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My Audience Research - The Munches (Screenshot's)

My Audience Research

For this certain task I had to do audience research via electronic means, I did this using my blackberry and interviewed five close friends of mine that had the same taste in music as me, I didn't interview and females because I didn't know any females that liked the same genre of music of me. I had a set of questions and some varied depending on the previous answer of the person, I asked the questions and then munched (screenshot) what the people said. In my next few post I will publish the munches (screenshot's). I also asked them to give their likes and dislikes on two magazine covers that I had previously addressed, and these were:

My Questions I Will Be Asking Are:

1. Do You Buy Music Magazines ?

2. Seeing As You Don't Buy Music Magazines Do You Read Them When You Go To The Doctors, Barbers, Dentist Etc.. ?

3. Why Don't You Buy Music Magazine Is It Because Of Cost Or For Another Reason  ?

4. Where Do You Go For Your Sources Of Information ?

5. If You Were To Buy Music Magazines What Would Be The Maximum Price You Would Be Willing To Pay ?

6. What Kind Of Genre Of Music Do You Like ?

7. Would You Prefer To See A Female Or A Male On The Front Of  A Music Magazine

8. What Would Your Prefer To See This Female Wearing: Tight Clothes, Just In A Bra, Clothing Showing A Lot Of Cleavage, And If A Male, How Would You  Like Him To Be Dressed ?

9. What Kinds Of Things Would Make Your Contemplate Purchasing A Music Magazine Or Put You Of Buying One ?

10. [I Will Send Them 2 Real Music Magazine Covers And Get Feedback Off Them] ?

11. If You Were To Give Any Tips To Anyone Making A Magazine What Would They Be ?

12. Have You Found This Questionnaire Useful, Good, Bad, S**T Etc. ?

POSSIBLE QUESTIONS TO ASK

      FIND DIFFERENT MAGAZINE COVERS AND ASK THEM WHY THE LIKE/DISLIKE THEM.

      DO THEY BUY MAGAZINES AND HOW MANY A MONTH.

      DO THEY READ MAGAZINES AT BARBERS, DOCTORS ……

      WHAT KNOWLEDGE DO THEY HAVE?

      WHAT WOULD MAKE YOU BUY A MAGAZINE (WHOS ON THE FRONT COVER)

      WHAT GENRE OF MUSIC WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE

      WHAT KIND OF ARTICLES WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE IN THE MAGAZINE GENRE YOU HAVE SELECTED

      WHAT IS THE MAX PRICE YOU WOULD PAY FOR A MUSIC MAGAZINE

      WHAT ARE THE MAIN THINGS ABOUT THE MAGAZINE THAT CATCHES YOUR EYE

      WOULD YOU PREFER TO SEE A MALE OR FEMALE ON THE FRONT

      DO YOU PREFER THE SUBJECT TO BE TOPLESS, IN A BRA, SHOWING CLEVAGE ETC.

Magazine Contents Page Analysis 4

1)      There is one main image used which is of a women lying on her back with her feet in the air, it takes up most of page and the text fits around where her legs are positioned.

2)      The Page structure is good on this contents page because the way the text is positioned around the main image, the woman is lying down with her feet in the air taking up the top left corner is the masthead which is place on her foot, then underneath the masthead and next to her leg is the actual contents of the contents page, and then small writing like the issue date and the image date along the bottom. Something that is very smart is the masthead is there but it hard to see it is the outline of a V. The actual layout of the word ‘contents’ is very different because most other magazines would have their writing across the top, this magazine has broken up the word and makes the reader look closer and focus.

3)      The woman on the taking up all of the space is Ciara she is 26 and is a black woman whose genre of music R&B, hip-hop, pop and dance.

4)      This is another contents page where the image takes up most of the page and the writing is place around her, if she was not so important the text would dominate the page and there would be a small picture of her at the top left for example, however seeing as she dominates most of the page this indicates she is an important figure. What she is doing on this page is very different to other magazine contents pages, because most of the people are standing up, she is lying down and if your look her legs are in a V shape as well.

Magazine Contents Page Analysis 3

1)      In this contents page there is only one image used and is a medium close up of a female, the image is large and takes up most of the page.

2)      The page layout/structure is similar to another magazine that I wrote about recently, the image is in the centre and larger than life and in the top left corner is the masthead, the top right corner is a statement that the women in the photograph has said and then underneath the guitar she is holding up contains, the contents of the magazine.

3)      In this photo the photographed person is a Caucasian woman called Duffy, who is 27 years old and her genre of music is Blue-eyed soul, pop and rock.

4)      Out of all of the magazines I have analysed this has to be one of the biggest pictures I have seen, by that I mean it takes up the most space n the contents page meaning that either the main article of the magazine is on her, or she is a really important famous person at the moment.

Magazine Contents Page Analysis 2

1)      In this magazines content page it has only used one picture, which is large and takes up most of the page.

2)      The layout/structure of this page is very simple there is the mast head in big foam writing along the top, then a picture of Katy Perry holding a mushroom which takes up the most of the page, on the far left is the contents which is in a column of text, and at the bottom left is a statement that Katy Perry has said.

3)      The photographed person in this picture is Katy Perry who is a Caucasian, 27 year old female whose genres of music is pop, rock and gospel.

4)      The picture is placed directly in the middle of the page however she looks tiny because she is holding a huge inflatable mushroom, so the editor has made her look smaller than average.

Magazine Contents Page Analysis 1

1)      There are 9 pictures used in this magazine cover, 4 of which are images of people, 1 image of a cartoon white male shooting bullets out of his mouth, 2 of a double page spread in the magazine and 1 of the front cover.

2)      This magazine front cover is a double page spread consisting of two A4 sheets that make an A3 sheet, on the left ‘first’ page there is a large main image on the right of the page and on the left is a column of text that has a picture above and bellow the text, so the pictures box the text in, and on the other page the its almost a mirror of the first page except there are a few images taking up a lot of space on the left of the right page, and a editors note at the bottom, also the column of text on the right of the left page is longer but with a picture of the front cover of the magazine at the top left.

3)      The big cartoon is actually of a band member in the group gorillaz called 2-D and he is male, 33 years old, and white, his genre of music is hip hop/alternative rock.

4)      The picture takes up nearly the whole of the first page, which shows that the magazine is quite dedicated to this person in this particular issue of the magazine, showing they have some importance.

4th Textual Analysis

Denotation:

The Magazine cover consists of a colour photograph of a women looking directly at the camera, in a suggestive and seductive way. The shot used is a medium close up showing her head, arms, waist and the end of her knees. She is sitting on something which looks like a bed and with her left hand on what looks like a beds metal headboard. The background is a cream/white colour, and the photograph covers the whole of the magazine cover. Behind the woman’s head is the blender masthead, and in front of her are 8 separate cover lines in bold black and highlighted yellow. The Photographed women’s name is in large bold orange writing. A barcode is visible in the bottom right corner and it is vertical.

Masthead:

Blenders Masthead is easy on the eye, distinctive and clever: Orange with a thin black drop shadow. The font is not serif; the letters are evenly spread out so they are not joined up. The Masthead towards the end has a line cutting through the rises and crinkles the text, which also gives it that feel that the text has been put through a blender itself and looks like the blender has disfigured and shredded it. The font used is similar to that of ‘Sprite’ font and connotes of something nice, thirst quencher, joyful. Where the slash is in the masthead also looks like it is cutting through the female characters head, which could be an implication that the model herself is unstable.

Character:

The cover photograph is of the successful American singer ‘Beyonce Knowles’.

Composition:

She is posed in a very suggestive ‘hey baby’ kind of way. She is sitting on a bed and looking very sexually suggestive and provocative, and it links in with the writing above her name which says “in bed with”.

Costume:

Her costume is a silk bed vest which is low down on her neck, and reveals a lot of cleavage and a black lace bra. Her clothing has definitely been specially selected to appeal to the target audience, who are most definitely going to be male. The tagline next to her name saying “IN BED WITH” the Beyonce, so the costume has to match this and that is why she is in a silk vest and sitting on a bed.

NVC:

Her Non Verbal Communication is also very seductive and suggestive. The way she has positioned her eyes and eyebrows are also very suggestive, but apart from that she has no facial expression.

Lighting:

The lighting is very is suggesting that is around midday, however Beyonce is in bed so that contradicts this and makes us think it is night or possibly early morning.

Setting:

There is a setting which is a bedroom however we can only see a bit of the bed which Beyonce is sitting on, and half of a metal bed frame which she is holding on to. The white/cream background connotes peaceful, calmness and tranquillity.

Cover-Lines:

The main cover-line that relates to her photograph says: “Beyonce Knowles: In bed with”. This is making a reference to a piece to a album that she brought out in September 2006, it debuted a number one on the billboard 200, selling 541,000 copies in its first week. It gained Knowles her largest first week sales of her solo career and became her second consecutive number one album. The album sold 3.2 million copies in the United States, and has been certified three times Platinum by the RIAA. The different cover-lines tell us that this magazine doesn’t concentrate on just one genre of music, and doesn’t just focus on music either, but it chooses who it wants to write about based on the genre of the magazine, however that’s not always the case this magazine is more of a R&B magazine, but rock, goth and other genres will appear sometimes. Artists mentioned in the cover-lines are include Evanscene a American rock band, Kevin Federline a American dancer/rapper and The Killers a American rock band now a theme that keeps coming up is the ‘American’, all of the people on mentioned are American rock bands, rappers etc which shows this magazine is based soley on American artists. The cover-lines are spread out between the pictures.

Target Audience:

Considering all of the points above, the likely target audience would be males and females (around 60:40 to m:f) more males, however a good amount of females are still in this audience. There would be two age ranges one 15-29 and 33-44. They would have a good knowledge in old and young artists, would have a good knowledge of music and would like the genres of music this magazine has to offer. They would be definitely be well educated and well read, and have a good interest in American culture.

3rd Textual Analysis

Denotation:

The magazine cover consists of a colour photograph of a woman looking directly at the camera. The type of shot is a cross between a mid shot and a long shot, showing her head, arms, chest, waist and half of the legs from the knee upwards. The woman in the picture is standing up in front of a background; the background is a grey colour and a lighter gray at the bottom and a darker gray at the top, also the photograph cover the whole of the front of the cover.  At the side of the woman’s right shoulder is the masthead “Q”, and in front of her are 8 separate cover-lines in black, red and white. The cover-lines are spilt up by colour as so; black, red, black, red, black and then a cover-line above that in white, black and red. A barcode is visible in the bottom right corner.  There is also a puff above the barcode.

Masthead:

The masthead for ‘Q’ is definitely very distinctive seeing as it is one letter, always in the top left corner and is in a red block and the letter Q itself is in white. The Q is not in serif font. The font used is similar to that used in the brand name of the sweets ‘M&M’ which connotes sweet, enjoyable, tasteful and colourful. The masthead takes up almost ¼ of the page, and is modern, and is easy on the eye.

Character:

The person in the photograph on the contents page is the young successful American singer ‘Lady Gaga’.

Composition:

She is posed in a very suggestive ‘come and get me’ kind of way. Her pose, body language, stance, and “clothing” as you may call it are very seductive, sexy, suggestive and provocative.

Costume:

Her clothing is made up of hot black latex trousers she isn’t wearing a top she is merely covering her chest with her right hand, but on both of her hands she is wearing black devil finger gloves. This ‘costume’ has definitely been picked out for a specific audience, and that audience is males and there is no particular age limit. One of the gloves fingers is in her trousers which is very provocative.

NVC:

 Her non verbal communication is very seductive and suggestive. Her mouth is slightly open showing her white teeth, and the kind of makeup she is wearing brings out her eyes which make the look like she is starring directly into the readers eyes.

Lighting:

The lighting is very dark and gloomy implying it’s a late afternoon and a rainy day, but that goes with lady gaga’s clothing because her clothing is very dark and mysterious.

Setting:

There is little, if no setting at all the dark grey murky background connotes mysterious, gloomy, inconspicuous and frustration, this could be because lady gaga is such a mysterious character and there are loads of rumours and speculation about her and her being.

Cover-Lines:

The main cover-line that relates to her photograph says: “Lady GaGa: Has Risen”. This is making reference to an album that had come out a few months before the interview called ‘The Fame Monster’ released in 2009. This music was pop, electropop and dance. That would link to her costume in this because it is very funky and hip. There are also over cover-lines that are either highlighted in white or a black cover-line followed by a red cover-line. There are also other musicians featured on the front of this magazine, Jedward, John Lyndon, Slash and Julian Casablanca’s. That is a real mix of musicians and music genres you got Jedward who are hip hop and pop, slash who are heavy metal, blues and hard rock and Julian Casablanca’s who does indie rock and so on. Now that is a big variety of musicians showing that they are appealing to a very big audience.

Target Audience:

Considering all of the above points that I have mentioned, the likely target audience would be male and female but a split of 60:40 male to female, roughly aged 15-49 this is because the younger audience the 15-28 would be more interested in Lady GaGa and Jedward so on, because they are young and hip and then the 30-50 for the people like Slash who is a old hard rocker, however don’t get me wrong the older generation may listen to younger music and vice versa. The people would be very knowledgeable about popular culture, the older generation and the younger generation.

2nd Textual Analysis

Denotation:

The magazine cover shows a colour shot of a woman (Fergie) looking directly at the camera. The image of the woman is from the waist up so this would be classified as a Mid Shot (MS) showing her head, her arms, and waist. The woman is just standing in front of a background. The background is pure white and covers the whole of the front cover. Behind the women is the Blender masthead, and in front of her are 5 separate cover-lines in blue and black. The photographed women’s name is in blue and the other main cover-lines are also in this colour. The same colour as the masthead which is a light brown also separates the different cover-lines and also is the colour of the bracket, highlighting one of the cover-lines in the bottom right corner. A bar code is also shown in the bottom left corner.

Masthead:

Blenders Masthead is easy on the eye, distinctive and clever: Blue with a thin black drop shadow. The font is not serif; the letters are evenly spread out so they are not joined up. The Masthead towards the end has a line cutting through the rises and crinkles the text, which also gives it that feel that the text has been put through a blender itself and looks like the blender has disfigured and shredded it. The font used is similar to that of ‘Sprite’ font and connotes of something nice, thirst quencher, joyful.

Character:

The cover photograph is of the successful and well known American singer ‘Fergie’ (Stacy Ann Ferguson) from black eye peas.

      Composition:

She is posed in a very suggestive “Hey Baby” kind of way. Her body language, and definitely clothing is very sexually suggestive and majorly seductive/

      Costume:

She is wearing a white cotton sweatshirt that isn’t zipped up instead she holds it away from her body, and underneath is just a black bra which shows more than a lot of cleavage. This piece of clothing has been picked out especially a target audience of the magazine, and judging by the image it is most likely to be men. Her look is like a street girl and that it what she is like personality wise.

     NVC:

Her Non verbal communication is also very seductive her mouth is open ever so slightly displaying her white teeth and pink lips, she is also looking directly at the camera, and her eyes look very seductive with the way she is looking.
Lighting:

The lighting gives no distinct time frame of when it could be, however because it is a pure white background it could suggest it is daytime.
Setting:

There is little setting, however the whit background connotes calm, heavenliness, and peacefulness, and is not keeping to a set theme but is making Christina Milian look as if she is a princess or a goddess.

Cover-Lines:

The main cover-line relates to her photograph and says “Fergie: how a bad girl made good”.  This could be making reference to the musical film called “Nine” filmed in 2008 that she was in. The film was a musical-romantic film. So the statement “how a bad girl gone good” is referring to the fact that Fergie isn’t know as a good girl she is known as the bad ‘chick’, so in this film she has to play a nice girl romantic girl who is very affectionate, therefore the opposite of Fergie.  Others mention in the cover-lines were led zeplin, Rihanna, MIA so we have tow American artists (Fergie, Rihanna), MIA a English artist and they all have roughly the same kind of music, R&B, hip hop, all of those latest kind of music, so led zeplin who does hard rock and heavy metal music he then stand out from the rest and not to mention that he died 31 years ago.

Target Audience:

Taking into account all of the above points, the likely target audience would be people (male and female which a ration of 70:30) and two age groups 15-30 for the more younger artists like Fergie, and  40-50 for the more older artist like led zeplin. The kind of people that would read this magazine would be well knowledgeable on the younger artists of today for the artists like MIA, rihanna and Fergie, and definitely up to date with the latest trends. Then you have the older generation that would be likely to be well educated/read, and led zeplin for the hard rockers.

1st Textual Analysis

Denotation:

The magazine cover consists of a colour photograph of a woman looking directly at the camera. The image of the women is from the waist up so this would be classified as a Mid Shot (MS) showing her head, part of her arms, and waist. She looks as if she leaning on something like a wall and part of her arms are cut out because of the angle she has her arms at an angle .The background colour of the image is white at the bottom but as you look up, the image gets darker like a sort of gray and you can see the shadow of her arms. The photograph covers most of/ nearly all of the magazine cover. Behind the woman is the Blender Masthead, and in front of her are 7 separate cover-lines some are in normal black font, and the others are highlighted yellow so it pops out and makes the reader more interested. The Photographed women’s name is highlighted yellow and there are other highlighted yellow pieces of text, which are seen as just as important. A barcode is visible in the bottom right corner.

Masthead:

Blenders Masthead is easy on the eye, distinctive and clever: Blue with a thin black drop shadow. The font is not serif; the letters are evenly spread out so they are not joined up. The Masthead towards the end has a line cutting through the rises and crinkles the text, which also gives it that feel that the text has been put through a blender itself. The font used is similar to that of ‘Sprite’ font and connotes of something nice, thirst quencher, joyful.

Character:

The cover photograph is of the successful and well known American singer ‘Christina Milian’

v  Composition:

She is posed in a very seductive pose in a “come and get me” kind of way. Her pose, body language and clothing are very sexually suggestive and provocative.

v  Costume:

Her clothing is a cotton open neck short sleeve shirt (extreme v-neck), showing lots of cleavage. This costume has definitely been chosen to appeal to a certain target audience of the magazine, who are most likely to be male, however most girls reading this magazine would like to look like her, and underneath her name is says “The Making of A PERFECT HOTTIE”. The clothing worn could be to promote her new single “SAY I” (Feat. Young Jeezy), and her clothing looks very new and modern. Also she is wearing white and the background is white so the editor is trying to make her blend in.

v  NVC:

Her non verbal communication is also very seductive. She looks like she is against a wall with her arms out, brushing her hair back, her lips open ever so slightly and she is looking at the camera with very seductive eyes.

v  Lighting:

The lighting is showing that it is about mid day.

v  Setting:

There is little setting, however the white background connotes calm, heavenliness, and peacefulness, and is not keeping to a set theme but is making Christina Milian look as if she is a princess or a goddess.

Cover-Lines:

The main cover-line that relates to her photograph says: “Christina Milian: The Making Of A Perfect Hottie”. This is making reference to the way she looks in the image, latest single “SAY I” (Feat. Young Jeezy) this picture was taken after the music was released. The single reached #21 on the Billboard Hot 100 and became her third most successful U.S single. Other artist mentioned was the “Arctic Monkeys” which are two different music clashes Christina Milian is a hip young American singer, and the Arctic Monkeys an old indie English rock band.

Target Audience:

Taking into account all of the above points, the likely target audience would be people (male and female which a ration of 70:30) and an age group of 15-30. The kind of people that would read this magazine would be well knowledgeable on the younger artists of today, and definitely up to date with the latest trends.