Evaluation

Media Studies - Magazine Evaluation

Planning was the first stage of creating my college magazine. I began by listing the things that feature in a magazine such as, masthead, images and incentives so that I would be able to include some of them when I came to create my magazine. Then I moved on to create a list of possible titles that would be suitable and then decided on which I thought was best which turned out to be “Priestley People.” I then continued by creating a series of sketches of my front cover so that I could choose which design I thought looked best.

The technology I used to create my magazine was the software Photoshop. I was able to use a variety of tools to make the cover look the best it could. I used the ‘Magnetic Lasso tool’ to cut out my background image so that the banner was placed either side of my cover stars head. Then I used the site ‘Dafont’ to get the style of text I used for my masthead. I changed the colour of the masthead and then by going to ‘blending options’ and adding a ‘stroke’, I was able to create a black outline to make the title look more abstract and effective.  I also added a puff to make a certain part of the content stand out. I thought that it would be considered as important so I added the effects such as ‘drop shadow’ and ‘outer glow.’ By adding an outer glow of a different colour, the information automatically stands out from the rest of the page as intended.

To create my contents page I decided on a standard, simple template that would structure the information well. I used the website ‘Dafont’ again to get a font for the masthead. I made the masthead quite big at the top of the page, so that it is clearly stated what page of the magazine it is. By using the ‘rectangle tool’ I was able to add a black coloured rectangle behind my white subheadings so that I was able to break up the information into little sections so that it wasn’t too much. Then using the 'text tool' i was able to add all the information required. I added images to make the page look more appealing and then added a 'stroke' to them through 'blending options' so that i was able to add a black border to them. Then by changing the setting to 'inside' i was able to define the edges to make them sharp.

If I were to create my main cover again, I think I would hold back on all the bold bright colours because even though I wanted it to look appealing to teenagers, I didn't want it to look too tacky. Also, I think I would use a different font for my masthead so that it looked more professional. However I think that the strengths of my main cover were that the information is all clear and evenly spread out and the images have been placed on angles around the page to make it look different to the standard layout. I think the weaknesses of my contents page are that it lacks colour. In contrast to my main cover there is a huge difference, and also the layout is simple which can be viewed as good because it is clear to read but it also looks dull. However, I think that the use of images make the page look alot better as it brings colour to the page and the font style of the masthead is more suitable to the audience compared to the front cover.