Research + Planning- For Prelim Task
For this particular task I virtually did no planning. I did
not blueprint design ideas or text ideas, I simply made it on the day and went
with the flow. But as for research, I did actually go online and look at past
magazines issued to the public, in order to see how a front cover is usually
laid out and what type of stuff it features. As well as this I took advantage
of the magazines the school had to offer, and looked into the layout of them.
From this I noticed the variety of colours used, and also noted that it fit
very well with their audience. For Rock as an example, the colours were very
dark such as black and a dull red. Each magazine was therefore different as
they all had different target markets. As well as the front cover, I also
looked at the contents page. From this I observed that it is very important to
make clear what the magazine has to offer. The contents page was in theory,
what sold the magazine and it would describe everything featured in it. When
flicking from the front cover to the contents, I noticed several similarities
between the two pages. From this I gathered that it is important to keep the
same colours on each page so they had a similar connection, and also the font
of the headings were similar. From looking at these I also came to the
conclusion that pictures are a very influencing factor in selling a magazine,
as it gives the audience a visual image to what it contains inside.
What I used
Technology wise, we were instructed to use the serif
application, as these gave us more freedom to edit our pages than sites such as
Word or PowerPoint. With this app, I was entitled to a range of colours and
different editing for both my pictures and text. One of my favourite features
about the site, was the range of different editing techniques available for
titles and headlines. With this I could bend, stretch, make 3D and much more
with my chosen title. As well as the computer, I also used my IPhone to snap
some great shots of other classmates to use in my magazine. The pictures a
chose looked really good and definitely would give a source of connection with
my audience as the pictured people are probably widely known within the sixth
form.
Problems
The task did not come without its difficulties. One
difficulty I struggled with most, was choosing a colour that would work with my
background picture. Megan my model was wearing a navy woollen coat in the snap,
which you would think would be no problem concerning a title. However I found
that dark colours would simply blend in with the coat making it invisible, and
that bright colours were simply unreadable to the audience’s eyes. For some
reason I found difficulty in this most, but eventually chose a pinkish red that
fitted with my background picture really well. Along with this I also struggled
to think of ideas for my contents page. I had mentioned only 3 things that were
going to feature in my magazine, and then my mind went blank. Looking through
example magazines were not helpful as it was for a music market mainly whilst
mine was for a school. I decided to take more of a personal approach following
on from this, with headlines including teachers names and students, that
audiences could relate to. As well as this as I couldn’t think of many ideas, I
set my magazine price quite low.
