How does you product use or challenge conventions and how does it represent social groups or issues?
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My product ELODIE is a monthly magazine of the fashion/beauty genre that, for the the most part, conforms to most important conventions of the genre. When doing my research, I found most magazines of this genre have similar readerships of mostly adult female audiences, and the magazines themselves predominantly feature content about fashion and beauty, with little to no reference to current world events, or controversial social topics. However, there are some that break this convention and challenge it and publish articles about the fashion industry in association with social movements and other popular topics. I have chosen to do the same through my product, for example, on my contents page, I talk about the “meToo” movement under the “viewpoint” category. Hence, my magazine breaks this convention of the genre, which will make it stand out to readers among other competitors, and more closely target a hegemonic readership interested in social movement, current world affairs and fashion and beauty, filling a gap in the magazine market. Although my magazine conforms to most conventions of this genre, so it will also appeal to a wider target audience in this way.
When planning my magazine campaign, I considered and studied several codes and conventions of fashion/beauty magazines along with a variety of elucidated examples such as Vogue and Elle; And I chose to conform to the house style of fashion magazines, taking into account my hegemonic readership, although conventions I adhered to will be aimed at a social grouping of A,B and C1 class demographics, and psychographic groups of aspirers, succeeders, and explorers, according to the Blumler and Katz theory. I researched the youth and pop culture surrounding my target audience, employing the research when creating cover lines for my cover page, deciding on different typefaces, colour schemes and the content featured in the text. Through the addressing of these conventions of fashion magazines, I was able to compile a design for my campaign, that would appeal to my primary target audience of explorers. According to the audience profiling theory, my magazine will target Lifematrix segments through my coverlines, for example I will appeal to the Tribe Wired group through interaction on social media, my app and website online; the fun/antics group through the coverline “Check these things off your bucketlist now!”; Renaissance women through the coverline about celebrities such as “Gaga and J.Lo” and “Prince” who may influence others of the LifeMatrix segments to read my magazine, enabling an exponential growth of target audience reach. Furthermore, my research helped me understand that covert advertising as well as sponsorship and product placement are important conventions of fashion magazines, which I adhered to by advertising the Ballerina perfume. This will appeal to my target audience as they will be aspire to have the product being advertised in my magazine.
My magazine features a lot of content about fashion, including interviews with fashion designers and celebrities, articles on the latest trends: fashion and culture; and adverts about fashionable outfits, accessories, and other luxury products such as perfume and makeup. This will greatly appeal to my primary target psychographics interested in fashion, beauty and lifestyle, the latter also talking about the latest cultural news.
There are several different issues concerning fashion and beauty magazines and the genre universally; most of these contemporary media issues are regarding racial and sexist discrimination, the induction of body dysmorphia, and political correctness. Most of these apply to the genre of fashion and therefore, my magazine. Many say that there is a large under representation of minorities and the portrayal of women as objects of sexual gratification for men by men behind the camera who are a part of the production crew, even though most of fashion/beauty magazines have a female audience. This can often prompt women into adhering to the conformations of a patriarchal society, in relation to the concept of the Male Gaze by Laura Mulvey. Others further argue that women are represented unfairly in magazines of this genre, and across countless other media platforms, adhering to unrealistic western beauty standards, especially when concerning body shapes and sizes of models featured in magazines of this genre. I have, however adhered to some of these conventions, such as the appearance of my model that conform to Western beauty norms such as bigger lips, smaller forehead, clear skin, etc, in order to appeal to a wider western female target audience. In response to research, I challenge the convention of representation by incorporating Janelle Monae into my contents page. Although, if I could make any changes to my magazine campaign, I would choose to feature more women of colour, as well as women part of the LGBTQ+ community, not just into my images and photography, but also in my text and content.
I made use of several coverlines and images throughout my campaign in order to appeal to as much of my target psychographic as possible, with little to no exclusion of topics of interest to my target demographic. This is often the case for most fashion/beauty magazines that consist of content that targets a large audience but realistically applies to only a small niche audience due to the lack of diversity within its pages. My magazine employs representation through its use of cover lines and images that span over certain content aimed towards my target psychographic, such as fashion, beauty, celebrity news, travel news, and lifestyle. Moreover, I chose to implement some racial representation through my use of images on my contents pages. However, I made the decision earlier on to show a closely accurate description of what is often seen in fashion/beauty magazines: a lack of racial diversity, which is reflected in my magazine. I have adhered to this convention by including images of mostly caucasian models, with the image of only one model of colour. Several critics argue that while the amount of diversity within magazines such as Vogue and Elle has increased, there still remains a lot of progress to be made with the inclusion of more women of colour, part of the LGBTQ+ community, plus-size models, and over-50 models, among other groups.
The female target audience for my magazine is most likely to aged 16-35; and according to the “Digital Native and Digital Immigrant” theory by Marc Prensky, my younger audience will be attracted to my magazine through my website, application and social media, as they are familiar with the latest technology and have a fair presence online, these are mostly females aged 16 to 30. My older, digital immigrant, target audience, aged 30+ will engage with my magazine through its physical print format, as they would be more used to a traditional presentation and distribution of magazines. Most of my target demographic consists of women since statistics about Vogue readerships show that the publication pulls in an 80% female and 20% male audience, with about 70% of them aged 16-34. I chose to target the same demographic because my magazine shares with Vogue, similarities in genre and house style, along with the sophisticated level of content.
I also incorporated a colour scheme within my magazine, in order to create synergy, continuity and a strong house style, adhering to this common convention of fashion magazines. I have used a yellow, green, blue and white colour scheme on my cover page, which will engage target audience, as yellow is an emotionally strong colour that catches the eye easily, while blue and green connote confidence and growth. White is a colour used most often in fashion magazines since it connotes truth, purity and professionalism, and I have used it throughout mine as it also helps me create synergy within my front cover, contents and article pages. I also used white on my contents page, because it allowed me to apply whatever colour scheme I wanted to the rest of the magazine. Furthermore, the unconventional photograph of my front cover, will appeal to my target audience of aspirers and explorers, who will be attracted to the front cover, which features a model in an outdoor environment. Therefore, I challenged this convention of the main image featuring a model in a studio, however, I adhered to conventions of the main image by featuring a mid-close-up, with high key lighting, both of which as iconic conventions of the genre of fashion magazines. High-key lit images can evoke a mood and atmosphere of professionalism, authenticity and quality, therefore, it is often used in images in fashion magazines. And since most fashion magazine feature advertisement of clothing and accessories, the high-key lighting makes it easier for the audience to see the actual products. Another convention I did not adhere to was the number of coverlines that are most often placed on fashion cover pages of magazines aimed towards a female demographic. I featured 10 coverlines on my cover page to give the impression that my magazine is full of interesting content and try to make the consumer feel like they are getting a bang for their buck, this will also engage a wider consumer base, as often the first part of a magazine reader see is the front cover. And since mine has several coverlines about different topics, rather than 5 or 6, it will make the readers feel as if my magazine has something for everybody, appealing to a wide spread audience. I adhered to the convention of making use of star appeal, according to Richard Dyer’s theory, to attract my target audience through the image of Crea Butlin that is placed on my front cover, contents and article pages. This not only creates synergy within the magazine, but it also helps attract a larger readership, consisting of fans of Crea Butlin and her work, in addition to my target psychographic interested in fashion, beauty and lifestyle. I adhered to the conventions of the masthead in fashion magazine covers, by employing one word as the name of my magazine, with 3 syllables and placed on top of the cover page with a center justification.
My article page is also quite conventional as it features a double page spread, with one containing a full page image of the featuring artist and the other, typically on the left side, with the written article. I also adhered to the convention of employing two or more font styles, in black serif font against a plain white background. This sophisticated, minimalistic approach to design is a common convention of magazines such as Vogue and Elle, as I founded through research, and appeals to my target psychographic. The title of the article gives the audience a clear indication as to what the article is about, as mine does: The matter of being Crea Butlin. This tells the reader that this article is about the life of Crea Butlin. I have also used a simplistic image of Crea so as to not divert the attention from the article. Moreover, I employed a small caption in the top right corner of Crea’s image talking about the outfit the artist is wearing, this is a common convention of fashion magazines. In all off my images of Crea, she is looking into the camera, directly addressing the audience which keeps them engaged throughout. My article page, like those of Vogue, split the article into 3 columns to give a professional, clean and organised look to the page.
By adhering to conventions of fashion magazines, I will be able to target a wide spread audience according to Jeremy Tunstall’s audience engagement theory, which states that audiences often consume media actively or passively. And depending upon this, audiences can be primary, secondary or tertiary targets. Moreover the audience reception theory by Stuart Hall states that a media text can have three kinds of readerships: dominant, oppositional or negotiated, and my magazine target the dominant and negotiated readerships, as they will make up the largest portion of my target audience.
When planning my magazine campaign, I considered and studied several codes and conventions of fashion/beauty magazines along with a variety of elucidated examples such as Vogue and Elle; And I chose to conform to the house style of fashion magazines, taking into account my hegemonic readership, although conventions I adhered to will be aimed at a social grouping of A,B and C1 class demographics, and psychographic groups of aspirers, succeeders, and explorers, according to the Blumler and Katz theory. I researched the youth and pop culture surrounding my target audience, employing the research when creating cover lines for my cover page, deciding on different typefaces, colour schemes and the content featured in the text. Through the addressing of these conventions of fashion magazines, I was able to compile a design for my campaign, that would appeal to my primary target audience of explorers. According to the audience profiling theory, my magazine will target Lifematrix segments through my coverlines, for example I will appeal to the Tribe Wired group through interaction on social media, my app and website online; the fun/antics group through the coverline “Check these things off your bucketlist now!”; Renaissance women through the coverline about celebrities such as “Gaga and J.Lo” and “Prince” who may influence others of the LifeMatrix segments to read my magazine, enabling an exponential growth of target audience reach. Furthermore, my research helped me understand that covert advertising as well as sponsorship and product placement are important conventions of fashion magazines, which I adhered to by advertising the Ballerina perfume. This will appeal to my target audience as they will be aspire to have the product being advertised in my magazine.
My magazine features a lot of content about fashion, including interviews with fashion designers and celebrities, articles on the latest trends: fashion and culture; and adverts about fashionable outfits, accessories, and other luxury products such as perfume and makeup. This will greatly appeal to my primary target psychographics interested in fashion, beauty and lifestyle, the latter also talking about the latest cultural news.
There are several different issues concerning fashion and beauty magazines and the genre universally; most of these contemporary media issues are regarding racial and sexist discrimination, the induction of body dysmorphia, and political correctness. Most of these apply to the genre of fashion and therefore, my magazine. Many say that there is a large under representation of minorities and the portrayal of women as objects of sexual gratification for men by men behind the camera who are a part of the production crew, even though most of fashion/beauty magazines have a female audience. This can often prompt women into adhering to the conformations of a patriarchal society, in relation to the concept of the Male Gaze by Laura Mulvey. Others further argue that women are represented unfairly in magazines of this genre, and across countless other media platforms, adhering to unrealistic western beauty standards, especially when concerning body shapes and sizes of models featured in magazines of this genre. I have, however adhered to some of these conventions, such as the appearance of my model that conform to Western beauty norms such as bigger lips, smaller forehead, clear skin, etc, in order to appeal to a wider western female target audience. In response to research, I challenge the convention of representation by incorporating Janelle Monae into my contents page. Although, if I could make any changes to my magazine campaign, I would choose to feature more women of colour, as well as women part of the LGBTQ+ community, not just into my images and photography, but also in my text and content.
I made use of several coverlines and images throughout my campaign in order to appeal to as much of my target psychographic as possible, with little to no exclusion of topics of interest to my target demographic. This is often the case for most fashion/beauty magazines that consist of content that targets a large audience but realistically applies to only a small niche audience due to the lack of diversity within its pages. My magazine employs representation through its use of cover lines and images that span over certain content aimed towards my target psychographic, such as fashion, beauty, celebrity news, travel news, and lifestyle. Moreover, I chose to implement some racial representation through my use of images on my contents pages. However, I made the decision earlier on to show a closely accurate description of what is often seen in fashion/beauty magazines: a lack of racial diversity, which is reflected in my magazine. I have adhered to this convention by including images of mostly caucasian models, with the image of only one model of colour. Several critics argue that while the amount of diversity within magazines such as Vogue and Elle has increased, there still remains a lot of progress to be made with the inclusion of more women of colour, part of the LGBTQ+ community, plus-size models, and over-50 models, among other groups.
The female target audience for my magazine is most likely to aged 16-35; and according to the “Digital Native and Digital Immigrant” theory by Marc Prensky, my younger audience will be attracted to my magazine through my website, application and social media, as they are familiar with the latest technology and have a fair presence online, these are mostly females aged 16 to 30. My older, digital immigrant, target audience, aged 30+ will engage with my magazine through its physical print format, as they would be more used to a traditional presentation and distribution of magazines. Most of my target demographic consists of women since statistics about Vogue readerships show that the publication pulls in an 80% female and 20% male audience, with about 70% of them aged 16-34. I chose to target the same demographic because my magazine shares with Vogue, similarities in genre and house style, along with the sophisticated level of content.
I also incorporated a colour scheme within my magazine, in order to create synergy, continuity and a strong house style, adhering to this common convention of fashion magazines. I have used a yellow, green, blue and white colour scheme on my cover page, which will engage target audience, as yellow is an emotionally strong colour that catches the eye easily, while blue and green connote confidence and growth. White is a colour used most often in fashion magazines since it connotes truth, purity and professionalism, and I have used it throughout mine as it also helps me create synergy within my front cover, contents and article pages. I also used white on my contents page, because it allowed me to apply whatever colour scheme I wanted to the rest of the magazine. Furthermore, the unconventional photograph of my front cover, will appeal to my target audience of aspirers and explorers, who will be attracted to the front cover, which features a model in an outdoor environment. Therefore, I challenged this convention of the main image featuring a model in a studio, however, I adhered to conventions of the main image by featuring a mid-close-up, with high key lighting, both of which as iconic conventions of the genre of fashion magazines. High-key lit images can evoke a mood and atmosphere of professionalism, authenticity and quality, therefore, it is often used in images in fashion magazines. And since most fashion magazine feature advertisement of clothing and accessories, the high-key lighting makes it easier for the audience to see the actual products. Another convention I did not adhere to was the number of coverlines that are most often placed on fashion cover pages of magazines aimed towards a female demographic. I featured 10 coverlines on my cover page to give the impression that my magazine is full of interesting content and try to make the consumer feel like they are getting a bang for their buck, this will also engage a wider consumer base, as often the first part of a magazine reader see is the front cover. And since mine has several coverlines about different topics, rather than 5 or 6, it will make the readers feel as if my magazine has something for everybody, appealing to a wide spread audience. I adhered to the convention of making use of star appeal, according to Richard Dyer’s theory, to attract my target audience through the image of Crea Butlin that is placed on my front cover, contents and article pages. This not only creates synergy within the magazine, but it also helps attract a larger readership, consisting of fans of Crea Butlin and her work, in addition to my target psychographic interested in fashion, beauty and lifestyle. I adhered to the conventions of the masthead in fashion magazine covers, by employing one word as the name of my magazine, with 3 syllables and placed on top of the cover page with a center justification.
My article page is also quite conventional as it features a double page spread, with one containing a full page image of the featuring artist and the other, typically on the left side, with the written article. I also adhered to the convention of employing two or more font styles, in black serif font against a plain white background. This sophisticated, minimalistic approach to design is a common convention of magazines such as Vogue and Elle, as I founded through research, and appeals to my target psychographic. The title of the article gives the audience a clear indication as to what the article is about, as mine does: The matter of being Crea Butlin. This tells the reader that this article is about the life of Crea Butlin. I have also used a simplistic image of Crea so as to not divert the attention from the article. Moreover, I employed a small caption in the top right corner of Crea’s image talking about the outfit the artist is wearing, this is a common convention of fashion magazines. In all off my images of Crea, she is looking into the camera, directly addressing the audience which keeps them engaged throughout. My article page, like those of Vogue, split the article into 3 columns to give a professional, clean and organised look to the page.
By adhering to conventions of fashion magazines, I will be able to target a wide spread audience according to Jeremy Tunstall’s audience engagement theory, which states that audiences often consume media actively or passively. And depending upon this, audiences can be primary, secondary or tertiary targets. Moreover the audience reception theory by Stuart Hall states that a media text can have three kinds of readerships: dominant, oppositional or negotiated, and my magazine target the dominant and negotiated readerships, as they will make up the largest portion of my target audience.