Article for magazine double page spread

Dr. Choke

 Prescribes Elements with a dose of his own medicine

The 19 year old up and coming hip-hop artist Dr. Choke (John Huff) reveals to Elements that his first album will be released in the summer of 2011.  The album will be called ‘Prescription’ and is said to include 17 of Dr. Choke's songs including his two in the chart songs 'Corner of my eye' and 'Understanding ourselves'.  ''Since I was 12 years old I have been in love with hip hop and have always practised my own free styling over a beat to come up with new sounds and lyrics which I would then write down onto paper and i like to call this my book of raps.  The album has songs which I wrote the lyrics to, from years ago and from the present times and so it is kind of a mixture of my life's work''. After he had completed his years studying A levels, Dr. Choke then went on to achieve a PHD at medical school, however only half a year into medical school he was offered a recording deal.  This changed everything for him as he then dropped out of medical school and began to pursue his long wanted life as a hip-hop artist.  “I knew that when I sent off some of my songs and nobody liked them that I would need to have a backup plan, so I thought I would give med school a try, since I did have some brains for it, so that I could earn a good living later on in life.  Funny thing is that about 5 months into med school I got a phone call from Aim2Break records, and yep that’s right you guessed it, they offered me a recording deal for an album and I knew then that this was it for me, I know it’s not going to be easy but I’m putting in a lot of effort to be the best I can be”.  It is said that in only a few months the album will be completely finished and will be out in the shops by summer this year.  “The album is nearly done, we just have a few fine tweaks to make to it but it will be out in a few months and defiantly be ready for summer, and as it is my first album, it is special to me and so I have put in all of my best work and a lot of emotion, blood, sweat and tears have gone into making it and so hopefully It will sell and that I will gain a lot of support from fans”.  We then asked Dr. Choke exactly where he gets his name from and he replied… ‘Well im sure you can kinda figure out the doctor part aye? If not then it’s because I studied medicine for a while so I thought I would take ‘Dr’ from this and then the name Choke is because when I go to rap battles,  not trying to big ma’self up here or anything like that, but I am known to be good at making people choke when I lay down my lyrics and have done this a few times now, causing me to look good in front of the crowds and win the battles, so this is where I get the name Dr. Choke from”.  Being a young artist and already having an album deal is a very respectable accomplishment and there must have been a lot of inspiration gone into the creation of the music and lyrics.  “yea, a lot of the songs are based on some real life events that I have experienced, when I was 10 my mum died and let’s just say my dad wasn’t a very good one, I would most days have to look after myself and make my own way to places cause my dad was never really about.  Over the years after this I tried to push myself so that I could get a good education and prove to myself that I could do it without my dad’s help but all I really wanted to be was an emcee.  Events such as these are the kinda thing that I’m sure many people out there can relate to which is why you will find a lot of stories like these on my songs, but on a few songs there are just short raps or skits, which is basically free styling I did in the studio with a bit of comedy in them which the recorders and myself thought would be good to have on the album”.  So now after the release of your singles 'Corner of my eye' which reached number 4 in the charts and 'Understanding ourselves' which managed to get to an impressive number 2 in the charts, how well do you think this album will do for you and your career? “Well ya know, I’m very appreciative of the fans who bought my singles and allowed them to get so close to the very top of the charts, it makes me so happy to see that the effort I put in pays off and that relief you get when you know you have a good song is just incredible.  From seeing how well the singles did I am hoping that the album will do just as god and that it will get into at least the top 20 albums, as for my career, I am wishing that it will sell well and so I can continue making songs and being able to sell these, but what artist doesn’t want this aye? Exactly, so really all I want is for it to do well and so I can make my mum proud although I know she is already”.

Evaluation of test photographs

for my front cover of my magazine the test shots i took were of my artist with a white background which i am going to later on cut around and then apply a background i will create for my front cover.  i have taken about 20 photographs of the artist in a variety of different poses and have narrowed it down to a choice of about 5 or 6 which i think would be the best.  they are all similar and have slightly different facial expressions and am going to later on choose only one for wen i come to make my magazine.  this an example of one which i think is best......

for my contents page i have taken photos of the same artist in a different pose and will cut out only a segment of the photo to use as the article of my contents page to give the audience a taste of what is to come, for this i have taken about 10 photos and have narrrowed it down once again to about 4 or 5 which i think are best and will use on  my contents page.   this is an example of the main artist photograph to go onto the contents page.......

 

for the double page spread i have taken photos of my main artist as this is who the article will be on.  i have taken the photos against a brick wall and had the artsist at different positions on the wall and have taken about 6 photos for this.  i have done this because i want to have the brick wall covering the whole of the double page and then the artist somewhere on the double page where i can hen position him and the article to fit well together.  of all of the photos i took for this i narrowed it down to 2 which i like the best.  this is an example of one which i think is best........

 

also for my contents page i wanted to have a microphone lead coming down one side of the page and then the actual microphone ending at the bottom of the page.  i wanted to use this to make the contents page look better and i have taken about 3 photos for this and here is an example of 1 of them.......

Golden Spiral

The golden spiral is a geometric shape that is used on photographs and when applied on top of a photograph, it shows us where the eye line will be taken to at the point of looking at a photograph.  this help me when taking my photographs for my magazine.

these are my two examples of using the golden spiral and have put them onto 2 of the photographs i have taken for my magazine cover and double page spread.

Pitch Feedback

After finishing my pitch i felt it went quite well, except slightly hesitating on a few of the questions, but i felt i managed to answer them.....eventually.  questions which came up were things like what inspired the name/genre of the magazine and i felt that these were the questions i did well on.  the question i did struggle on a little was about the types of clothes my artist/band would be wearing and i did manage to give examples of types of things they were going to wear and i was also given advice on this front, so that i had more ideas which could help me when deciding on what i wanted the people in the photographs to be wearing.  for the musicl inspiration of my pitch i had included 2 bands/artists which would not really appeal well in my magazine and so i removed these from the animoto and have now replaced them and made it look better and so this can be watched as the final one. after the feedback i decided that i wanted to have a solo artist rapper and i then looked at the artists i had used as my inspiration and decided that i wanted to base my artist on someone like 'Proffessor Green' and 'Devlin'.

Artist Profile

This is my profile i have created for my artist, this artist will be on the front cover and double page spread.

Name: Dr. Choke

Age: 19

Qualifications: Dropped out of medical school.

Lifestyle: enjoys socialising in free time, recording new raps and beats in the studio, competing in rap battles, clubbing, sports.

Ambitions: wants to pursue a career in hip hop and hopefully one day become internationally known and makes loads of money.

Likes: other Emcees such as Devlin and Professor Green, likes to base his music areound their work and hopefully get to be like them.

dislikes: people who are famous for being famous and havent had to work for it.

Musical Preferences: Hip-hop, likes a little bit of Jazz, Ray Charles mainly, some mainstream music.

Hobbies: likes to play some sports which are, football, and a little bit of basketball. 

Fashion: The hundreds, Obey, Billionare Boys Club, Henleys, Levis, Flat peak caps, Nike's.

This is my pitch i created which includes some of the ideas i have for my music magazine and also the inspiration i have for those ideas.

Fonts

these are the fonts i have looked at the most and am going to narrow down two of them to decide which i think would be best on my magazine but will do this when i get closer to making the magazine to see how they look as a masthead on te front cover along with the rest of the front cover.  they include, Consolas, Gungsuh, MisterEarl BT, Orange LET, GulimChe, Calibri (Body), Verdana, Lucida Sans, Candara, Comic Sans MS.

final name/title of magazine

i have decided to choose 'Elements' as the name/title of my magazine as it refers to all of hip hop and as my magazine is going to be a hip hop magazine then i think the name would go perfectly with the genre and this is why i have decided to go with it.

names of the magazine

i have thought of several names that i could call my magazine and as it is going to be a hip hop magazine i have tried to refer the names that i have thought of to refer to hip hop. the names are:

Flow - this refers to the flow of lyrics in a rap or song

Stream - this refers to a stream of music in a rap or song

Street - this refers to some of the 9 elements of hip hop which inlcude Street Entrepreneurialism and Street Language

Break - this refers to the part of a rap or song where everything is cut off including the percussion and then reintroduced into the song.

Elements - tis refers to the 9 elements of hip hop which are
1. Break dancing
2. Rapping
3. Graffiti art
4. DJing
5. Beatboxing
6. Street fashion
7. Street Language
8. Street Knowledge
9. Street Entrepreneurialism


Emcee - this refers to the rapper/MC but can be spelt emcee which is basically the person who is rapping the lyrics/bars.

The Beat - this simply refers to the beat of a rap or song.

final colour palette choices

i have decided to go for either the colours of black, white and yellow or black, white and red, this is because i have seen magazines with both of these schemes in and i feel that they would work best with te magazine i am hoping to make.  i am not going to choose my final colour scheme choice untill i am closer to creating the magazine as i will then be able to use the photos i have taken and match them to the best colour scheme of the two.

Colour Palette ideas

for the colour scheme of the magazine i have created some colour palettes of colours i think will look good on a magaizne from research and my own knowledge.  have decided to use black and white as a definite combination of colours as i think these always go well together and then with them a brighter colour to give the magazine a nice look to it and  make it look more interesting. 

Target Audience Profile

i have created an audience profile of someone who i have created myself and have applied it to the magazine i will be creating.



Age: 17
Gender: Male
Education: 6th form student
Lifestyle: enjoys socialising n free time, well off, likes to go into town, buy clothes, magazines, games, enjoys photography, cinema, films.

Ambitions: wants to study media or photography at University after A levels.  hopefully wants to have a job in the media, preferably as a photographer or a journalist.

likes: looking good (likes to keep up to date with fashion trends, and keep physical appearance best as he can), socialising, partying.

Dislikes: mardy people, bitchy people, cheese.

Musical preference: Hip-hop, 'anything that sounds good', pop, some mainstream music, little bit of indie/rock.

Hobbies: shopping - for clothes mainly, football, going to the gym, social networking (Facebook mainly).

Disposable income: magazines, clothes, food when out, games, CD's.


from this audience profile, this will be the type of person who will be the target audience of my magazine and the sort of person who is going to buy it.

Inspiration.....

the inspiration i got from this front cover of kerrang is the photo of the 5 people standing in a line with 1 man at the front and then the rest beside him but further back, and this makes him look like the leader, and this is something i would like in my magazine of either a small group of artists or a group of 5 like in the photo on this cover.  and i will have the leader of the group or lead singer/rapper at the front of the picture and then the rest behind him like in this one.

Inspiration.....

there are two things about this double page spread of kerrang which inspired me and the first is that the photos are all in black and white which i would like to do in my magazine for some of or all of the photographs, the second is that the first photo takes up just about the whole of the first page, and te reason i like this is beacuse it is the first thing we see in a magazine when we turn the page and so to do something will like this will get readers to look at my photographs more than if i were to put them on another part of the double page.

Inspiration.....

the thing that inspired me from this contents page of NME is that the layout is very understandable and easy to read as there is the title at the top in a font the same as the front cover, there are lists of cover lines on the right hand side which is easy to find what is on wat page, also the list of the band index on the left hand side i think is a good thing to have on a contents page as it allows the reader to quickly find the artist they like the most and go straight to that page of the magazine and so this is why i would like to have something of this style in my magazine.

Inspiration.....

the thing that has inspired me from this contents page of kerrang is the colour scheme of black, white and yellow and after looking at many magazine covers and conents pages i have found this scheme to be the most appealing to me as it think it has good appeal and makes the magazine look quite good.  and so to have this in my magazine i think will allow it to have a better look to it.

Inspiration.....

things that inspired me from this double page spread of Vibe magazine is the fact that in the photograph there is a man on turntables, which is a key instrument in hip hop and allows DJ's to create their beats and mixes for rappers to rap or 'spit' to, and so this is something i would like to include in my magazine  as a picture on its own r with someone on them.

Inspiration

first of all the style of magazine i have decided to do is a hip-hop magazine as this is the kind of music i myself like the most and feel the most comfortable making a magazine from it. 

there are many things about hip hop that i really like but the artist i like the most is Eminem.  i feel he is the greatest rapper and i have listened to all of his music and still do and he is quite an inspiration for me which pushed me more towards doing a hip hop magazine, aswell as hip hop being my favourite genre of music.

Mood Board

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEht9E69yTJ6yXYtRupK3o_SbYsAVrLK3yBP7jgYUOckTjuZRAJtBaXO8IO3C1_k8oYDz92l5lRZmhTpRmJRoirHQlPgotlsYo-MmXFWuOSGhhn1VhRTgMPtrxKzHSWQzpJkcoWfbD6F6IMH/s1600/omp3e6k_Magazine.jpg

please click this link to see my mood board as the picture was to big to see as a blog post :D

Double page spread analysis 3

for this double page spread of Kerrang the colour scheme used is black, white and red and tis allows the reader to see things clearly as the colours go very well together.  we can seee that the whole of the double page has been used up well with very little space left and this is good as it makes it look as if alot of information and photos have been used and tat the reader will  be able to get alot ut of this spread.  the title of the page has been put in white and red and is in quotation marks and reads 'were being the best MCR we can be' and where it says 'were being', and 'we can be', the font used is red and smaller than 'The best MCR' which is in a large white font and this is because it attracts the reader more as MCR stands for My Chemical Romance which is the name of the band and they are saying they are being the best they can be and tis use of font makes them look as if tey are the best.  the main photograph of the page has been put mostly on the right side as it is the first thing we see wen we turn over the oage and is of the lead singer of MCR and so it attracts the reader more if tey were a fan of MCR.  this photo is in black and white aswell as the other 3 photos layed out at the bottom middle and right of the page and this makes them fit in with the colour scheme of the page and gives it a good look.  2 of the other photos are of the rest of the band doing what they do in the recording studio and the last one of the other 3 is the lead singer again, recording a song on te microphone in the studio and as tis article is about them letting Kerrang into their studio, these are a good use of photographs to let the reader see what goes on in their studio.  under the title there is a subheading reading 'My chemical romance invite kerrang to their recording studio...'  the use of elipsis is good as directly underneath this sub heading is the text of te article and so it lets te sub heading flow well into the article so the reader will easily be able to read on.  listed on the far right and side of the page is a list of new tracks by MCR which fits in with the theme of tem being at the studio as they are at the studio where new songs get recorded, and to go with this list is information about the tracks and so the reader can find out more than just the tracks name.

Double page spread analysis 2

for this double page spread of Vibe there is a very basic colour scheme of red, white and black which is only briefly shown at the top left hand side of the right page were it shows the date of the issue in a red circle with white text, which does stand out well for the reader to see and then the text next to it is shown in black with with a title of 'Hopeful Hitman' which could mean that the artist in the article is a good artist as the word 'hitman' is used with the word 'hopeful' and so it could mean that he is someone that people hope to be a 'hitman' at what he does as hitman means someone who kills for money, but in this term it would mean to kill the crowd by getting them on his side and liking his music.  in the text of the article there is the name 'Charles Hamilton' in red and this shows that it is him who is the man in the photograph to the right side as it is who the text is closest to in the photo.  the photograph dominates the whole page as it is spread completely across both pages and is of three men, one who is on some turntables so we assume he is the DJ, the man on the left is holding a microphone but we dont see his face so we know that he is not the main person on wo the article is about and we see very clearly the man on the right smiling and holding a micropone and we know that it is him who is 'charles hamilton' and that the article is mainly about him.

Double page spread analysis 1

for this double page spread of NME we can see that te colours used are very basic were there is a white background and then a black title and text, with a tiny bit of blue which says 'Florence Welch' which is the name of the woman in the photograph, from 'Florence and the machine' her name is put into blue to let us know that it is her who is the woman in the photo.  there is also red used in the photograph which is on the american flag and this also emphasises the colour of red in her hair.  the 'USA' has been made in the biggest font but has been put at the back and is a few shades darker of colour than the actual background and so this shows that the article is about Florence in the USA and it has been put into the title of one of her songs where it then says on top of 'USA', it says 'got the love' and so has been made to say 'USA got the love' and the fact that she is sitting on top of an american flag in the photo would mean that the article is about Florence in the USA and what she has been up to there.  the large 'D' at the beggining of the article matches the font of the title and so it shows it to be flowing from the title and straight into the article, it has also been used in the same text size and so this will easily let the reader know where the article starts for them to read.  also in the photo Florence is wearing all black, and the skirt is wuite short giving it some sex appeal, and this is the colour of power and autority and could show that she has been to the USA and has dominated other artists and has done well for herself whilst being there.