How did i use technologies?

In the construction of my magazine, technologies were key in enabling me to create a professional, high standard magazine. This was mainly due to the adobe program's of Photoshop and Indesign, as well as media platforms such as blogger, polyvore and survey monkey. 

Firstly, Photoshop, a photo editing software was key in helping me to create professional looking product. I uses tools such as the spot healing brush (air brush tool) and the magnetic lasso (cutting out objects) to achieve this, my skill becoming more advanced with time. This meant that I could cutout photos of my model and move them on to different backgrounds, as well as make the general quality of my models skin and features better. I was also able to use states such as the hue/ saturation to change colours on my product, using layers to change the state of different objects, as well as adjusting the brightness and contrast etc. Ways I used this included changing the colour of my artists lips to match the masthead, by cutting out the section on a new layer and changing the hue.

Other vital program's included the use of Adobe InDesign, where I could arrange my photos and text in a professional way for both my contents and double page spread. It was here that I learned to add conventions such as pull quotes and drop caps, as well as learning to warp the article around the photos of my artist to make it visually appealing.

Finally the combined use of other websites and platforms were very helpful in the overall planning and construction of my product. Websites such as survey monkey allowed to me to carry out in depth questionnaires to help me establish my audience, as well as the help of Polyvore, a website which allowed  me to create collages when planning. The overall use of blogger has also been effective in my construction, as I can digitally refer back to any research or planning at any time to ensure consistently in my product. 

Who will be the audience for my product?

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

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Who Will Distribute My Product

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

How did I attract/address my audience?

http://prezi.com/etd7zrretoi0/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Completed music magazine

Final Double page spread (version 2)

Final contents page (version 2)

Final Front cover (version 3)

Focus group feedback

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

 General feedback:

Good colour, scheme including effective use of colour matching throughout the create house style.

• Nice pictures which are clear and conventional to my genre in my use of clothing, makeup and outdoor setting.
• Not cluttered and good use of space
• Generally eyecatching and professional looking.
• The model looks great, I love all of her clothes and makeup!
• The general style look really good, i like all of the fonts, colours and pictures
• All of the features look great i want to read it"

• Could make better use of space on contents page. The space below 'Contents' look unusual
• The 'Lily Temple' feature box on the front cover covers the artists face and distracts from her
• The writing on the right half of the DPS is unreadable                                                           

Contents and cover feedback

Rare Contents and Cover Feedback

Double page spread first draft

New double page spread flat plan

After rethinking my original double page spread flat plan which featured three photos of my artist, I decided that a simpler approach would be more effective. By featuring one picture across the two pages, it would appear less cluttered and,minimalistic which is slightly more complimentary of my indie genre.

'Lily Temple' artist interview

Rare Interview

Research and planning: designing my dps

I was stuck when deigning my double page spread, as I had two strong images, yet both very different. I thus began to design a double page spread using both to decide the desired style and image of my product.

This image with my model holding a guitar is a strong image as it reflects the music genre of the magazine. I thought it brought about the opportunity to use my red colour over the top without distracting from the image behind as it's black and white. The picture itself if also of good quality and appears so in preview.
I however decided that placing text over the image did not work and I realised that doing so would mean that my models face would end up being covered. I have also not used a black and white image with this particular model before in the magazine, and i thus think that using this does not follow the house style.

I then experimented using this fade image which I edited in photoshop. I think that the fading around the edge looks professional, and also eye catching. My model is also wearing a red skirt with red lips which ties in with my colour scheme and helps me to assert my house style better on these pages. Her positioning is also a positive point in the photo, as it provides opportunity to warp text around her. The text does not look out of place when going over the landscape of the photo, and draws no attention away from the model herself.

Indesign skills development

I learned the basics in constructing a contents page/DPS in adobe indesign. By selecting 'file,place' you can insert a picture into your document, placing it wherever you want to. Then, by drawing a textbox of the appropriate size, you can select 'type, fill with place holder text' which gives a sense of the visuals of the text you wish to insert. You can the select your image, and find the 'warptext' button in your essentials tool bar to arrange writing around the photo.








I then used and developed these skills to experiment with my double page spread design.I used the fill with placeholder text to get a feel for the way a particular photo would look with text over it. I also learned how to type on a path by selecting 'file,type on path' to create text that appeared to read in a certain pattern. I developed this by using the draw tool to draw a line and box around the guitar in the photo and fill it with place holder text to create another warp text effect. I also added drop cap by selecting 'type,paragraph styles and paragraph options' and selecting 'drop caps'. This allowed me to see the visual effects of drop caps and all the conventions of a dps.