The link to Pete's Media Blog

Here's the link to the evaluation guidance from Pete's Media Blog.

http://petesmediablog.blogspot.co.uk/2011_06_01_archive.html

The Evaluation

The Mark Scheme

·         Excellent skill in the use of appropriate digital technology or ICT in the evaluation.

·         Excellent understanding of issues around audience, institution, technology, representation, forms and conventions in relation to production.

·         Excellent ability to refer to the choices made and outcomes.

·         Excellent understanding of their development from preliminary to full task.

·         Excellent ability to communicate.

Evaluation guidance:

1. Create a separate blog post for each question.
2. Don’t post long blocks of text; add pictures to illustrate your answers.
3. You MUST use digital technology in your evaluation.

E.g. A PowerPoint uploaded using SlideShare or a Prezi. Go for variety; really try to demonstrate that you can use technology effectively.  Again add pictures to illustrate your answers

4. Use as much media / magazine technical vocabulary as possible: connotations, masthead, generic conventions, coverlines, puffs, pugs,  house style, mode of address, brand identity…etc
5. Start thinking about and drafting your evaluation as soon as possible!

Work flow for the next three weeks

Date	Tasks to complete in lesson time	Tasks to complete in own time
Week beginning 7 January 2013	Finalise magazine design in response to audience feedback and individual feedback Louise will give you. Post final magazine pages on your blog by the end of the week.	Make sure that blogs are up to date by referring to the checklist on my blog. Begin to draft the evaluation. The questions with guidance are on my blog.
Week beginning 14 January 2013	Work evaluation.	Work on evaluation.
Week beginning 21 January2013	No more lesson time to work on coursework. Complete any outstanding work in your own time. Final deadline for all work to be completed and posted on blogs: 25 January 2013

Wednesday 19 December

During the lesson today please try to complete your music magazine!

Remember to take screen shots of the development of each page – at least five screen shots for each page.

Work to complete over the holiday:

1. Make sure that your blog is up to date. Use the checklist below as a guide.

Blog Checklist

Introduction to main task & action plan

Initial ideas post

Analysis of 2 X front covers

Analysis of 2 X contents pages

Analysis of 2 X double page spread

Pitch

Pitch feedback & summary of findings

Time Management update

Research of chosen subgenre

Style sheet

Mock up of front cover

Mock of contents page

Mock up double page spread

Screen shots of design development of front cover – at least 5

Screen shots of design development of double contents page – at least 5

Screen shots of design development of double page spread – at least 5

Audience feedback from front cover

Audience feedback from contents page

Audience feedback from double page spread

Final design of front cover

Final design of double page spread

Final design of double page spread

2.    Produce a rough draft of the evaluation. The seven questions are below with some pointers on what you need to consider when writing your response.
  

• Question One

 In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

What are the conventions (key ingredients) of music magazines?  What does the front cover have to include?  What is a typical contents page and DPS like?  How have you included these conventions in your own magazine?  Have you done anything differently? How have you pushed the boundaries of this form? For this section you must try and use as much media / magazine vocabulary as possible: connotations, masthead, coverlines, central image, puffs, pugs, serif, sans serif, brand identity, house style, mode of address…etc.

• Question Two

       How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Which social groups have you represented e.g. teenagers?  Rock music fans?  How have you represented them? Have you represented them in a stereotypical way which maintains a dominant ideology of that group? Or have you tried to produce challenging, alternative representations which reflect more of an emergent ideology.   Discuss the images you have used, the language you have used, the ratio of text to pictures etc. It is always useful to say why you have made these decisions – essentially how these representations have been used to appeal to the target audience and sell the magazine.

• Question Three 

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Which institutions already publish magazines like yours?  Or perhaps you might mention an institution that has a gap in the market…Why would a company want to distribute your magazine – what does it offer?

• Question Four

       Who would be the audience for your media product?

Age? Gender?  General profile of your audience?  Refer back to your pitch post.

• Question Five

     How did you attract/address your audience?

What did you include in your magazine to make it attractive to your target audience?  Spend some time discussing the front cover – remember this is the hook that makes people buy it (70% of people buy their mags on the spur of the moment) Think also about mode of address – how does your magazine “talk” to the audience.  Why would someone want to buy your magazine?  Refer to audience feedback here – you will get this feedback during our lesson on Monday 12 March.

•  Question Six

      What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Which technologies have you used (Blogger, InDesign, Photoshop, Photobooth, digital camera, Facebook?)  and what have you learnt?

• Question Seven

      Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Hopefully for a lot of you it will be to do with making your practical work look professional and what appeals to the target audience.

Magazine Production

This week is all about magazine design - developing your front cover!

Here's the mark scheme:  
There is evidence of excellence in the creative use of most of the following technical skills:

• Producing material appropriate for the target audience and task;

• showing understanding of conventions of layout and page design;

• showing awareness of the need for variety in fonts and text size;

• accurately using language and register;

• using ICT appropriately for the task set;

• appropriately integrating illustration and text;

• shooting a variety of material appropriate to the task set;

• manipulating photographs as appropriate to the context for presentation, including cropping and resizing.

 As you design, take screen shots (command, shift, 3) of your work and post these with a short commentary which explains what you're doing and why you're doing it. 

Top tips
1. Explain / justify your design choices by making links back to your research (audience / genre).
2. Analyse your magazine design in terms of it's use of generic conventions and the suitability of those for your target audience.
3. Use key magazine terminology: brand identity, mode of address, house style, coverlines, puff / pug, colour palette, spalsh, connotation....etc.

By Wednesday you should be ready to get some audience feedback on your front page. 


 

Two very good blogs so far....

If you want to know what level four research & planning looks like so far this year have a look at Alice's and Amy's blogs.

http://alicegodding.blogspot.co.uk/

http://amysasmediablog1.blogspot.co.uk/

Some really fantastic work - well done!

The Research & Planning Mark Scheme

 A/ B: Level 4 16–20 marks

Planning and research evidence will be complete and detailed;

There is excellent research into similar products and a potential target audience;

There is excellent organisation of actors, locations, costumes or props;

There is excellent work on shotlists, layouts, drafting, scripting or storyboarding;

There is an excellent level of care in the presentation of the research and planning;

Time management is excellent. 

This is a Level 4 research and planning blog from last year:

http://alicesasmediablog.blogspot.co.uk/

You will have to work backwards with the blog - look at the oldest posts first.

It should give you a clear sense of the posts that you need to complete in order to meet level 4 criteria!