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

I found the contents page to be the hardest part of the magazine to do because there was a lot you needed to put in there but still make it look easy to read and not over do it. As I struggled with the layout  numerous times, I opted for the layout of Billboard’s 2010 issue because it had a set structure that was somewhat easy to follow.

1. Editor's Letter: In the Billboard issue I was looking at, they had their charts listed in the sidebar. I thought that was an interesting use of space but did not want to follow their conventions because charts are what Billboard is best known for so I thought I shouldn’t do the same as that’s not what I was going for and I instead used this space for an ‘Editor’s Letter.’ Furthermore, by having an editor's letter, it gives a more personal feel and the reader would feel welcome. In the letter, I tried to make it both professional but also use colloquial language because its important to not intimidate the reader. With all the magazines I looked at, I noticed that they rarely wrote editor letters. However, I thought that magazines do change their format over time so I wouldn't need to keep it there for all the issues as once I hit a specific issue number, I could change the layout (not too must though) as magazines do that often. For example, Billboard recently changed its font (see the picture on the right). It has been changed quite a bit but not too he reader would not know the magazine anymore, though I personally don't like the change because it doesn't look like a music based magazine anymore.

2. The 'By-Line' & Signature: I decided to add a signature and ‘by-line’  here because it made it look more professional, appealing and easy on the eye. It adds a sense of quality and worth of money. I did not use a font for the signature but rather signed a piece of paper and scanned it into photoshop and this gave it a more 'real' feel.

3. "CONTENTS": I have kept continuity going from my front cover to my contents page by using the same font. I also followed the same format of Billboard's because according to my research, 71% preferred it that way.

4. Issue Number: I did not have an issue number anywhere on the front cover and I thought that I should place on in the contents page to inform the reader.  Also, Billboard had their issue/volume number in the contents page too so I decided to follow that convention.

5. Pictures At The Top: I liked the idea of having images at the top when I saw the Billboard cover. I was originally going to have 3 images too but because of them being landscape, they couldn’t all fit and I then opted for the ones that had a better colour scheme. My feedback suggested that this was the strongest part of the contents page. I agree with this and think that its mainly because of the dominant colours, which also compliment the white of the numbers. 

6. Feature Puffs: Under most of the features in Billboard, some text was written beneath it. I decided to follow this convention as it was a decent use of space. However, now that I'm looking back, I think that perhaps I wrote too much text and my target audience is relatively young and would rarely read the contents page. 

7. "IN EVERY ISSUE": A common convention in most music magazines is to note the articles that appear in all the issues. I decided to use this form because it separated the features from the other things and gave it a more organised feel.

8. Pages: The magazine logo is also displayed next to the page number, which again implies a sense of consistency.