My Preliminary
task Evaluation:
My preliminary task was
to create a front cover of a new college magazine and a mock-up of a contents
page and double page spread. Before creating my magazine I had to extract the different
sections to magazines in which had already been created, Looking into the different
conventions of a magazine, after looking at the conventions I then had to begin
a L.I.I.A.R analysis for the front cover, contents page and a double page
spread. To find my images I simply used the internet (google).While doing this
research I found that a key success in creating a magazine, you must know your
target audience this makes it easier to catch their eyes when you create your
plugs or pull quotes, knowing their interests allows you to carefully select a set
of stories and plugs which will intrigue them. I already know that my college
magazine would be aimed at students at the age of 16-19, from this I decided to
Research College magazines looking at what they used to target their audience
also being 16 helped me to know what interests me and helped me when creating
my mood board. After looking into the conventions and creating a mood board I
then progressed onto creating an initial idea mind map, which allowed me to
come up with a Masthead, I then continued onto creating a layout for my front
cover and a mock-up of both my contents page and double page spread. I firstly
drew up a draft of how I wanted it to look , I then progressed onto Photoshop
creating a digital mock-up of each of my pieces (Front cover, Contents page and
Double page spread) when doing this I made sure to refer back to my conventions
ensuring to apply the needed ones to my magazine. While in the process of
creating my contents page mock-up I came up with a list of what could be the
contents, in which I decided to sit and choose the best / more intriguing ones
to be the feature story’s upon my front cover these include “Results!” and “Jay’s
talk on sport” however I decided not to initial put “Jay’s talk on sport”
instead I decided to have him as a feature story but using “Jay scores Wyke the
top spot once again” as this has a slight play on words with the “Jay scores”
making the magazine a little more informal to make the readers feel comfortable
also from this story I decide to create a pull quote as it makes the target
audience want to read on about Jay the pull quote I decide on is “I enjoy
playing so much I don’t mean to win I just do it” I believe this is a powerful
pull quote as both my target audience along with the sporty people within my
audience will be intrigued as to how he scores and wins without trying . After I
had decided upon my feature stories I decided to begin taking my photos, with
my stories in mind I took a set of various photo’s until I finally decided upon
a clear shot of my subject stood in front of Wyke college, holding a folder,
this targets my audience as it portrays the college life and shows the environment
as well. I also referred to my brief in which I made sure my subject was in a
medium close up shoot however my background doesn’t exactly back this as I would
not have been able to contain the full image if I was to go any closer, also I ensured
my subject was smiling this portrays she’s happy at Wyke however to ensure it doesn’t
look like it’s all fun and the work is important I had her holding a folder.
Since I had Wyke college in the background of my image, I decided my magazine
name would not include ‘Wyke’ instead I referred back to my mind map and
decided I liked ‘College Knowledge’ I think it has a rhyme to it and it catchy
and easy to remember making my target audience more likely to remember it and
be intrigued into “what is the college knowledge?”. To create my magazine I
used the software’s, Photoshop, Microsoft PowerPoint. When using PowerPoint it
allowed me to create my different conventions first in a simple form, in which I
then transferred onto Photoshop to add detail and edited on to my background,
Photoshop allowed me to remove objects I didn’t want within my image such as
the alarm on the front of Wyke and the number plate on the car within the back
ground.
Also Photoshop allowed
me to layer my items ensuring that I could position things in separate places, overlap
without effecting the other layers I had already created. During my progress I
have been uploading my work to this blog (http://itsmymediayouknowit.blogspot.co.uk/ ) In which has helped me to keep onto of
things and organize my work, Overall I am happy with what I have produced, I
have found Photoshop to be the difficult part to the whole task and I have
decided to try working on it with different images to help myself progress.
After I had complete my front cover , I decided to post it upon Facebook an get
some feedbackI found that most people liked my colour scheme (Green and purple) and my mast head "college knowledge caught peoples eyes" , Overall I received good feedback but an improvement for me
would be my editing skills in order to make my magazine look more realistic along with text sizing.
