CCR Draft #1

1.  How does your product use or challenge conventions and how does it represent social groups or issues?

My magazine uses conventions that I have seen in similar magazines in this genre.  The front page features a dog that grabs the audience's attention, with the title of the magazine above it and subtitles lower on the page. This is the most common layout that I have seen for most magazines.  I added a section at the top of the page that says "dog heath, care, food, and fun." I added this feature so that when the magazine sits on a stand at a grocery store, the top of the magazine is still visible and people will be able to see what my magazine is about.  Although this is not on every magazine, I still wanted to add it to mine in order to utilize the once empty space. During peer revision I have received many compliments for this feature as well.  I also decided to photo shop the title to go behind the dog's head.  I have seen many magazines do this and it looks very professional so I wanted to do it also.

My next page is the title page.  I kept this page pretty simple but I think it turned out very good and appealing.  The entire background is taken up by a high angle image of a dog, compared to the low angle the I used on the cover page.  The title "Contents" is written at the top of the page in white.  The page numbers and titles are in white and are located on the sides of the page, wrapping around the image of the dog. Most magazines have a very busy table of contents with different pictures, fonts, and colors.  However, I wanted to keep mine clean, organized, and simple.

My two-page spread looks pretty similar to other magazines, and uses the same conventions.  For example, the first letter of the article is in a larger font and in bold.  Most magazines utilize this convention to make the page look professional and makes the article stand out.  The actual text of the article is in two columns, separated by a high angle image of a dog.


My article represents issues regarding animal abuse, adopting, and sheltering.  I wanted to make this magazine about animals after I had seen how animals can be mistreated in stores, and how adopting is always the better option.  I wanted to bring awareness of these issues and if I were to write more articles in the future I would conduct more research and possibly do interviews in order to write more articles about issues such as these.