amazing stories. Hopefully, this will encourage anyone who is struggling to get help, you’re not alone!”

Second Passing has released a teaser of their upcoming 3rd album, in fact as you are reading you can pre order “Clear Head” on iTunes!  It is said that 25% of the profits raised from pre-orders will be going towards charities that helped Rachael.

This is the article that will be going down the right hand side of my Double Page Spread.

Organisation: Photo Shoot Planning

 For my music magazine, I need to take photographs, in total; I will need between 4 and 5 different photographs for my cover, contents page and my double page spread. For my cover, I may need to take my photographs on a solid background that will be easy to crop out. Because of this I may need to use a white background.

For my Contents page, my photography will be surrounded in a black border and so I am freer with the background that I use. However, I will be using a red page number on top of the image so I will need to take that into consideration.

For my double page spread my background does natter all that much as my text will have a white background and so I will only need to ensure that my artists are not covered by text.

Drafting and Planning: Table of Contents Layout

Above is my Table of Contents that will be positioned on my Contents Page. As you can see, I have split articles into 4 different sections: News, Featured, Regular and Album Reviews.

“News” includes stories that may be seen as big news in the alternative music industry. I have kept this section small as my magazine is monthly, and not every month has masses of news. Furthermore, because of my target audience, I feel if I was to include too much “News” it may feel boring to read.

“Featured” includes all the artists listed on the left hand side of my cover. I have put the featured second to top because that is what will be the selling factor to my audience.

Below that I have “Regulars”. These are the articles designed to keep the reader interested and encourages repeat custom.

I took the idea of “Album Reviews” from Rock Sound. On their contents page they have a number of “Album Reviews” which are displayed at the bottom of the table of contents. I have only set these to be one page long because I feel like a Double Page Spread of these would bore the reader.

As you can see from the page numbers, I have mixed all of the features (except for the Album Reviews) throughout the magazine as I wanted to give the reader a variation of content, as personally, I find it boring when there is a strict format, e.g. all Features, then all Regulars, etc.

Organisation: Band Profile

The band I will be using on my front cover is called “Second Passing”. They are a made up band consisting of 3 female artists. They include: Rachel Basset – Lead Singer, Jess Simmons - Bass and Guitar, and Ruby Oldwood – Drums.

Second Passing originates from Birmingham, UK and was founded by Rachel Basset, when they were in school. The band started out small doing shows for free but were soon spotted by Lab Records Limited who signed them and brought them to the attention of the alternative scene. From there, Second passing grew rapidly, producing their first album “Thoughts of a Full Moon” under Lab Records within a year of being signed, which sold over 5000 physical copies and over 50,000 Digital copies, including iTunes, Spotify and YouTube. Following the release of Thoughts of a Full Moon, Second Passing was invaded to support Neck Deep on their UK tour in the summer of 2013. A successful first album was followed by their self-titled second album under Hopeless Records in 2014, which brought them into the American Alternative scene. In 2015 they announced a hiatus to “focus on their band members and family” following their lead singer’s admission to a rehab centre.

Research into Target Audience: Expectations

There are several expectations from the Target Audience of an alternative music magazine. These include:

• ·        Dark clothing: while this is not the case 100% of the time, there is a large stereotype that alternative artists wear dark, often black, clothing which connoted the emotion that is portrayed in many alternative songs.
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• ·        Strong body language: it is common that, on the front cover of alt-rock magazines, that the cover stars have strong and defensive body language. For example, arms crossed, standing at an angle (which gives a person a sturdier balance)
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• ·        Direct address: Direct address is a very important aspect on the front cover of an alt-rock magazine. This is because direct address from one of more cover stars intimidates the reader into investigating the magazine, possibly encouraging them to pick up and purchase the magazine.
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• ·        Language: Strong, short and snappy wording for my cover lines are commonly found on the cover page of an alt-rock magazine. The use of bold statements will match the attitude of the genre.

To ensure my magazine is as realistic as possible, I will make use to include all of these points within my photography on my cover page.

Drafting and Planning: Article Drafting

In preparation for creating my magazine, I need to create an article to go on my double page spread. The first draft of which follows:

Second Passing is back! Fans of the British Alt-Rock band Second Passing took to twitter to welcome back the band after an almost 2 year hiatus following the revelation that the lead singer, Rachel Basset, was struggling with an addiction to cocaine.

Back in March 2015, Second Passing’s management announced the band’s hiatus to “Focus on the wellbeing of the band members and to take a break from the spotlight of the industry”. It was revealed that the lead singer, Rachel Basset had been admitted into a rehab centre to recover from a cocaine addiction. On her personal twitter the day of the announcement, he stated “yes the rumours are true I am being admitted to rehab for cocaine I would like to thank Second Passing for being with me through my recovery” followed by a tweet on Second Passing’s account saying “We are proud of Rachel for taking this step towards getting better, we ask that you all support him during this difficult time”.

Now, almost 2 years later, and with a fully recovered Rachel, Second Passing are back. On her personal Twitter, Rachel said “I would like to thank everyone who helped me during my time of need. I would also like to thank the wonderful staff at the centre I was treated at. I met some amazing people with some amazing stories. Hopefully, this will encourage anyone who is struggling to get help, you’re not alone!”

Second Passing are said to be working on their third album. It has been rumoured that the profits from the sale of the album will be going to charities similar to those that helped Rachel during her difficult time.

At the moment, this is just a rough draft of my article, and so this is not enough to fill my double page spread and will need to be altered to make it longer.

Drafting and Planning: Basic Magazine Layout

Above is my first version of my magazine cover. This is only the basic layout of my cover, currently, I have not taken photographs to use on my magazine and so, the colour scheme is subject to change, I used pink temporarily as it is a neutral colour that is similar to a skin tone, allowing me to see what the elements of my magazine would look like with a cover star present. I have used a skyline, which again is subject to change but I wanted to get a feel for what the skyline will look like. Currently, without a cover star, the main headline looks odd, but it will look better with a main image behind it. I have used fonts that I have featured in a previous blog about the typography, including Andre Light SF and Chanson Heavy SF.

Organisation: Location

When I come to take photographs for my magazine I will use the school’s Drama studio, using the black walls as a background. I will use these images as my main imagery on my front cover. By using a black background I will be able to crop around my artist with ease, with as little blocky areas as possible. This will give my magazine a smoother look. 

 

For my contents page and my double page spread, I will take photographs outside. I will try to take some photographs on a set of stairs. As you can see below, it is common pose for alternative bands to take photographs on stairs; these photographs will look good on my contents page or on my double page spread.

  

Drafting and Planning: URL Positioning

One of the features commonly seen on a magazine is a URL to the magazine’s website. A URL is usually found written below or integrated into the masthead. I made 6 different mastheads all with the URL in a different position (above). The top, centre and bottom left mastheads are all the same size fonts, positioned next to, on top and below the masthead. Top and middle Right are similar, however top right is a bigger font size, which allows it to be more prominent. Finally, bottom right is the most different out of the 6 because it is positioned in the arrow with a white font.

My favourite out of the 6 is top right as I feel as though it looks most realistic. While I like bottom right a lot, I feel like it wouldn’t be used on a real magazines as it looks quite distant from the others.

Drafting and Planning: Masthead Design

In preparation for creating my magazine, I designed some mastheads that I could use on my front cover. Having an effective masthead is important for any magazine as many shops and outlets that sell magazines have too many to display to be able to put them out on the shelf next to one another. Because of this, having an effective Upper left third masthead is the best way to ensure your magazine is seen by everyone who looks.

When designing my mastheads I decided to keep the colour scheme as Red fill with black outline (this may change later) to give myself a fair comparison between all of my designs.

Designs 1, 2, 3 and 4 are simply different fonts (1: Amelia BT 2: Cinema Gothic BTN Shadow 3: Annie BTN 4: Agency FB) with the same colour scheme, while design 5 is a mixture of Times New Roman and Agency FB however, the O and the arrow coming off the O was my own design. I decided to use an arrow in this design as the word “Outre” comes from the French word “Outré” meaning “unusual and typically rather shocking.” Or “Out of the norm” – Something that I feel represents the Alternative music scene. After looking over these 5 designs, I prefer my own design, number 5 as it is unique, but also captures the meaning behind the name.

Drafting and Planning: Double Page Spread Layout Draft

In preparation for creating my music magazine, I decided to plan the layout of my double page spread. I decided to position my main image over more than one page, by doing this I will be able to give my artist dominance over the rest of the content on the page. I decided to position my title over the main image, and again over half the page, I did this to make it prominent on the page, however, I don’t want it to dominate the main image, which is why I will position it completely inside the main image. My main body of text will go across the right hand page, with half of the text wrapped around the main image. I will include a pull quote to full space at the top right of the page.

Drafting and Planning: Contents Page Layout Draft

In preparation for creating my music magazine, I decided to plan my contents page. I decided to take inspiration from an NME contents page here, even though I am using RockSound for the majority of my inspiration, this layout stood out to me because of the large main image and the big cover line. I also liked my idea for a title for my contents page, “Inside Outré” as they are both contrasting words and I feel like they flow nicely together. I like the side bar design, which I again took inspiration from the NME contents page. At the foot of the contents page I decided to put an advertisement section, where I may advertise a new album. Finally, I decided to include an image of the front cover at the top of the page.