Development Diary…

I started with the image for the double page spread. I opened the image by going to file > open > and then finding and selecting the image of my choice.

It is important to make the image look professional; therefore I altered the levels and curves of the photo just like I did with the image on the front cover. All I did was go to ‘layer’ and ‘adjust colour’ in order to find the right tools to edit the photo.

I then also unsharp masked the photo, to again make it look more professional, just like I did on the cover photo.

The spot healing brush was the next tool that I used in Photoshop. I used this tool to get rid of any imperfections that my model may have had. I simply selected the tool and then anywhere I saw a imperfection I clicked on it to removed it.

I then made the double page spread itself. It was important that I made it twice as big as the contents page and the cover as it needed to represent to pages of the magazine. To do this, when I opened the new page in Photoshop I changed the dimensions of the page to what I needed.

To make it easy for me to see where the two ‘pages’ were when I opened the document I then used the shape tool, and the ruler guides, to make a thin line that would show this.

For continuity with the house style for the house style of my magazine I then used the same gradient that I used on the contents page and the front cover (using the gradient tool again).

The next step was me putting the edited image from before onto the double page spread itself.

To do this I opened the image as before and once opened used the move tool/ cursor to drag and drop the image onto the page.

I then used the keyboard shortcut ‘cmd’ and ‘T’ again to change the size and position of the image to my liking/ requirements.

I wanted to extend the background of my image across the entire width of the page.

In order to this I had to use the clone stamp tool in Photoshop. The tool works by cloning a selected area (you do this by selecting the tool and then holding down the control key on the keyboard whilst clicking on what you want to clone). The tool then remembers this and you can then click on the page and whatever you selected will come out on the tool.

Once I had finished the page looked like this.

I then added the gutter of the page in. For this I just used the shape tool again set to line and drew the gutters on the page (just like when I did the guide for the split between the two pages).

I

then did the same for the ‘gutters’ or divides between

where the text is going to be positioned. I used the ruler guides so I knew where to position them and on what length to make them.

It looked like this when I was done.

I then made the standfirst for the page. To do this I used the shape tool again as I wanted the text to really stand out – this also continues with the house style from when I put the ‘contents’ title in the rectangle shape.

I

then used the text tool in Photoshop again and the text tool bar to get the right style and size of text that I wanted. For the body copy I wanted to use the same font style that I used previously – Bank Gothic.

Using the text tool in Photoshop I drew individual text boxes for each column – this is a typical convention of magazines and you wouldn’t see text in large chucks. I also made the first letter of the article a lot bigger than the rest of the text. I did this as it is a typical convention of magazines and just signifies the start of the article.

I changed the colour of some of the text (for example in the standfirst) as it made it stand out more against the box I had put the text in. The colour matched the house style (here as you can see it’s the same magenta pink colour used in the cover and contents page. I used the text tool bar again to edit this. I also change the size of the text in some parts too using the same tool bar (for example in the pull quote.

When I was totally finished with the text the page looked like this.

To signify that the article had concluded I made an end blob. I used the elliptical shape from the shape tool in Photoshop to make this.

I drew the shape, sized and positioned it where I wanted it.

It is a typical feature of end blobs to have some kind of symbol, shape or icon in them. I chose to use an arrow. I got my photo from the Internet and then opened up in Photoshop.

Once I had the shape open I used the magic wand tool in Photoshop to select around the shape. I then inversed the selection by going to select > inverse - this then meant that the shape itself was selected.

From here I could used the move tool on Photoshop (as used before with other images) to drag and drop the arrow shape on to my page. I then resized and positioned the as I did before with other images.

This is what the end blob looked like when I was done.

I wanted to include a pull quote on the image background that I

extended. To do this I again used the shape tool (to make the quote stand out more) and drew a rectangular box where I wanted the text to be.

I then used the text tool again to add the text in. I also did the exact same thing for the title that I put at the top of the page.

I wanted to use the same splatter effect using the brushes that I used on the cover and contents page of my magazine. For this I used the same brushes as before and made sure that I applied it to the ‘background copy’ layer.

I then added the byline. I simply used the text tool for this and positioned it below the main pull quote.

Pagination was the last thing that I had to add to the double page spread. For this I used the text tool again for the numbers – I also used the same font that I used for the cover headline for the name of my magazine and used this next to the number.

This is what the final piece looked like.