Initial Planning

I have started to plan out how I intend for my acoustic magazine to look. I have done sketches based on my reseearch of how I want my front cover to look aswell as the contents page and a double page spread. My planning is all based on my research and my audience research. I have included features that I found worked well and were used in other acoustic magazines and what my target audience have said they liked from those existing magazines and my mood board.

I think that photography is a very important feature in magazines and the photographs are what catch the audiences eye and attention. When I did my audience research I had some feed back that the photo's weren't important in a magazine and it was more the content of the magazine that was important, so I have taken this into consideration in my planning. In my research into existing acoustic magazines photographs were very prominant and featured through out the magazine. These photographs were used mainly for advertising, another feature that was pointed out unnecssicary in a magazine, but I have noticed that all magazine use advertising as a way of bulking out their magazine so I have decided that advertising will be a feature in my magazine.

I am planning on using two different tpyes of advert for my magazine. One advert which will be on the front cover of the magazine listed as a feature inside is the advertisement of venues holding music sessions. The other advert I will include is the advertisement of instruments. Guitars were advertised alot in ACOUSTIC and I have looked closely into the photography used in these advertisements, so I have decided to include a guitar advert and use simular photography as used in existing magazines.

Nature was linked into all of the adverts for guitars as the bark of tree's works well as a back drop against the wooden bodies of the guitars. Objects used in these adverts, if used at all were very simplistic and orientated around the idea of country life and tended to be quite rustic and retro.

I have been photographing tree's around my area which I think would work well in my advert.

These are some pictures of tree trunks which would work well against guitars. I am planning on using one of these tree's in my guitar advert for my magazine.
In the existing magazines the whole of the tree is not included in the picture and the main focus is on the trunk of the tree, with the guitar resting on it. I think that these tree's have good potential for photography as they have not only got a good trunk but they also green leavage aswell which would work well.

Below is my initial plan and sketch of a tree I had in mind for photographing. This is a tree with a hollow trunk where I could place objects in surrounding the guitar. Also I planned the background which I wanted in the photo, which was an old wooden fence with fields in the background. All this fits in with the nature.


Here is the phot of the tree, although there is snow in this picture so the background is not overly clear and and nor is the ground. I may decide not to use the background and just focus in on the trunk of the tree, as shown in a photo further up the page.
Other back drops I have seen which may be usefull for advertising is an old wooden door with a natural brick wall frame.

I photographed this door as I thought it would work well as a back drop again as its quite an arty door and the colour of the door is very good and made with real wood which has a wooden texture which you can see in the pictures. Also the shape of the door with the arch and the frame would would brilliantly as a back ground for a guitar.

My advert will be on the second page of my double page spread and will take up an entire page, as this was a common feature which I found in existing magazines.

On the first page of my double spread will be an article on one of the main feature artists.

Here is a rough sketch of my double page spread.

On the first page I have roughly sketched out how I want the lay out to be. I will have the artists main picture (which will be used in the contents page) at the top left hand corner of the page. On the photo in white, bold writing there will be the artists name and in black underneath will be a brief write up and the interviewers name. The page will be split into two collumns. The background will be white and the text on the page will be black. The text will start underneath the main photo and carry up onto the second half of the page. In the middle of that section there will be a photo of her performing on stage, as done in existing magazines. The text will continue below it. At the bottom of the page will be a small box which will be a small fact file of her music and about the artist. In the box will be another small picture of the artists, with their instrument. This photograph will be finished in black and white, as this feature is used in existing magazines.

I already have an idea for the artists main photograph. The artist will be female and here is a quick sketch of how I would like the photo look, where it is taken, whats in the photo and what she is wearing, all important aspects of the photo which need to be taken into carefull consideration.

My sketch shows the female artist in a field with a tree in the for-ground on the right side of the photograph. Against the tree will be the artists guitar. I want to guitar to be there to link the guitar with nature as the style of music is acoustic. The female artist will be standing in the middle of the field with her back to the camera and her head turned to the right over her shoulder, looking at the camera, In the background will be a field.

She will be wearing non-fashionable clothes of a bohemian style. Although someone in my audience research said that the clother they were wearing was unimportant, image is music is important and with the style of folk/acoustic music comes the style of bohemian dress.

I also want her to have bare feet to show her looking natural and to link in with nature and the bareness of the music she creates.

I want there also to be a certain light in the photo, so I plan to take it either at sun set or sun rise, so as to give the photo an overall warmth.

Below is my sketch and plan of my contents page. I have decided to spread my contents page across two pages. I have done this as I found that from my research, I myself as a reader found it easier to identify what was in the magazine as more pictures can be used and the article written about more. Also it looks visually better and you can sell your magazine features more as you can include more in your contents so the reader is bound to find something they find worth buying the magazine for. Also in my audience research, when I showed ACOUSTIC which is an existing magazine, they liked the contents page as it was more clear and organised and more to read and the pictures helped out.

The first page on the contents page will be dedicated to the artists featured in the magazine. So at the top of the page there will be the two main featured artists. These two artists will have a large picture (which will be used as their main image in their article) and also their name and a breif write up of them and what is included in their article. The colours used for this text will be the colours I identified as the main colours in my magazine which are red, green, blue, brown and white. So seperate colours for the artists name and write up will be used from this selection depending on the final colour of the photographs.
The box below these will be a a larger and more well-known artist of the acoustic/folk scene who gives a short review of new up and coming bands and artists. Included a more familuar face in your magazine is important and is a feature which proved popular in my audience research, So by some one famous reviewing artists less famous will not only advertise the artist themselve's but also the smaller artists as the reader will be drawn to this page. A picture of the artist will also be included in this box. Idea's for the artist are people such as Newton Faulkner etc.

The two boxes below are small artists in the music scene, who have an article to advertise themselves. Again a picture will be included.

The box to the right hand side will be a list of the artists interviewed and reviewed in the magazine.

The final picture and box on this page is for an article about the Banjo. I have put this article on this page soo that it stands out against the pictures of the artists and so the readers eye is drawn to it. This article will be about the new popularity of the Banjo on the folk scene. This is also a way of me increasing the audience as people who like the Banjo may want to read magazine. Including the Banjo also means I am steering away from having a purely acoustic guitar magazine.

In every box on this page will be the page number, which will be wrtten in red text.

The second page of the contents page is going to be split up into different sections. This is a feature I noticed in a few music magazines and means that it makes finding a certain section alot easier.

The first section is the section for pure acoustic guitar. This section will include TAB as this was also another feature that proved very popular in my audience rsearch. But one feature that was not included was a CD of the songs which the TAB was provided for. This was a feature that people in my audience research said they would find helpfull and would like to see included, so I am going to. There will be a small picture of the TAB provided and a small write up of the song and artists next to it on the left hand side in a seperate box. Aswell as the TAB and CD I am also going to have pages for guitar techniques as this too proved popular. Also listed in this section will be the page for guitar sales and reviews on what guitars are hot this month. The fact there is a free CD will be advertised in red text, so ass to attract the readers eye. The background of this page will be white and the text will be black with certain eye catching words highlighted in red and bold text, so as to stand out. The page numbers will be positioned down the left hand side of the collumn, in red text.

The next section will be for new music and will have a list of artists names and their CD's. It will also have the venues and dates of where new artists worth going to see are going to be gigging.

The page numbers will also be down the left hand side of the collumn in red text.

The last section section on the contents page is going to be about Musical Goings On and will include a page numbers for the lists of venues holding music sessions and write ups of some of the best music sessions around in the country. There will be a picture in the middle of this section where I plan to have a photograph of a music session in one of my local pubs.

This is a photo of the pub where I will be taking the picture of the music session.

These are pictures taken from the pub the Fleece Inn. I am planning on getting together a group of local musicians around this table and old wooden seat and it is here that I will photopraph them and use one of the pictures in my contents page.

I feel that this is a good pub to photograph as it is an old black and white, traditional pub and will work well with the article about traditional folk/acoustic sessions. As it is an old building and goes back along way, so the setting is very good.

Finally here is a sketch of my planning for my front cover

I can't decide whether to have plain colour background or whether to photograph my main sell against a background such as the wooden door and frame (photograph further up page.) I haven't seen many magazines with a non-block colour background so I don't know whether it would work effectively but this is not to say I couldn't do it.

My masthead is going to be Unplugged. I have chosen this as my name as it is basically what my chosen genre of music is, which is acoustic/folk which is played 'unplugged.'

Folk and traditional folk music often uses a style of text which is very celtic like.

Here are some examples of celtic texts

This is the first celtic font, it is a very celtic style as it has the patterns around the initials. I think that this font would be too celtic for my magazine as its not a pure folk magazine.

This is the second celtic font, this font is less celtic but still has the celtic and traditional look.

But this is more the font I think that I want to be aiming for using. It looks slightly celtic but not over the top, so it would fit in with an acoustic/folk magazine.

The masthead will be positioned at the top of the page going across the centre. The main sell may overlap it slightly in the middle as I have noticed that this is a common feature in magazines. The main sell will be the main feature artist in the magazine. Using the main feature as the main sell is the best way to attract the readers and the audience and all magazine's do it. I'm going to be using a acoustic/folk artist and not just a pure acoustic act, I am doing this so as to target both acoustic and folk musicians and get that cross over of the two genre's of music which I want. The main sell will dennote the artist holding their guitar as this connotes acoustic music. At the artists feet will be another instrument such as the violin, I am including this instument on the front cover to get that cross over between acoustic and folk music and so that it doesn't look like a pure guitar magazine.

Above the mast head will be a small box going all the way across the page, this will advertise other smaller features included in the magazine, in the form of Coverlines with a Strapline underneath. An idea for one of these is simply 'BANJO' - 'The new Guitar?' The box at the top is going to be white with red, bold text for the Coverlines and black, smaller text for the strap lines. The use of red is so the top of the magazine stands out to the readers eye, so they are more likely to pick it up.

On the left hand side of the magazine will be the Coverlines and Straplines for those Cover lines.

Here are the rough idea's of the coverlines and pictures and Straplines I am planning on using.

The first Coverline near the top of the page will be the artists seen in the mainsell name. The Coverline will dennote a white, bold and large text as this is the main selling feature of the magazine. The Strapline will also be in white text, but not bold and in a smaller text.

Underneath will be the Strapline to go with it, which will be about whats included in his article or maybe an interesting quote from that article.

Directly underneath will be a Coverline about music sessions. There will be a picture of the venue I wrote about further up the page and a Strapline to go with this. This Coverline will dennote a pale green, bold text in a smaller font than the previous Coverline. This Strapline will use a white, non-bold and smaller text.

And then the final Coverline on this side will be one about guitar techniques and will dennote a bold and large red text so as to stand out to the readers eye. It is important that this feature is eye catching as this was one of the features that appealed to the people in my audience research. The Strapline to go with this will be in white text.

At the bottom right hand corner of the page will be a white box with black bold writing advertising the freebie included in this magazine which will be a free CD to go with the TAB included in the magazine. I have decided to include a freebie as I found out in my audience research that they would find a CD useful and this feature may sell my magazine more.

On the other side of the front cover at the top will be the Coverline for the well known acoustic artist who has reviewed new and up and comming artists of the folk/acoustic scene. This will dennote a white, large and bold text and the Strapline a smaller, non-bold white text.

Then underneath will be the Coverline for the other featured artists and will use the same text as the the previous Cover and Strapline. There will also be a picture to go with this artist which will go below the Cover and Strapline.

Then in a green, bold and medium sized text will be a Coverline for Crafter Guitars and the Strapline will be about how fanatastic there make of guitar are. The Strapline will be written in white non-bold text

Then finally in small but bold, red text will be the word 'plus' and underneath in white non-bold text three names of other artists included in this magazine

At the bottom right hand corner of the page will be the barcode, price, issue number and date.

The price of my magazine will be £3.75 as this is a price which doesn't sound too expensive but at the same time sounds like its a price you'd pay for a quality magazine.