Main task evaluation
I have been working on my AS Media main task for around three months now everything I have produced and researched can be found on my blog www.benslater.wordpress.com. I have kept my blog up to date in a diary type form showing my work and what I have learnt, I update it on a week to week basis so it has everything that I have done in this task.
The task brief said we had to continue our choice of music or video from the preliminary task so I continued by working individually on a magazine. The task set was to create a music magazine we had to include a front cover, contents page and a double page spread
We where aloud to pick any genre of music and style the magazine in any way we wanted we just had to use four original images throughout the magazine. Because the task set had such a huge range of ways in which I could create this magazine I knew I had to settle with one type of music which I was familiar with and a type which I also am passionate about.
Instead of starting straight away I looked back over my preliminary task and assessed what I had done right and wrong, the main aspect which appeared to me was that in the preliminary task I had made my cover to complicated for me to construct so I knew this time to stick to the basics and make it look professional. I believed I could do this due to the vast improvement to my skills on Photoshop, I was now confident in myself on the program as before I did not feel comfortable. I found several different aspects with my preliminary task which definitely had to be changed in my main such as; more precise images this meaning eye catching and making you want to look agen, also to keep a theme throughout I believed if I included these aspects my magazine would be of a much higher quality.
Now that I had analysed the project and noted what I needed to change I started to research the three different pages contents, front cover and double page spread. I started by looking at double page spreads I had a basic idea of the different styles of layouts such as the main image taking up one whole side or spreading over both pages. I had this general knowledge because I am a fan of music magazine and have read several over the years this made the task all the more exciting for me. I found one aspect which I wanted to use in my double page spread it was where there is a picture of the artist with a reaction shot of the crowd on the other side, I thought that this would give the reader a much better of how there performance was reacted too. I researched into how successful magazines might do this and I found that they would have a large image of the artist and then a smaller image of the crowd somewhere near the article, I also realised that I would have to add captions to the images to not confuse the reader and show the images are linked.
The next thing I researched was contents pages they where the hardest to research because it was hard to find a pattern in all of the different ones I looked at. What I did like about some that I found was that there was a lot of images used, instead of using text like I did in my preliminary task I could use images instead to pull people into the article. Before I was trying to use bold words and interesting article names to gain the readers attention instead I could carry this on but fit it around an image and I think this makes the article all the more exciting. I did not research contents pages aswell as the other two because I think I have a good knowledge on how to create and lay them out my main purpose of research contents pages was to try and find ideas in which I could use in mine.
I continued my researched by looking at several different successful magazine covers, I looked at famous titles such as Mojo and Kerrang even though this is not the genre I wanted to use for my magazine I thought it would still be a good idea to study them in depth. I looked at how they places there images and how they layed out there text, I begun to realise that the there title was not important I thought this would be a main selling point for them but because they had the famous artists on the front that’s all that that mattered. I noticed both magazines make the image very significant and eye catching they place them to make you look more closely. I wanted to do the same thing with mine because I knew if I could draw my reader in through the image then they will look at what else is on the front cover. But Mojo and Kerrang make it seem like the front cover is simple where it is extremely difficult to shoot a picture of that quality, I continued to think of a way round that as the task went on.
Now that I had researched the three key aspects of the task I decided to look at some smaller aspects which I could research these where fonts and a overview of magazine creating. I found 8 steps to follow throughout the whole task, these steps where extremely useful and kept me from making vital mistakes in the task. I also spent time finding several different fonts I came across a site called www.dafont.com this website was extremely helpful throughout, it supplied me most of my fonts which I used for Masthead’s, Headlines and captions. The website had thousands of fonts to select and different genre’s you can choose from I stuck to the same genre for my whole magazine so I can keep a theme going throughout. I stuck to these types of fonts because i think they represent age well, by this i mean they appeal to the age of my audience and they work extremly well with the genre of my magazine.All of my research can be found on my blog and in paper work.
Now that I had finished all my research I thought in depth about what genre I wanted my magazine to be because I wanted it to be something that I was passionate about and that I had a good knowledge of I immediately thought dance music. I stuck with this genre because I could talk about several different genres such as House, Electro and Trance and they all come under dance music. Another reason for sticking with this genre is that I had been to see allot of famous DJ’s perform and have photos of them, I knew these would come in hand for parts of this task. I also knew I was going to see others as the task went on so I knew that I could take some of my original images there. The genre of dance music was perfect for me and I knew this straight away because I am so passionate about it.
I know wanted to put some of my initial ideas onto paper so I begun to sketch three front covers to have some kind of initial idea when creating the cover. I mainly thought about layout and how the image would be placed and how the text would fit around it, I took feedback from other students and placed there ideas with mine and see how it worked. I finally finished with three ideas which I would consider to use when creating my front cover the ideas would not be definite because I knew I would come across problems when creating this cover.
Just before i started constructing my magazine i wanted to come up with a name for my magazine, i wanted it to state the genre of my magazine but yet still be elegant. My audience is the younger generation 15 - 30 is the age i would be aiming at so i needed it to be a name which would stand out and that would be remembered. I finally decided on “Dance Euphoria” Euphoria meaning the extreme happiness, so the title represents the extreme happiness you get from dance music i also believe the name is very catchy and stays in your mind.
It was now time to start constructing one of the three aspects of the task I chose to start out with the front cover because I believe this was the easiest out of the three and I had a picture in my head in how it would look. Firstly I started out by playing around with different colours for my background I had the idea of it looking like disco lights so I used several different gradients to see which one suited best. I finally found one which was clear and most importantly that the reader would be able to read the text which I would lay on top of it. I then began to start looking at fonts I went back to my research because I knew I had several that I liked there, I ended up using one that I had chosen in my research I got it onto Photoshop by using the website dafont I entered in the words I wanted and then printed screen and cut the part out which I wanted. I then used the magic wond tool to change the colouring and move it onto my front cover, all I needed to do now was add a gentle glow to the outer of the wording and masthead was complete. I carried on to use this technique for several other aspects of my magazine it is a long process but I believe you get a much better finish a lot better than if I was using the basic fonts that Photoshop have.
Now I began to add some article names about the page I new I needed to use taglines which would draw the reader in to the different article in my magazine. I added several different images to the page to make the some of the articles look more interesting, I kept to a theme with every image by adding a slim border around each one I believe this makes the page look more professional. On the contents page I used one original image it was a picture that I had took in a London night club, I wanted a picture that overlooked the whole club I think the image taken fits that perfectly. I selected other images that would fit nicely with the article I believe I have a good range of different types of articles for the magazine. Finally I wanted a trade mark item which could be used on every contents in different issue’s I chose a disco ball which I think represents dance music fantastically. I believe all of the colouring in the contents page represents my genre well and I wanted to stick to this throughout.
I continued to represent music in different ways throughout the magazine, when creating my front cover I started by creating a sound wave across the top of the page. I made this sound wave by using three different colour brush tools I drew the the waves freehand straight onto the cover. I believe I created what I wanted and I think the waves are a key aspect to my front cover; I considered printing my magazines name across the top of the sound waves. After asking several other peoples opinions I came to the decision of having it slightly below because I think there would have been to much colour and that would make it hard to read. I continued to construct my front cover by working on the masthead I used the same technique I used for the contest but this time it took longer because I spent time on changing the colours of the lettering. But this was all worth while because by doing this I had kept the multi coloured concept throughout both pages in which I have created.
The next step which I took to produce my front cover was to add my main original image, the idea was to have my close up image of an artist from an angle where he’s face is not clear. I took a great picture of a friend of mine that is a DJ I was extremely pleased in how the picture came out and thought it would work well with my front cover. I uploaded the photo into Photoshop and worked on the colouring and contrast to make the image more significant but when I placed the image of the cover I wasn’t best pleased with the way it looked. I tried several different angles to try and make the image fit and look better but it just wasn’t working so instead of wasting any more time I took an image of a famous DJ from the internet and changed different aspects of the photo, this image looked allot better so I kept it as my main picture. Now I had a dilemma I had to use three original images in the rest of my work, I did this by firstly adding another two images to my front cover the first one being of a famous sign in Ministry of Sound in London. As soon as I see the print on the wall I new it would be a great idea to use this in my media work I was not sure on where I would use it throughout the magazine but I new it would come in useful. The other image was one that I had taken on my summer holiday it was at a famous DJ’s (Tiesto) concert. I used to image on the cover to advertise a competition to win a trip to Ibiza, I thought this was a great way to mix the image in with the magazine also by using a word like “Win” will draw the reader into the prize and the magazine.
Now that I had enough images on the page I believe I smartened the cover up by adding borders and make the images appropriate sizes. I kept to the steps which I had found in my research when creating this front cover I used a great masthead and I used a great cover photo which I think is the most important thing when creating my cover so i am glad I didn’t risk using my original image and my front cover not being as good as I could have made it.
All i now had left was my Double page spread i wanted to make this more simple and less colourful because there would be a article on it unlike the contents and front cover. This would be quite a challenge because i wanted it to fit with the rest of the magazine and not loose my theme which i have kept throughout. I started by working with the background i wanted to keep some colour to stick with the rest of the magazine so i used a purple for it, i studied it and new it had to be changed because the article would be difficult to read so i used a gradient to fade the colour out and make the article clearer i new this would make the image and article stand out. I then started work on the masthead agen i used the technique of cutting it from dafont to place it on the top of my spread. I went for a more simple masthead because i wanted it to fit with the article and show clearly that they are together. I continued by typing up article when writing my article i used quite simple language which my audience could easily understand and relate too. My audience is male and female from the ages of 15 – 30 so when writing this article i didn’t want to be using words which would confuse my magazine consumer.
I then added to images to the page one was original and the other was taken from the artists website. This image that i had taken i made the main picture in the spread it takes up half and is surrounded with a slim border like the others in the magazine. My original image is of an arm with the artist name on it.I wrote his name on my own arm and made the affect of it being inside a club by taking a video making it full screen and placing my arm in front of it. This was hard to frame because the arm was a fair size larger than the screen so i took shots from all different angles to find one which worked. I believe the picture came out well but i didn’t get the writing as well as i could of but that is because i was drawing it onto my own arm.
The main task took allot longer than the preliminary but i am pleased with the result i think that i have put allot more thought into the project another reason why i believe my work has a vast difference between the two task is down to the improvement of my skills on photoshop. I am now confident in using the program and know allot more tools which can be used when magazine designing. Overall i am pleased with my work throughout the magazine i believe i have represented age well through different fonts,colours and pictures. I would of liked to have more time to have completed drafts instead changing aspects as i went also i would have enjoyed holding focus groups and getting specific feedback on my work. I believe if i had this task set agen i might of been able to do these because of better time management but atleast i have learnt from my mistakes and will carry on improving into the next task.
