QUESTION TWO

How does your media product

represent particular social

groups?

Whilst producing my final product, I had to think of how

I was representing my target audience of teenagers,

split 70/0 between female to male. “Representation

refers to the construction in any medium of

aspects of ‘reality’ such as people, places, objects,

events, cultural identities and other abstract

concepts.” In my magazine, I mostly represented

people, however within my planning there are further

links to objects and events. I have represented them

through the use of images and props.

MISE-EN-SCENE

I have used props when shooting my two models to further represent my target

market. I have used a Union Jack whilst shooting my model [Tara Symonds].

This represents my target audience because it connotes the genre of music that

they would be interested in. The Union Jack has a lot of associations with my

genre of music, for example, the Union Jack dress which Geri Halliwell wore

with the Spice Girls. It is also linked to the 1977 Silver Jubilee, when the British

punk genre of music first came about, the foundations of British music today. I

also used a pair of Ray Ban wayfarer sunglasses to represent my target

audience because of the associations with the mysteriousness of wearing

sunglasses to hide your eyes.

MISE-EN-SCENE

I have shot my model [Tara] wearing an Oasis t-shirt, blue

heels, and a coloured pair of shorts. I feel that this represents

my target audience because it has connotations to Britpop,

which is the genre of MALICE, and the type of music that

teenagers would be interested in. I feel that this would attract

my female consumers, however I decided to shoot Ellie

wearing a large leather jacket and studded shorts, I did this to

attract male consumers within the genre of Britpop music.

MODEL POSITIONING

I have shot both of my models [Tara & Ellie] in dynamic positions, this was

to represent the young and fun nature of my target audience. I wanted to

represent my target audience as joyful, to achieve this I shot my model

[Ellie] smiling to the camera and engaging with the reader. My model’s

facial expression [Ellie] is positive, presenting my target audience as

positive people. I feel that I have represented my models in different ways,

Ellie seems to take her music more seriously whereas Tara is represented

as having more fun, this is from the way that her arms are up in the air, this

signifies that she is carefree. I used both of my models because they fit my

target age group, but are also very fitting to the fashion and style look of

my magazine.

CLASS

My magazine’s target market doesn’t have a particular socio-economic

group attached to it, I decided to make my magazine accessible to

anybody of the age group which ‘MALICE’ is targeted towards. I have

represented this decision by the range of clothing and props that I have

used whilst shooting my models. For example, I have used an inexpensive

Union Jack flag, but I have also used a pair of Ray Ban sunglasses, which

might appeal to 3rd class consumers, and 1st class consumers. I have also

represented my decision to not attach a particular class to my magazine

by pricing it at £2.99, this price makes it accessible to both low income

consumers and high income consumers.

MAGAZINE GENRE

The musical genre which I have centred my magazine around is

representing my target audience of teenagers because it would

attract them to my magazine. I had to think how I would

represent the age and gender of my target audience. The genre

‘Britpop’ is a subgenre of alternative rock that originated in

Britain, it was most popular in the early 1990’s, influenced by

rock bands from the 1960’s and 1970’s. I decided to cover this

genre because I know that a lot of teenagers can relate and are

interested in this genre in particular.

ARTICLES

Everything which I have written is written in a way in which a teenager would be able to relate to, for example, I have written about iconic artists such as The Beatles and used quotes from Oasis songs. By looking through fashion and other music magazines which share my target audience, I was able to understand how articles were written and how

other magazines targeted teenagers.

COLOUR SCHEME

I decided to use a colour scheme of red, white and

navy blue, not only because of it’s associations with

my Britpop genre, but they are very bright colours.

Bright colours would represent my target audience

because my research shows that teenagers would be

more inclined to purchase magazines that include

bright colours as they are more interesting to the

eye.