Evaluation presentation

Amelia Larkin Evaluation Presentation

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Preliminary task

Stage four of the magazine production: Adding content and the finishing touches to the magazine layout

Front cover:

 This is my final completed front cover for FUSED Magazine. As you can see I have added another rectangle banner at the bottom of the publication with more advertisements about what can be found inside, and also a bar code to the bottom right of my front cover, to emphasise on the professionalism of my magazine. I have also added the date and price to the top right hand side of my magazine.
Although I like the outcome of my magazine, if I could go back I would change the colour scheme and make it more corresponding - I think the colours of the arrows (as they are in mainly primary colours) go outside the colour scheme of blues and greys and make the layout look more simple, and somehow plainer. However, this might not be a negative thing, as if the arrows were more corresponding with the rest of the layout, they may not have stood out as well as they do, and detract from the boldness and striking appeal of the band fronting the magazine.
To improve my magazine I would have also made The Weak(end) Arrow’s title smaller in size, in order to create more room around the sides of this to include more information on inside articles, as I do not feel there is enough information on the front cover about what can be found inside. 

Contents Page:

  This is the final contents page for FUSED Magazine. As you can see, I added all the content such as adding the article titles into the index bar on the right hand side of the page, and the page numbers next to them.
I also added a small introduction for my magazine, which is just a summary or a welcome into the new edition, and mentions a few articles that can be found in the magazine.
Generally I was very pleased with the outcome of my contents page, although to improve it I think I could have included something in the right hand top corner, as that corner looks quite empty and plain. I would've also changed the colour of the main heading which contains the logo and the 'Contents' title, in order to create some variety between the index bar and header.

Double page spread:

This is the finished double page spread. I have added the actual interview content onto the opaque content boxes that I made earlier in the production and like the effect. To distinguish between the interviewer and the responses of the band I set the font colour as burgandy for the interviewer, and kept the responses made by the band as black. In the end, in order to squeeze the text in I had to cut out a lot of the interview, and only select and include what I thought to be the most important information/the information that best reflects the indie-rock and what the band would have wanted to portray.
I generally like the appearence of my double page spread, although in some places I think the text does become quite cramped and messy, which if I were to redo, I would improve by making it neater, and less clashing.

Stage three of the magazine production: Adding content and articles to the magazine layout

This is the current stage I am at in my magazine production:
Front cover:

I have added a banner along the top of the front cover, advertising an article which can be found inside the magazine. This banner was created using a rectangle select and then fill tool on adobe photoshop, and then font simply placed over the top of this. The font I chose for this was Arial Bold, which I hope will attract the reader’s attention -set in capital letters and striking against the much lighter shade of blue that the background is.
The title of the band itself was created with Adobe Photoshop also, the arrows individually created by me using a line and curve tool. The font which is placed over the top of this reads the name of the band: ‘The Weak(end) Arrows’, and was created using font website www.dafont.com, after much experimenting with a variety of different typefaces and fonts that are available.

Double page spread:

I have now added opaque text boxes onto my double page spread, using a rectangle fill shape, and changing the transparency down to around 80, just so you can see the band photo through the text boxes. Before I changed the opacity the text boxes were just one solid white colour, which I think made the magazine layout look much more amateur and less professional. These areas are where the band interview will be eventually put in the next stage.
I also added four other photos to the double page spread of the band, two taken at one of the band’s live performances, and two from the photoshoot arranged to gather photos predominantly for use in the magazine. Before arranging the photos on the double page spread, I added a small white border before resizing, as I think this sets the photos apart from the rest of the layout and stops parts of the background clashing with the photos, resulting in the layout becoming confusing. 

Contents page:

I have added three images to my contents page, the largest one, aligned to the left, is a picture of The Weak(end) Arrows, the band fronting my magazine. I have included a small box to provide the page number to advertise the article to the reader as they turn onto the contents page. Underneath this, are two smaller images taken for extra use in FUSED Magazine, which also have small page number boxes and a space for the name and a short description of the article. Doing this was simple - I copy and pasted the images onto the publication, then added a thin black border using the rectangle tool. To add the page number boxes, I selected a small square and filled it in the pale blue colour, then proceeded to copy and paste the page number box so it is equal.

The next stage of my magazine is adding the written content and the finishing touches of the magazine.

Stage two of the magazine production: Adding headings to the magazine layout

The second stage in producing my magazine is to begin to create and add the headings and titles to the magazine layout. Creating the titles and headings is a task which will take time in itself, as the different types of font and typeface need to be experimented with in order to find the best and most suitable font to fit with the layout beforehand.
The current stage I am at with the magazine production at the end of this is shown below:
Front cover:

As you can see, the logo of the name of the magazine that I created earlier in the week is now placed in the top left corner of the magazine. After experimenting and editing with Adobe Photoshop I decided that it is best to place the logo in the background, behind the band photo, in order for the band to stand out the most, emphasising the fact that the magazine is all about the music, and have as much impact on the reader as possible. I did this by selecting part of the original image of The Weak(end) Arrows where the title was going to be, and then cut out the white background of the title logo using the magic wand tool. I then copied the logo, and pasted onto a new layer on the image of the band, so the background was transparent and see through, but behind the band member’s heads. I then just edited the size and shape of the logo to fit correctly using the drag buttons around the selection.

Double page spread: 

As on the front cover, I created the titles for the double page spread using www.dafont.com. I decided that it was important on this page for the font to be in the foreground of the image, in order for the reader to be able to read the name of the band as easily as possible, and have no chance of being mistaken.
The arrows on the page were my own idea, as it relates to the name of the band ‘The Weak(end) Arrows’. The arrows were individually created on Adobe Photoshop using different line and curve tools, in order for them to go in the direction that I wanted them to.

Contents page:

The beginning of the contents page was created on Adobe Photoshop using rectangle filled shapes. The content is yet to be added, although I have already created some sub-headings under the main index, listing ‘News’, ‘Features’, ‘Gig Reviews’, and ‘Album Reviews’ With space available underneath each for the article names and page number. The logo is again placed in the left top hand corner, slightly tilted to the right along with the top header.

Stage one of my magazine production: Photo editing

The first stage in producing my final magazine was to edit the photos that will be used in my publication. To do this, I chose to use photo manipulating software Adobe Photoshop. I had decided beforehand I didn’t want to use any heavy effects on my photos, to avoid ruining the raw, professional look of the photos and making the magazine look more amateur.
Here are three examples of photos that will be used in my magazine:

 After experimenting with the images on Photoshop with the images, the results are shown below:

The effect is simple and basic, but I am happy with the effect as I did not want the image’s crisp, professional appearance to be spoiled. All I did to achieve this effect was to change the contrast/brightness setting on Adobe Photoshop, so the colours look deeper, clearer, and more appealing to look at.
The next stage in my magazine will be creating and adding the headings to my media magazine.

Raw images for potential use in FUSED Magazine

For my media magazine I needed to find a band to front my publication. So I arranged a photo shoot with local new band The Weak(end) Arrows for the images to use in my media magazine. I took twenty nine raw images with my own digital DSLR from two different locations to potentially use camera in order to achieve the most high-quality, professional-looking images as possible.
I have narrowed down my choice of the best photos to seven. These seven are shown below:

The photos are a mixture of landscape and portrait shots. I tried to use several different camera angles and techniques to take these photographs in order to include a broad variety of photographs, which will make my publication more varied, interesting, and improve the professionalism of my magazine. Camera angles I included were high-angle shots, eye-level shots, medium shots, close ups and full-body shots.