Evaluation: Part 7

Evaluation 7: Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product? 

 

When looking back over my preliminary task, I am able to see some big advances in the way i have both structured and design my magazines from colour to content. Starting with my front cover page, from making my first front cover to my last I feel that I have learnt a lot about imagery. My images in my preliminary task are very basic and boring, they have not been edited and have been taken at a simple and standard angle. However, when I look at my I see a range of editing skills have been used and I although my final cover is simple I feel this makes my image stand out. As I am looking back over my preliminary task I soon realise that not having cover lines was a good idea as although it makes it harder for the reader to see whats inside the magazine the image on the front will hopefully draw them in. 

When I look back over my contents I can clearly see how basic my preliminary task contents page is. From the basic layout to the boring colour scheme my preliminary task was. I learnt that to make my contents page more appealing I had to include a range of colours that would compliment each other such as red and green, which i have used in my final task contents page. In my preliminary task I had a very small target audience being school children, this I think was more difficult than making my final magazine attract a bigger selected audience. For my preliminary piece i found it difficult to accommodate my magazine to such a small target audience due to the fact I could not alternate and be as free with my design, content and layout.

 

 

Evaluation: Part 6

Evaluation 6 : What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

I have learnt that when making a magazine, technology is very important factor.  Without technology is would be difficult and very expensive to mass-produce magazines and make them look appealing to my audience. The imagery of magazines would be very basic and minimalistic without camera's. When making my magazine, I used a Canon to take my images. I used this because I felt that the canon was the appropriate due to that fact that the zoom enabled me to add focus to my model's and in my double page spread the focus was very important as it enabled me to focus on the fist rather than my models face.
Editing was very important in my magazine as it gave me the chance to add effects and 'extras' that i couldn't have without technology. I have learnt that this is a very long and delicate process which takes the majority of the time when making my magazine. When editing I used many online application such as 'Pixlr' and 'PicMonkey' which meant I was able to adjust and fix my image to the way i wanted. I was able to add makeup and adjust the effects placed on the image to enhance the effect it gave on my readers.

Evaluation: Part 5

Evaluation: Part 4

Evaluation 4: In what ways does your media product use, develop, or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Oxford Dictionary defines a convention a "A way in which something is usually done".  This means that magazines will stick to certain layouts, formats and contents that are popular so that their magazines sell and that they will gain interest from readers and gain popularity.

When I began to plan my music magazine I decided that I would make my magazine both defy traditional music magazine conventions and follow them. When I started my research around music magazines and I found an artist called David Carson who directed Raygun. Raygun was a very controversially magazine that was first published in the 1990's and was thought to be barbaric and many people disliked it because of its originality. I liked the look of Raygun's designs and I liked the originality that the magazine gave to the readers. However, I noticed that Raygun was not a very popular magazine because of it's originality and 'wacky' designs. After realizing this I decided that my magazine would stick to the traditional conventions of a music magazine but would also subtly challenge some. 

Firstly, my front cover. My cover had conventional features that will help the magazine appeal to readers who prefer traditional magazines styles. the way that my front cover image fills the entire page. This will make the readers comfortable with the cover. I decided important features such as the bar code would remind in the correct place to stop confusion between readers. However, my magazine cover solely defy's these conventions meaning that although it appears comfortable it the reader it still appeals to the in a unusual way. For example on my front cover my magazine my masthead is not in the conventional place at the top of my magazine due to my imagery and the idea that i wanted to defy some conventions i decided to place my masthead at the bottom middle to create interest in the reader.I also used an unusual image that will draw the attension of the readers.

Secondly, my contents page. I decided that this page would stick to conventions completely and i feel that this was a wise choice and as it is the page that most readers will be drawn to after the contents to identify what is in the magazine. It was important that this page was simple to understand but informative at the same time. Due to this my layout for this page needed to be very simple and traditional, to help find inspiration for this I used the search engine 'Google' to find examples of music magazines contents page. After finding examples i took different extracts of the examples and applied them to my contents page.

Lastly, my double page spread. This also manly stuck to music magazine conventions, the layout of this page was very simple and like the contents page i researched some examples of double page spreads and image that would go with this. I found an image of Hayley Williams, lead singer of paramore and i decided that I would re-enact this image with one of my 'models'. I then formed my text around the 'model'. I feel this is a typical magazine convention and allowed me to follow these conventions.

Evaluation: Part 3

Evaluation: Part 2

Evaluation: How did you attract/address your audience?

Colour Scheme

Colour Scheme was a big issue for me, I really struggled to decided on what colours I could use that would help me to attract the target audience I planned for. I decided that I would do some quick research around my genre and what magazines of my genre have used and chose for their colour scheme. I came to the conclusion that rock magazines like to use plain colours like black and white and then use bright, bold colours for example, red, green or blue to make words or important images stand out in contrast to the other images. I decided that I would use red as the title colour for my contents page as it is bold and would stand out and draw the attention of the reader. This is important I feel this will enhance the look the magazine has. It was important that my magazine was not only filled with bright and bold colours that it also featured some relatively dark such as black and grey, this will help give my magazine the rock vibe I am looking for.




Structure


I feel that the way that I  have structured the layout of B.A.S.S will draw attention to it and hopefully gain interest due to its uniqueness. I did plan to stick to the typical magazine convention layout. However, I made some slight alterations that I feel will expand the target audience and make the magazine have a more professional view. I did some research when making my double-page spread and my contents page and I found a image of NME's contents that I decided would be a good template for my contents page. I based my double-page spread off this image of Hayley Williams, lead singer of Paramore. I found this image very eye-catching and interesting. I had my model pose in a similar way.

Eye Contact


I had all of my 'models' make eye contact with the camera. This was very important as I feel it enhances the effect the magazine has on the reader and will hopefully gain their attention more than a image that had no eye contact. This I feel is important as it will help to gain the audiences interest to the page and hopefully the information on it.