Production Log Entry – Contents Page

20th November 2008

In today’s lesson I continued work on contents page draft. Although this started as a draft, as I started getting feedback from teachers and other students I decided to use this as my final contents page. I feel I have worked harder on my contents to make it look more proffessional I think this is why it came out so well.
My contents page consists of and white and lilac background with gradient as well as a block of dark grey covering the top left hand corner. At the top of the page is the magazine title in an italic font and logo with ”Inside” written above it in cerise pink and bold font.
 Going down the centre I have the features; followed by the every week contents. In the bottom right hand corner I have placed one of my original medium close-ups in black & white with certain elements highlighted. I have also scattered three other images separating the features from the every week contents.  

 I really like my contents page so far and will use this for my final design.
The feedback I’ve received is very positive and I havn’t come across any elements I need to change.

Below is the Contents page:

Filed under: Magazine, Photoshop, Preliminary Media Task, Production Log, Magazine, Photoshop, Production Log

Production Log – Final Front Cover

In today’s lesson I created my final cover changing the elements that needed to be changed due the feedback I received and my own personal preferences. For my final cover I decided to stick to the ideas used in the third draft because I preffered the overall look of the cover and how it suits the typical look of teenage magazines. As well, I received feedback that the first couple of drafts looked less proffesional than the third; also the use of differents fonts on the first two designs made the covers look ammeture.
 For the final cover in reference to the third draft, I made no changes to the background image or the masthead; however I did change the position of the puff underneath the masthead because it looked too harsh and randomly placed. I also decided to use different effects on each puff to make the page look more bulky and youthful I also added another puff which makes it look busier: this was an element from research models. In my personal opinion I think that it is a good layout and is a much better choice than the other two drafts.
 I decided not to use the idea about accessorising the mannequin logo, mainly because I want the logo to be recognisable to the students and other readers, with the idea of logo changing every now and then this would not be able to happen.

I really like the overall look of the cover, it suits its theme and also is appealing to its target audience. I like the fact that it doesn’t look over-proffessional, it isn’t patronising to the students as well. I think it suits its audience perfectly, the youthfullness of the cover helps show that it is designed for a college. Im very happy with the final results.

Below is the completed cover that I will use:

 

Filed under: Magazine, Photoshop, Preliminary Media Task, Production Log, Magazine, Production Log

Production log – Feedback Questionnaire for Cover draft 2 and Contents page

In todays lesson I created a feedback questionnaire on my draft 2 cover and contents page. Below is an example of the feedback sheet:

The feedback results were very successful and I now know what I need to change for my final cover and contents page. The results showed that my title was not bold enough and I need to use stronger colours; the background image of my cover needs to be toned down as it is too orange; I also need to create my own college logo because people thought that the Harlow College logo didn’t suit the cover and finally I need to make some adjustments to the dressmaker’s mannequin logo.

 I will make these adjustments to my cover as well as use some different ideas to make a final draft. From the results of the feedback there weren’t any elements of the contents page I need to change.

Below is an example of one of the completed Feedback Questionnaires:

Feedback Questionnaire

Filed under: Magazine, Preliminary Media Task, Production Log

Production Log – Cover Draft 2

In todays lesson I created my second draft of the magazine draft as well as a contents page. In this draft I used my original photographs that I will be using for the final idea. 
 The front cover consists of a main image in warm colours with the masthead “Wardrobe” in italics. Also above the masthead is bright green text ‘Winter Wonderland inspired edition’ this reinforces the theme of the models clothes.
Down the left hand side of the page there are puffs showing what will be inside the magazine these are: ‘the student show, catwalk special’; ‘WIN your chance to meet TOP designers inside!’; UNION FASHION Give us your designs’.
I have used the Harlow College logo at the bottom left hand corner to show it is a college magazine. As well as this logo I designed my own logo for the fashion department which is a dressmakers mannequin, this is in the top left hand corner of the page.

I really like this cover; however for my final draft i’d like to try something different which hopefully follows the teenage fashion magazine conventions better.

Below is the second draft:

 

Front Page Draft 1

Filed under: Magazine, Photoshop, Preliminary Media Task, Production Log, Magazine, Production Log

Production Log – Cover Draft/Practice 1

For the preliminary task we have to complete a series of drafts before creating the final cover. For my first draft I decided to just practice and use an image off of google; however for my second draft I will be using my own images. Draft 1 consists of a medium close up of a girl in black & white, on photoshop I chose elements of the photo and changed them to colour; because my magazine is for fashion I highlighted the materials around the models neck.
 Overall I enjoyed making this draft I found it quite easy because I used simple tools. I may experiment in my second draft; however I like the ideas I used on this draft.

I used a sophisticated font for the masthead and created a few of different puffs that are placed around the models face. At first look this cover doesn’ t look proffesional at all and is not busy enough; therefore in my second draft I am going to try and bulk it out more and make its look slightly more well designed than this first draft.

Below is my Magazine Cover Draft 1

 

Magazine Cover Draft 1

Filed under: Magazine, Photoshop, Preliminary Media Task, Production Log, Magazine, Production Log

Research for Preliminary Task

In order to learn more about the type of magzine I am going to create, I decided to annotate three fashion magazines covers that are aimed at the same/similar target audience of my magazine: teenage girls interested in fashion.

The magazines I researched “Teen Vogue,” “Cosmo girl” and ”Bliss.” Below is the annotated covers.

 

The research models gave me some ideas for my cover. All of the covers I looked at they all focused on the mastheads and the main image. The mastheads were all very bold and two out of the three used two different fonts to make them more eye catching and effective. The main image was framed by the puffs on the cover, and all of the models looked happy and confident.
 All of the covers used plain, bold fonts with bright strong colours, there was a lot of information on each cover and ‘Bliss’ even used additional smaller images to inform readers about the content: I thought this was a good idea.
 All of the covers looked disorganised and quite youthful because of the natural structure of different sized fonts and the young, fresh colours.

Filed under: Magazine, Preliminary Media Task, Production Log

Production Log Entry – Introduction to Brief

 

Introduction to Brief

 

My chosen assignment brief for the preliminary task is print, which will be a college magazine: front cover and contents page. The alternative brief is a video; however the creative appeal of the magazine was my preference also I chose this task rather than the video because I prefer to work independently and like to take ownership of my own work.  The magazine that I have chosen to create is called “Wardrobe” it is for a Fashion & Textiles course within a college I created called ‘The Great British Fashion Institue’.

Response to Brief

Once I chose my brief I was very pleased with my decision and I was looking forward to designing and creating my magazine. The brief explained that the magazine the candidates create, has to be for a college; with this in mind I chose to design some ideas for a particular course within Harlow College as I thought this would be easier as I have experience within the college. To make sure it is clear that my magazines are for a college, I will have the college logo on each cover including puffs informing students on student union news.

Description of Initial Ideas

My first initial idea is for a photography course within Harlow College, this magazine was called “Vision.” The cover included a medium close-up of a student laughing and holding a strip of negatives across her face. The background to this image was plain white and overall the covers photo was very simple and laid-back. The student was wearing very natural make-up and a plain white t-shirt.
  Within the front page there are Puffs which are small amounts of information showing what is inside the magazine itself. The puffs that I decided to create for this particular magazine includes a competition for photography students, 100 best student photos, and student union information, I was also going to include the lead topic which was “Back to Basics – the basic elements of photography.”

Initial Idea "Vision"

My second initial idea was also for a course within a college; however this was for Fashion & Textiles within Harlow college. This magazine is called “Wardrobe.” The image for this cover was of a student dressed and styled in their designs: the theme being fantasy. Also within the covers the puffs that I was going to use were: ‘Get Your Designs Seen,’ ’Fashion Show,’ and finally more student union information.

Initial Idea "Wardrobe"

 

Presentation of Initial Ideas

As a class we had to present our initial ideas in a focus group to get feedback on our designs. From this I found that people preferred the font of the title on “Vision” but overall preferred the “Wardrobe” idea. This has helped me as I will now be able to use the font from the “Vision” magazine for the “Wardrobe” magazine as my final idea.

Photoshop Training

The first task I completed for Photoshop training was merging two images I found on Google. I found this quite challenging as I had never used Photoshop properly before; however once I got the hang of it it became simpler. The final outcome can be seen on my Blog and is titled “LionFlower”.

 The other training task was to create a magazine article page, this can also be seen on my blog titled “Sleeping Beauty”. This was easier than the previous task due to the lack of editing, this training consisted of arranging text as well as creating a story to write about.

The most recent task I completed for Photoshop training was to create a mock magazine cover based on my final preliminary idea; for this task I used images from Google; however I will not be doing this for the final completion. I enjoyed this task because I enjoyed being creative with the layout and font. This mock magazine cover can be found on my blog titled “Mock Magazine cover”.

Filed under: Magazine, Preliminary Media Task, Production Log, Magazine, Production