Friday, 18 November 2011
Photoshop Tutorials
For further research for my magazine I have watched some tutorial videos on the internet to help me create a better product:
Recreating An Existing Cover
As preparation for my main task I have used Adobe Photoshop to re-create an existing magazine, I chose this magazine because it was not too complicated, used very simple colours, and only featured one person.
To create the magazine I took a picture of somebody, who looked as close as possible to the artist on the magazine, and positioned him to look like the person on the cover.
With my photo I began recreating the cover on photoshop, and this is the finished cover:
Overall this task really helped me get to grips with more than the basics of photoshop, I have learned how to do typical thing for a magazine cover on photoshop and even gained more detailed knowledge of the codes and conventions of a magazine cover, and I feel that when I come to do my main task it will really help me save time.
Friday, 11 November 2011
Sunday, 6 November 2011
Products Already Available
I have carried out some brief research into similar magazines already available, in order to help me establish what features my magazine should have. I looked at magazines with a similar genre and target market to my own.
NME Magazine
Launched in 1996, New Musial Express or NME magazine has been around since all of the great bands emerged, it is a magazine mainly focused towards indie/rock and contains all you need to know about music, including exclusive interviews, reviews pictures and your own personal gig guide. The magazine is released on a weekly basis with all the latest new, costing around £2.40 for each issue. They also offer subscriptions for the magazine.
Genre – Indie
Cost - £2.40
Frequency – Weekly
Country – U.K
http://www.nme-magazine.com/
Kerrang Magazine
First issued on June 6 1981, and has become one of the world's biggest selling music magazines, The name of the magazine ‘kerrang’ is onomatopoeic of the sound made from an electric guitar power chord. Kerrang is a brand for all rock genres form, pop-punk, to heavy metal containing the hottest news, reviews, gig guides, exclusive features, posters and videos. The magazine is issued weekly and costs £2.20.
Genre – Rock
Cost - £2.20
Frequency – Weekly
Country – U.K
Issued – 51 a year
http://www.kerrang.com/blog/newissue/
Q magazine first published in October 1986, has been said to set its self apart from other magazines because of its high standards of photography and printing, for not focusing on a specific genre of music, and only releasing one issue a month Q magazine has become very popular indeed. The magazine is well known for creating lists, Such as "The 100 Greatest albums", and every issue has a different message across the spine intriguing readers to figure out how the message is linked with the issue, it has become known as ‘the spine line’ and the idea has been adopted by other magazine like ‘empire’. Much of the magazine is devoted to interviews with popular musical artists. The magazine is only released once a month and costs around £3.50.
Rock Sound Magazine
NME Magazine
Launched in 1996, New Musial Express or NME magazine has been around since all of the great bands emerged, it is a magazine mainly focused towards indie/rock and contains all you need to know about music, including exclusive interviews, reviews pictures and your own personal gig guide. The magazine is released on a weekly basis with all the latest new, costing around £2.40 for each issue. They also offer subscriptions for the magazine.
Genre – Indie
Cost - £2.40
Frequency – Weekly
Country – U.K
http://www.nme-magazine.com/
Kerrang Magazine
First issued on June 6 1981, and has become one of the world's biggest selling music magazines, The name of the magazine ‘kerrang’ is onomatopoeic of the sound made from an electric guitar power chord. Kerrang is a brand for all rock genres form, pop-punk, to heavy metal containing the hottest news, reviews, gig guides, exclusive features, posters and videos. The magazine is issued weekly and costs £2.20.
Genre – Rock
Cost - £2.20
Frequency – Weekly
Country – U.K
Issued – 51 a year
http://www.kerrang.com/blog/newissue/
Q Magazine 
Q magazine first published in October 1986, has been said to set its self apart from other magazines because of its high standards of photography and printing, for not focusing on a specific genre of music, and only releasing one issue a month Q magazine has become very popular indeed. The magazine is well known for creating lists, Such as "The 100 Greatest albums", and every issue has a different message across the spine intriguing readers to figure out how the message is linked with the issue, it has become known as ‘the spine line’ and the idea has been adopted by other magazine like ‘empire’. Much of the magazine is devoted to interviews with popular musical artists. The magazine is only released once a month and costs around £3.50.
Genre – All Music
Cost - £3.50
Frequency – Monthly
Country – U.K
http://www.qthemusic.com/
Cost - £3.50
Frequency – Monthly
Country – U.K
http://www.qthemusic.com/
Vibe 
Magazine
MagazineVibe magazine was first launched in 1993 and is a music and entertainment magazine, mainly based on R&B & Hip-Hop. It provided information of urban music as well as coverage of the latest new of fashion, cars & gadgets. Vibe is well known for its creativity of their covers. Vibe is issued monthly in the U.S and costs around $2.95.
Rock Sound Magazine
Rock sound is rock based British magazine aimed at teenagers 16+ which includes rock news, reviews, interviews, gig guides, and freebies. First launched in March 1999, rock sound is known for being less commercial, but still features very well known bands and artists. The magazine is published monthly and is around £3.99.
Friday, 4 November 2011
Questionnaire
In order to help me create a good quality magazine, I devised a questionnaire for people within my target audience to get a better understanding of what my magazine should be like. Firstly I asked a number people if they were either interested in music or music magazines, if their answer was yes I asked them to fill out my questionnaire. Each question was used to help me establish what me target audience wants and what I should include in my magazine.
Tuesday, 1 November 2011
Preliminary - Evaluation
For my preliminary task my job was to create a front cover for a school/college magazine and a DTP mock up of a contents page. To create my designs I used Adobe Photoshop, I struggled with getting to grips with the layers on this software to begin with but after I had taken my photos I began to get used to the tools and by the end of the task I knew how to use the basics of the programme.
Personally think that I used the software well to create my magazine, my final magazine cover and mock-up follow the basic codes and conventions of school/college magazine, the name runs along the top of the magazine, I also tried to use very subtle and calm colours so that I didn’t overwhelm the page, I used a medium close up as was asked in the brief but also used other images so the reader had more to focus on, and the colour scheme remained consistent throughout my cover and my contents mock-up. I think my time management during my preliminary task was also very good; I took my photos for my magazine early on so that I had time to play around with them and make sure I was completely happy with where they were placed, and I set out to spend two lessons on my cover and one on my contents, which I ended up doing in just two lessons.
I believe there were a few areas for improvement in my preliminary task, I did follow most of the typical codes and conventions for a magazine however it lacked a few, for example, a barcode or price in the corner, or a website name at the bottom of them page, and although I really like my final colour scheme I think it was very sophisticated and subtle I think for a typical comprehensive school I maybe should have used some more bright and basic preliminary colours. After doing my preliminary I am now confidant on the basic tools of Adobe Photoshop and to improve on my main task would like to learn and use more adventurous techniques. Perhaps my contents page also deserved a little more work as there was not anything very eye-catching on the page because it was a very basic layout.
I think I have benefited a lot form my preliminary task I have a better understanding of Photoshop and photography, and have had my first taste of practical media work. I also have a better concept of what a magazine needs, and the codes and conventions and how certain techniques can be used to make magazines look appealing, which will greatly benefit me for my main task.
Personally think that I used the software well to create my magazine, my final magazine cover and mock-up follow the basic codes and conventions of school/college magazine, the name runs along the top of the magazine, I also tried to use very subtle and calm colours so that I didn’t overwhelm the page, I used a medium close up as was asked in the brief but also used other images so the reader had more to focus on, and the colour scheme remained consistent throughout my cover and my contents mock-up. I think my time management during my preliminary task was also very good; I took my photos for my magazine early on so that I had time to play around with them and make sure I was completely happy with where they were placed, and I set out to spend two lessons on my cover and one on my contents, which I ended up doing in just two lessons.
I believe there were a few areas for improvement in my preliminary task, I did follow most of the typical codes and conventions for a magazine however it lacked a few, for example, a barcode or price in the corner, or a website name at the bottom of them page, and although I really like my final colour scheme I think it was very sophisticated and subtle I think for a typical comprehensive school I maybe should have used some more bright and basic preliminary colours. After doing my preliminary I am now confidant on the basic tools of Adobe Photoshop and to improve on my main task would like to learn and use more adventurous techniques. Perhaps my contents page also deserved a little more work as there was not anything very eye-catching on the page because it was a very basic layout.
I think I have benefited a lot form my preliminary task I have a better understanding of Photoshop and photography, and have had my first taste of practical media work. I also have a better concept of what a magazine needs, and the codes and conventions and how certain techniques can be used to make magazines look appealing, which will greatly benefit me for my main task.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)