The Brief

Main task: the front page,contents and double page spread of a new music magazine. All images and text used must be original,produced by you-minimum of four images.

Evaluation

My final front cover follows a lot of the general conventions youd expect to see on any magazine.I tried to include a lot of the conventions to create a more realistic looking magazine.I kept the mast head large to show which college magazine it was,and added relevant ocver lines that relate to that college during that edition.

My media product is not targeted towards a specific social group,I made it in the thought of that it can be readable and found intresting by anyone.I tried to include feature stories that cover every social group and that might intrest different people.By doing this I hoped any one would find at least something within my college magazine intresting and worth reading about.

The audience for my college magazine would be mainly college students (any age/gender) and also adults e.g parents,staff etc.I wanted to create a magazine that was mature enough to be read by adults but also be up to date with what the students was doing.I felt by incorporating all these things together I could create a college magazine that everyone would be intrested in.

To attract the audience I went with the well known college colours with a pop of lime green.I stayed with the college colours to keep in with the college theme and make it more realistic.I felt the colour scheme I picked was bold yet complimentary.I stayed with blue,greens and purpels,by doing this I felt I created a very eye catching front cover without it looking messy.

To attract the students I added a plug which offered ‘free printer vredits’ I did this because at wyke you have a £5  print credit limit each term,and for coursework based subjects this is extremely small.So by offerinfg free printer credits I feel it was a little incentive in roder for the students to pick up this magazine and read it.

To attract the adults I included updates on the new build to keep them up to date with whats happeing right now at wyke and also about UCAS applications as they may want further information on that subject in order to help there child/ren.The UCAS subject I thought was also good for students to as it may give them a littler advice about what to do.

In the making of this front cover I have learnt a lot,ive picked up new techniques such as fading text behind an image etc.Its made me more aware of wat customers want to see,and what techniques you need to use in order to sell your product.I really enjopyed making the college magazine,I only came across a few struggles but felt I delt with them quickly.

Looking back to my perfume advert I feel ive learnt a lot in terms of techniques.Coming to wyke my photoshop knowledge was limited but I feel I picked it up quickly,during the making of my perfume advery I was hesitant to experiment about with different techniques but now ive learnt a lot in terms of trial an error and how to make an overall good front cover.

If I had the chance to do it again I wouldn't do many things differently,I felt  everything went as hoped but in the future I need to manage my time slighty better.This is because I found some days I was falling behind and had to make up time,so I think if I managed my time better I wouldn't have had that problem.Also I would've maybe added another photo to my front cover,or toned down the brightness of the text,other than that im really happy with my final outcome.Im conclusion I feel this project went really well,I really enjoyed learning how important the conventions of a magazine are and how vital they are in ensuring the magazine is exciting and sellable.

 

 

 

 

Final front cover

My final front cover

Un used images

Drafts

Front cover

 

 

Contents page

 

 

Double page spread

 

 

 

 

Initial ideas spider diagram

Initial ideas spider diagram

 

 

Mood Board

Mood Board

 

 

Here above is the mood board I created when coming up with ideas for my college magazine. I gathered together some images that I thought would suit my college magazine well. As you can see I chose quite a lot of green, purple and blue colours, I want to base my colour scheme on these colours as I feel as they're the Wyke colours already, to create a realistic college magazine I wanted to stay with these colours to keep the theme of Wyke.

 

The rest of the images I put on to my mood board as I feel they all tie in with college life or could be possible feature stories for my magazine, such as the sports picture-that could be a article on Wykes sport achievements etc. Or the UCAS logo represents a possible feature story for my magazine about applications.

 



Example of shot types

Close up

 

Medium close up

 

 

 

Medium long shot

 

 

Long shot

 

 

 



Exsisting Products

Existing Products research

 

This college magazine follows the standard conventions you'd expect a magazine to, it has the mast head; date/issue; cover lines; main feature image; barcode etc.

The layout of this college magazine is settle yet engaging, the medium close up image is a great way to show off an important image without the image been lost within the magazine. College magazines often show images relating to them such as here we have a student representing there college.

This college magazine have used complimentary colours in order to create a formal yet eye capturing front cover. The bold red masthead text matches with the students top, tying in the over all scheme, this technique is used in order to create an appealing effect.

College magazines such as this one show cover lines  that are about their college, by showing little snippets of what the college has been doing/is or what they  have to offer is an deliberate  intention that the editor does in order to make you want to read on and look into the magazine more.

 

College magazine are made in order to get important information across to either the students and/or parents etc. So it is vital that is appealing to all audiences, and looks presentable. If the college magazine was presented messily and didn't show cover lines that may be appealing to read about, the  college magazine would be unsuccessful in its purpose.

 

The front cover of this Wyke college prospectus follows a few conventions you'd expect to see. This prospectus is presented in a formal manner with a modern edge, the colours used are purple and green, these are the colleges colours so to use these colours within the front cover of there magazine carry's through the theme of wyke by just using specific colours.

The presentation of this magazine is different from the others, its presented in a formal manner yet is still appealing to anyone. The use of green to highlight the words 'WOW FACTOR' is a deliberate technique in order for you notice that the most.

 

All the images used on the front of this magazine are in relation to college, promoting it instantly just by the use of images. If the images where of well known celebrities or had nothing to do with the college at all then people may see the overall magazine as unreliable and most probably not the truth.SO by using students of the college to promote what they do, is a much better approach at promoting the college.There's a few images been used aswell,not just one.There's images of sport, science and just one of the overall college again so each image will appeal to any type of person medium close up shots are used on the front of this cover, this is a good shot to use in order to keep the customer interested in the image itself.

 

 

This college magazine is an extremely formal type of magazine that doesn't follow many of the conventions you'd expect to see on an everyday magazine. This magazine had a mast head and a footer, also a main image but nothing else, it doesn't have any cover lines or main feature story's that you'd expect to see.

 

The layout of this magazine is extremely formal, the simple design and less cluttered approach to this magazine speaks for its self. You can tell instantly this college magazine is being published souly to show information about the college and nothing else. Id say this magazine is targeted at an audience of more of the parents, its also for students but Id say its not a magazine you'd read for fun its more or an informative magazine unlike the previous college magazine that is abit more fun and caters for a more urban audience.

 

The colour scheme used is quite muted and laidback,not a magazine id say is trying to be intentionally eye capturing but this is exactly what it wants to be like, this college magazine is one that's holds the information needed and doesn't need to sell its self as much.

 

The medium close up shot on the front of this college magazine is connotes perfectly with the feature title. As the Chinese flag is red, the clothes he is wearing is red match perfectly with the title 'Quest to China'. This continuous running colour scheme compliments really well to the overall colour scheme of the magazine.

 

 

 

 

 

LIIAR ANALYSIS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Conventions analysis of a magazine

Mast Head: The mast head of any magazine is the brand name. As for this magazine here above, the mast head is ‘NOW’.

The mast head is always usually the biggest text on the magazine, it promotes the brand of magazine making it noticeable to the customer. Its always placed at the top of the magazine to grab the attention on the customer and allow them to notice what brand it is, in the hope if they enjoy the magazine they will return to buy this same brand of magazine again.

The mast head connotes to the magazine as its relevant to what the magazine is publishing. This magazine is called ‘NOW’ and all its content is up to date stories and information that is happening right NOW.

The mast head appeals to audience in many ways, firstly without a mast head a consistent customer will not know which there favorite magazine is as there is no brand name selling it. Also, the mast head is always bold, big and bright, a specific technique in order to make the customer remember this brand name.

Main Feature Story: The main feature story in any magazine is the most interesting and juiciest information they have that they want to promote as the most important. The main feature story is always the most interesting story within the magazine, and is used as the magazines biggest selling point.

The main feature story is usually always central on the front of a magazine, and usually takes up most of the space. This is because it’s a deliberate intention to promote this story they have information on ,they want you to know its important so show main snippets of it on the front with the intention that you will buy the magazine to read on further.

The main feature story is always important to the audience as the majority of the time this is what sells the magazine its self. Without a main feature story, the customer may not be interested so making the main feature story, interesting and up to date is extremely important.

It persuades them to buy the magazine as they want to read on further about the story,they want to find out what else was said,in this case about Ashley cheating on Cheryl.

 Main Feature image: The main feature image and the main feature story work together in promoting the most important story in the magazine. The main feature image is used to promote the main story, it gives you visually something to look at to put the feature story into perspective.

Its always placed in the center just like the main feature story header, its placed here so it capture you on first glance an it the most prominent feature on the magazine front. If it was placed in a corner and was very small it wouldn’t have the same effect as a large image than covers most of the front of the magazine. It would give the impression that that image doesn’t have much importance.

This image used on this magazine promotes exactly what the main feature story is about. We see Ashley almost looking smug and powerless and he stares at Cheryl, while Cheryl herself looks doubtful and forgiving exactly what the main feature story entails-Ashley blaming Cheryl for something he’s done.

Its appealing to the audience because its visually eye capturing, without a picture the text may come across boring and ‘story-like’ where as if there’s an image that connotes with the story it brings it back to real life and puts what is actually been said into perspective. It persuades the customers to buy the magazine as the image may have an effect on them, the may be able to relate to it, or wonder why Cheryl is looking the way she does, it creates an effect on the reader that may cause them to buy the magazine, that without it they wouldn’t-and this is why having a main feature image is so important.

Pull Quotes: Pull quotes are used to promote snippets of interviews/story’s etc that are within the magazine itself.

They’re placed on the front of a magazine to intrigue you and made you want to read on further. They’re often the most interesting bits of a story/interview etc and are used to promote the whole story itself.

In this case the pull quote is actually one of the biggest pieces of text used, NOW magazine have deliberately done this is order to show you what Ashley has actually said. Using pull quotes in this way can be extremely effective and make the article the magazine is promoting even more believable.

Pull quotes are appealing to the audience as they’re interesting, intriguing and more than often the attention grabber than makes you want to read on. Without a pull quote nothing may jump out to a customer, resulting in them not buying the magazine.

Pull: The pull in a magazine is more than often the little added extra to entice you to the magazine even more. Its usually a giveaway or something free within the magazine but more than likely it’s a competition.

By adding pulls to a magazine it makes you think that if you buy there magazine your also going to get something else-as if your getting more for your money.

In this example Now have advertised that they have the best selling holiday clothes from just £2,a deliberate act in order to make you think how can they be so cheap. Resulting in you buying there magazine, pulls I think are the are the extra little selling point that without could effect the sales of the magazine as a whole.

Cover Line/s: Cover lines are the second most important story in the magazine. They usually feature at the top of the magazine and are often smaller,theres usually more than one of these too.

Magazines usually (like the main feature image) advertise high profile images of celebs on the cover story’s too, so if you are not that fussed over reading what the main feature story is there still trying to intrigue with more gossip they have to offer. By showing well known faces there increasing there customer base of who the magazine would appeal to.

Now here have used a very popular at the minute reality tv star Joey Essex and an extremely well known high profile celeb J-LO.

I noticed on the cover lines they included a man and a women, again appeal to both the male/female audience.