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

For my A2 media product, I have constructed a Local Newspaper. Doing extensive research into existence products, I made sure I was clear of the conventions and knew which ones to use for my product. In this evaluation, I will explore the ways my research has helped me use, develop and change conventions for my own product.


In what ways does my product use forms and conventions of real media products?




COLOUR SCHEME
Analysing an abundance of existing products, a main similar convention that stuck with me that all products had, no matter the location was the colour scheme represented the city. As one of my inspirational texts was the Sunderland Echo, analysing many products I immediately noticed that with every issue, the colour scheme consisted of the same colours, again to represent the city. These colours were red, white and black. For print media products, it is extremely common for them to stick to a house style of three main colours, that are used more prominently and boldly amongst others. For the Sunderland Echo, these were the 3 main colours. I decided for my product, I decided to utilise this convention and include colours that would represent Sunderland and alert the audience that this product consists of Local news.

The main colour of my product is red, to represent the colour of SAFC, a colour the audience support and will easily recognise. To get the correct colour for my product, I used the colour absorbing tool on Adobe Photo Shop. I downloaded an image of the Sunderland football shirt and highlighted the red colour, meaning I could use the exact same colour for features in my product, e.g. masthead, boxes etc. likewise to existing products, I also included the colours black and white in my colour scheme. It is an existing convention of papers that they print ink in black and white as it is more economical for both the company and the customer. By sticking to this convention it makes my product look more realistic, no newspaper has alarming colours in or article text printed in bright colours, therefore this would make my product look unprofessional. The colours black and white are plain and bog-standard, yet bold, attracting attention to specific features. The colour white is also apart of the Sunderland strip, so the colours work well together to represent Sunderland. Again, here I am utilising an existing convention of local newspapers, as Sunderland Echo also has the similar colour scheme to represent its city.

Analysing colour throughout local papers, I have learnt that no abstract or alarming colours are used. Colours such as pinks, oranges, purples and greens are most likely o be found in magazines which serve to look glamorous and entertaining. For my product, I need my audience to know they can get the latest local news from it, therefore my colours need to be plain, yet reflect Sunderland.

• Likewise to existing products, my Local newspaper maintains this colour scheme throughout the product. Sticking to these 3 colours gives the product a house style, a convention that existing products use. Keeping to these three colours help give my product an identity. Throughout my product, I tried to make it evident that the main colour was red, alerting the audience that the product supported and reflected Sunderland. Also by using the bright colour alert made certain features look bold and important.

I repeatedly used the colour red, constructing my borders from the same colour and also some of the text. This all helped strengthen the identity of the product and formulate a house style, a convention I learnt from analysing existing products. Also as the word Sunderland from my masthead is in the colour red, this establishes a meaning to the audience. Because the colour red above, is acting as a border to the images, it represents the location of the image which is also Sunderland, the colour helping the audience understand the meaning.



Looking at existing products, I again noticed that the main colour was used consistently throughout the front page, displaying to the audience the dominating colour. At the bottom of my inspiration text, the Sunderland Echo, the banner line is always the same colour red, again keeping the colour consistency. For my product, I decided to use this convention and also have my bottom banner red. This frames the front page and again demonstrates the main colour of the product.

Images- For my AS media product, when taking images, a convention was to make the colours stick to the colour scheme to strengthen the house style of the magazine. However for my A2 product this convention does not apply. Researching the article images, none particularly include noticeable colours from the scheme, mainly because the images need to represent real life and make the article look believable. I again stuck to this convention for my product. Furthermore I feel the article images break up the colour scheme slightly, making other features which include the colour scheme more noticeable.



 I stuck with my colour scheme throughout my ancillary tasks also. Looking bot at newspaper posters and local websites, I discovered they kept to the same house style, maintaining the same familiar identity for the audience. On existing Sunderland Echo poster, the colour red was used for the logo, creating a sense of familiarity for the audience. I decided for my product to stick to this convention, and also used the same colour scheme for my Poster ancillary task.

 The background of my poster is the same colour red used in my actual product, immediately initiating to the audience that this poster is representing 'Sunderland Life'. The web link is also has a bright red background, strengthening the colour scheme. This makes the roduct lok professional, as it is an existing convention of real life media products. It offers a link between the three; the poster, the website and the paper, making them represent the same thing and showing they are providing the same nformation, the are a package.

For my website ancillary task, I maintained the colour scheme as best I could. when deconstructing an existing website, I noticed the colours were plain and simple, making the information easily digestible and the site easily accessible. The logo of the site however, dominated the page, representing the city and also the papers colour scheme. I decided to keep this convention for my product. I too decided again using fancy colours for my website, mainly sticking to blacks, greys and whites, like my main product. This helped strengthen the house style. I felt it was important to have my logo the same colour as the masthead as it represented the newspaper, creating a direct link between the products.

My product uses the same style masthead as existing ones. When researching into the names of local newspapers, the key thing I learnt was each one told the audience the location of the news/place it was representing. All of Sunderland's Local newspapers consisted of the word 'Sunderland' in the masthead making the location clear to the audience. As one of my inspirational texts did this also (Sunderland Echo), it was crucial for me to include the location in my product name.

Name

When deciding what to call my product, I again researched into existing names, noticing most had short names, for example 'Sunderland Star, Sunderland Echo'. The word after the location in the masthead needs to represent the location, tell the audience about the city. Again I stuck to this convention. Words such as 'Star' are described as a buzz word, making not only the location, but the product sound appealing and intriguing to the audience, furthermore good for value. Again I decided to use this convention and chose 'Life'. I felt life was a youthful word and really represented what the audience could find in the product, information about peoples lives that would interest and could well concern them. 'Life' is also a monosyllabic word, short and simple, plain yet effective. The enthusiastic word will stick in peoples heads and invite them to come back to the product.
Colour
Another convention I stuck to when constructing my masthead, was colour. Looking at real media products, the colour scheme of the news paper would represent the location, mainly using football colours. When analysing Sunderland Local newspapers, all mastheads were red, reflecting the colours of Sunderland football club. This is a recognisable colour, and the audience will be able to immediately tell that the product will be providing the latest local news. I decided to keep to this convention to try to make my product as realistic as possible. The bright red masthead, not only represents and supports Sunderland, but is bright and attractive, making the local newspaper stand out in the newspaper rack.

Font
Looking at existing products I noticed that the font for a local newspaper was basic, yet bold.

This lead me to the decision to keep my font plain and simple, yet bold to make up for lack of design. By using a plain font, it makes my product look more realistic and therefore will increase the sales if it was for sale in the real world. I decided against using an artistic font, as this is  convention of magazines.  This would make my product look unrealistic, again leading me to the decision to use a bog standard font. A simple, yet bold font also means it stands out enough to attract the audiences attention, however not so much as to divert the spectator from the main article. The masthead is there for the fundamental reason to alert the audience of what the product is, giving them simple information, therefore a fancy, artistic font is not needed to do this job. The fact that Local Newspapers behold a serious tone to look professional is also a given reason as to why I have used a plain font.

Again, looking at existing products, I noticed that mainly the masthead was in lower case letters. this is done so that it doesn't distract the audiences attention from the main headline, which needs to be the largest font on the page (typography), to reflect the importance of the article. I have kept to this convention and put my masthead in a lower case font to make my product look realistic as possible to maximise sales potential.

Layout-
My masthead is positioned, large, running across the top of the page. Using my knowledge both from AS media and researching into existing products, I learnt that all mastheads are positioned like this as to stand out in a magazine rack, so it is the first thing the audience sees. The spectator is then immediately aware of the product, and it is essential that the masthead is appealing as to attract them to pick the product up. Sticking to this convention was crucial. It makes my product look realistic and immediately dominates the page, so that the audiences are provided immediately with all the information they need to know about the product.

The next convention i decided to utilise in my product was the price, date and website banner that is positioned directly under the banner. This is the basic, yet essential information that the audience need to be provided with, and by positioning it directly under the logo means that their eye line will be directly drawn to it. The audience will immediately be exposed to the price, which for my own product is 30p, a bargain price which will persuade them to purchase the product. They will also be exposed to the date, so they can check they are being updated with the latest news. finally, the audience will be exposed to the website, alerting them immediately that this newspaper is available to read online, a more convenient and accessible way for some members of the target audience, eg teenagers. by seeing this, this may persuade and help my product gain More attention, people will check on the online site increasing the hits. This can result in the newspaper charging higher advertising fees.I feel it is a great way of appealing both the a family audience and including teenagers. for example, if a parental figure purchases the newspaper, a teenage family member might skim read the first page and notice there is an online site, in which they can consume their news in a much easier method.

On this banner, I have also included the weather and temperature for the day. This is useful information for the audience, who will be attracted back to the product by this convention. Looking at my inspiration text, I noticed that the Sunderland Echo provided their audience with weather updates. I decided to use this convention as it is handy for the spectator, and also if audiences collect newspapers they will be able to look back and know what the weather was like on certain days.

For my product I decided to also include a little diagram of the weather, so that the audience can quickly skim read and recognise the symbol.

When deciding on what design to use for this particular small banner, I researched an abundance of existing products. The style of this banner changes frequently within the Sunderland Echo, depending on what news and features are on the page. One in which I got particular influence from was the one featured in the image above, where the banner is black, contrasting with the colour of the masthead, attracting the audiences attention to the feature. The white text on the background made the text clear and easy to read, as well as standing out against the black.

Another convention of exsiting products that I utilised in my own Local Newspaper was the 'Ears' of the page, a term given to descrve the features directly under the masthead and essential information. When looking at existing products, I noticed mainly that underneath the name was adverts, or features involving the customer winning something. When constructin gmy own product, I felt it was crucial to get inspiration from exisiting texts to see what kind of features they had in the 'Ears'.

• That most of the features included the buzz word 'WIN'. This word is something that appeals to every target audience as they thing they are purchasing a bargain, buying their local news and in with the chance to win something also. The fact these words are positioned in the 'ears' of the paper and are in a bold, large text means the audience will immediately see this feature. If someone is standing looking at the newspaper rack, and see only the masthead and the 'ears' of the paper, the buzz word 'WIN' will attract their attention and persuade them to go to the newspaper stand and pick the product up. For my product, I decided to use this convention as a USP for my product.
  
  When deciding what product I should have for my audience to potentially win, I again looked at my inspirational text the Sunderland Echo. I quickly noticed there was a lot of chances to win vouchers for meals at Local restraunts such as Frankie and Bennies and local amusements such as Ten Pin Bowling. Here I stuck to this convention, choosing my audience to win something local. My target audience influenced my choice of 'Win tickets for Oz', as I intended on having something that would appeal to a family target audience. 'Oz' is a current film that at the time of construction just came out from the Cinemas. Locals would be excited to see the new film, and would purchase my paper to be in with the chance of winning tickets.
• Like existing products, I constructed the buzz word 'win' to be in capital letters. This makes the text look bold and important to the audience, catching their eye and making them be alert of the feature. This convention helped my product look realistic, maximise the professionalism of my local newspaper.
• Another common feature for the 'ear' of the local newspaper, was a story about a familiar business, something the mass target audience would recognise.
  
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  For my 'ears' for my product, I also adapted the style that was used in existing products. The boxes that the features are framed in have a thick border around, creating a section for the feature and securing it as important. The bold border also attracts the audiences attention to the feature, making it stand out against the main article of the front page. I kept to this convention to achieve the same effect for my product. For the text, I again used an existing convention, the text being layered over the image, white with a red border. I did this on Adobe Photoshop.

 please click this link to watch my zooming presentation on 'main article' click here

Side article-
In most local newspapers, it is common to have more than one article on the page, depending on hwat other features are on the page. What I Have learnt from deconstructing several local nespapers is that the layout can change daily, depending on what features are included.
For example, in this issue of the Sunderland Echo:

• There is two articles, one positioned directly under the masthead, the other following directly underneath.
• Due to one large image being used at the 'above the line fold', there is tw smaller images positioned on the right hand side to make the audience alert of the features.

However, in this issue of the same Local paper, there is two articles, one taking up a large proportion of the paper, suggesting to the audience it is of great importance. To the left is a smaller article, however due to the large main article image, an image doesn't accompany this side article. Underneath is positioned an advert, something of lease importance so placed at the bottom of the page as to not distract audiences attention from more important features.

As I have quite an abundance of adverts and images on my front page, I decided to stick to an existing convention of the real life media product and include a side article. This here is a small article, again not displaying the full story, just a teaser to persuade the audience to purchase the product and read on. When constructing this article, I based it around newsvalues and treatment values, sticking to existing conventions to aim to make my product realistic. An extremely popular newsvalue is 'Negativity' as it can have the biggest shocking effect on the audience. This newsvalue can also be dramatized to make it more interesting for the audience. In my article I stuck to this convention, using a dramatic semantic field, for example, "devastating news". Furthermore, most smaller articles have a small heading, in a font size only a couple of sizes larger than the text. This is designed as to not distract attention from the main article, and also to not restrict space. I again stuck to this convention to aim and make my product seem realistic.

Adverts- Car adverts are extremely common within local newspapers, often family cars. Because my target audience for my product is families, I decided to stick to this convention and advertise a family car. This avert again gives a clue to the audience who the target audience is, and draws them in and persuades them to purchase the product. Again when looking at existing car adverts, the backgrounds are usually white. I stuck to this convention, and using the eraser tool on adobe photo shop, made rubbed the background out. I then used the blur and smudge tool to make the image look more professional. With adverts, it is essential to get the audience to think this product is for them. Looking at existing products, their is a lot of emphasis onto how the price is cheap and they would be saving a lot of money. I stuck to this convention, positioning how much the audience would be saving on purchasing the car in the middle of the advert, directly under the car. I have stated on the advert that the family is a family car, and used a specific lexical field to make the car seem appealing, 'safe'. This reflects and appeals to the target audience. To make the car seem more appealing, I have again stuck to a convention and used the star rating. This makes the car advertised seem amazing and a must have for the audience. This makes my product seem more realistic and professional.

It is a common convention on the front of a local newspaper to have a strap line running along the bottom of the page. Here I have one giving the audience the chance to win a holiday. The price itself reflects and relates to the target audience 'a family trip to Disney land'. This makes the paper seem a genuine family friendly publications. The fact the audience has the chance to win it also makes it seem more appealing to them and persuade them to purchase the product.

• The essential information is provided also telling the audience exactly where they will find the holiday deal.
• A convention I did not stick to was to provide an online link to where the audience could look up the deal. Here I missed an oppurtinity to advertise my Sunderland Life and alert my audience that we are available online. If I was to reconstruct this product, this would be a convention I would definitely stick to.

Second page- for the second page o fmy product I again aimed to stick to a lot of existing conventions to make mine look as realistic as possible.

please click here to view my zooming presnetation on the construction of my second page

please click here to watch a video of my deconstructing my poster
please click to watch the rest of the video


For my website, I looked at existing products to gain inspiration to create my own realistic product. I looked at the existing codes and conventions within the site and decided to use them for my product to make it as professional as I could.

A key factor that I took into account when constructing my website was my target audience. The site itself has a different target audience than the newspaper product, I wanted it to appeal to younger audiences as well as adults. I wouldn't be focussing on appealing to older ages as they are not familiar with internet technology. An existing site I liked and had a similar target audience to my own as Sunderland Echo: http://www.sunderlandecho.com/

How is my own product similar to real life?

When analysing existing products, I noticed there was a lot of features on the site where the audience had the chance to interact and get information from. For eample, the 'find it' feature. This was where the audience could look up a pplumber or an electrician. This ffeautre is benefitical for the both the audience and the site. If the audience see this feature this will encourage to revisit the site when needing to look for a local business. It also has a positive reflection on the site, it looks friendly andw elcoming and willing to help the audience. I have decidied to include a feature similar to this to make my site look professional and also increase the virtualness.

I called mine 'Fast Search' as the name itself is straight foreword yet effective. 'Fast search' portrays the features mmiedicay.


Advertisements-

• Adverts purpose is to sell the product, make the product look appealing.
• It directly adrresses the audience and draws them into the product.
• It is advertised a place where the target audience will be able to recieve it.

On my site, I have also included advertisements, an existing convention. Adverts are key to the sites funding. One advert I included was for a holiday site 'Pebbles holidays'. I positioned it directly above the logo, an existing convention of real life media products. This means it immediately catches the audiences attention.The advert was advertisening a Winter sale. To improve this feature, I could of made it appeal more to my target audience, for example the advert could of used a lexical field more suitable; 'family holiday', or 'teenage getaways'.

 Looking for-
A convention I stuck to for my own product was the Looking for table. This is a drop down table that helps the audience navigation around the site. I feel with this convention however, I didnt stick to my target audience. I needed to concentrate on tagetting teenagers, keeping them on the site for as long as possible and maing them want to come back. I could of used better articles within to appeal to them. Here, although it would appeal to adults e.g. 'Houghton Builders', I feel this convention hasn't attratced the full target audience. here this convention hasnt worked. 

Game/ advertisement

A convention of existing products that I stuck too was including a game advert on the site. I made several creative decisions for this feature. As the main colours on the site are black and white, I decided to use an abundance of bright alarming colours on the advert to make it look fun and exciting, attracting the audiences attention. The clash of colours has a reflection on both the site and the game as being fun. I used words on this stereotypical for adverts, e.g. buzz word 'free'. 'Register today', makes the game seem immediate and something the audience can do directly.

The problem with this feature- It wouldn't directly appeal to a teenage audience. As the site was aimed at adults and teenagers, I should of created a game that would be more appealing to teenagers to show them the site was directed towards them. 

Drop down menu/table

This is a particular convention that I liked as it again improved the navigation on the site. The audience can go to this table and see the article organised by 'popular, most commented and most shared'. Here the audience can see them best stories for them to read. I feel this makes my product look professional.