Evaluation Question 7: Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have

learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

What have you learnt about the conventions of magazine productions and what progress have you made from the student magazine?

Since producing my student my student magazine at the start of the year, I feel as though I have become a lot more observant and critical over my decisions in my work. I have always been confident with taking photos however I was less confident in editing images. As you can see from my student magazine which is barely edited in comparison with my finished music magazine which is very high in contrast and brightness, showing I have progressed in ability to use the software to get the results I wanted by practicing and trying new tools. An issue I had with y preliminary task was I didn’t consider the layout and design effectively as I had limited space to use for sell lines, which I worked on in my final as I used an block colour background but still chose to focus on the artwork rather than chaos of sell lines all over my finished product. As well as striking images which draw the attention of the audience on both of my magazines, I feel as though I am more aware of angles, lighting and mise-en-scene which is crucial in some cases like rock.

Previously I really struggled with using Photoshop as an editing software which is clear in my preliminary task, as a lot of my editing is not seamless or flows to the same extent as my music magazine. All of the text I implemented on y student magazine is also one dimensional and quite flat not giving it much appeal, it also sized just to fill space not necessarily to suit my layout and the design.

Whereas in my music magazine I have considered the effect of text and fonts to have an audience meaning as well as make it ore aesthetically suitable to the genre I researched and am selling. I used a range of different fonts to suit the genre and tested my ability to use editing software to create shadows and depth to them.

• Other aspects I worked on were the masthead and headline which were a similar size to the other general text which doesn’t match professional products at all, which is why when it came to doing my music magazine I did a lot of genre research to prevent making the same mistakes. This can be seen in my music magazine as the other text is significantly smaller in comparison with my masthead and headline.

• From analysing my student magazine it is clear that I ad not considered the effects of placement and the cover didn’t come together as well as I had hoped because of my minimal knowledge in design and layout of magazines, however in my music magazine I focused on creating a striking cover and implemented a contrasting colour scheme to compliment the edited image I used.

Contents PageAgain it is evident that in my preliminary task I had an issue with the text s it is all the same size and quite ineffective at engaging an audience with using a bland colour palette of black and orange with no real contrast. I also used the same font consistently excluding the masthead which is not that much bigger than the general text. The general layout is also quite bland as the pictures don’t include conventional forms of eye-contact preventing audience engagement.In comparison my music magazine includes the heading and masthead which are significant bigger by a couple of sizes compared to the general text and includes a more contrasting colour palette as the yellow/green tone and white contrast with the black background. I also used my images as a boarder and kept them towards the right-hand side with columned text on the left all of the same size and font to show consistency. As well as include a few more images of mixed genders to appeal to a wider audience.

I have also shown greater attention to mise-en-scene which matched my genre (bold/dark/intimidating) and the importance of eye contact which I learnt about through y research and the audience engagement it promotes. To make it more of a realistic magazine I also included a subscription section in an amp to link to the electric rock genre and included page numbers as this is a convention and makes it easy to navigate through. I also used a range of editing techniques to make the images more interesting and display a range of technique in editing.

• My contents in my preliminary task also features a textured background to suit the wall in my student magazine front cover, however I feel I could have tried a few different design techniques to challenge myself. With my music magazine I used block coloured backgrounds to focus on my colour palette, and images to make the product what it is as that involves ore thought and design obstacles, as it all has to tie in and still match the house style of the genre.

Double Page Spread• This was the longest task and the most difficult to execute which is why I didn’t include it in the preliminary task so I had more time

to work on y music production. As I have nothing from my previous task to compare this with I will just evaluate the decisions I had made and my drafting of my final DPS. This is the section I feel needed the most planning and creative planning as it involved an article suited to the genre as well as a main image still incorporating rock conventions. Layout was the hardest for me to execute as I wanted a conformative black and white dps as this is common in the rock genre and creates a bold statement. So I chose to edit my image with an extremely high contrast and shadowing to connote darkness and a very personal article related to the artist. I kept the image on the left hand side as this is conventionally in most magazines and makes sense for the readers. I implemented the same mise-en-scene keeping consistency with the dark clothing, band t-shirt, eye liner, and slight mohawk as well as intimidating facial expressions t compliment the genre and intensity of the article. I had to create an artist name to also include as this is another rock convention, and I went with toxic as it was associative with the article and I created the skull to include as the band logo using Photoshop showing that I understand the importance of design and aesthetics. I also included a banner of people at the bottom to also link to the genre and live music as well as the tour they are embarking on. I kept with consistency by using black and white as well as the off green/yellow tone to show consistency and still keep it quite black and white as they was what I wanted in contrast to all the other coloured images on my other pages to show I have a range of Photoshop techniques which I have learned throughout my production and incorporated to make y product unique. I also include concert dates as this is one of the main ideas associated with rock and live music it also gives the audience a chance to engage with the artist making it interpersonal. My masthead is the same on all my pages again to sow consistency and show the organisation of the product which is important and incorporated by all magazines brands including rock as this is professional and conventional. Throughout my production I made sure I was looking back over my analyses of existing products and y research to ensure all the choices I made were appropriate in attracting my targeted audience of males 15-25 whilst still appealing to a broader audience spectrum.

Audience research

• https://youtu.be/PcidF4vLd0w• Most of the features the audience expected to

see were quite, conventional of the rock genre. • The audience expected a male artist as this is

quite conventional however to challenge this stereotypical idea I went with a female artist. However some expectations I chose to stick to like the mise-en-scene and editing so the magazine was identifiable as rock.

Post-production feedback• Here are some of the ideas held by my audience;• Front Cover

I like the composition of the photo; you can really tell that it's a rock magazine because of the dark makeup and the outfit (all-black, leather jacket). There is also a really good choice of fonts that seem to match the conventions of rock music magazines because it looks decayed and has a grunge look to it, although you could improve on the placing of text because the button has a lot of blank space on it. I guess it's supposed to replicate the layout of the 'silencing of the spirits' line, wherein each word is in its own line to make it more impactful? But it could've been positioned so that '6' & 'free' are together, with 'posters' placed at the bottom and in line with each other to make use of the space.Also, I noticed that the artist name 'MUSE' looks smaller than the rest of the artists' names and I'm not sure if that was intentional but it really caught my eye. Other than that, you used the banners effectively because it didn't take the attention of the cool photo away from the reader, and the colour scheme is obvious and the use of these colours really got your attention (as they were black, white, red, and yellow, which matches the model's hair).

Contents PageThere is a number of editing styles used for each photo that makes each artists look unique, and I like the way you implemented the colour scheme onto the model on pg 36, while still using a greenish-yellow colour for the other texts. The different sizes of the font makes it easier to see where the features and the news sections are, although I think changing the colours for these headings might have made it better as it would make it easier to find them. I also noticed that pg 56's sell line doesn't have a large enough gap (in comparison to the others) to separate itself from the 'ALBUMS' section, and that may throw the reader off a bit because they'd have to read to find the 'ALBUMS' section instead of just looking for the next gap to indicate a change in sections.

Double Page SpreadI really like the use of the fans in the background to perhaps emphasise on the artist's popularity, and the subtly placed skull on top of the headline. It adds a really nice touch to the magazine as it makes it look more edgy and dangerous, since skulls connote to death and 'toxic' is enough to show that something is potentially deadly. I think you could've placed the pulled quote in a way that framed the picture as opposed to just being aligned in the same way. The colour scheme is obvious here too, and although I thought it was strange for there to be no red when I first looked at it, it actually made the article more dramatic because it looked dark and gloomy. Maybe next time, use red on the pulled quote to emphasise it or use it on the headline to grab the reader's attention