Feature article

Construction schedule

Week 1- Started to write the feature article, decided on title of the magazine, drafted layout of cover and contents page.

Week 2- Constructed masthead, typed article into Photoshop, created cover lines for the front cover.

Week 3- Completed photo shoot, uploaded pictures to the feature article, updated contents page.

Week 4 - Uploaded and edited picture for front cover and contents page, changed layout of feature article

Week 5-  made small changes to all products, added information to contents page.

Week 6- Finished drafts of all products, decided to make changes to all products

Week 7- completed second photo shoot, uploaded and edited photos, created contact sheet.

Week 8-  Updated masthead, changed layout of contents page, added masthead to all products.

Week 9- changed layout of feature article, added subscription box to contents

Week 10- Wrote editors note on contents page, changed layout of front cover

Week 11- made small last minute changes to improve the look of my products and uploaded them to my blog

Masthead comparison

The top masthead was the original one for my magazine. After looking at the first drafts of my products. I realised that my masthead looked quite plain and didn't stand out in the way that I wanted it to. I felt that if this was on the magazine stand then it wouldn't stand out enough for my target audience to be attracted to it. The first thing that I did was experiment with colours, to see what colour looked the best for the M. I decided on a dark more plum purple, compared to the lighter violet, as I believed that this would attract my target audience, and stand out more. The next thing that I did was italicize the M. By doing this I felt that this created a house style and that it would be more prominent in the magazine stand. I believe that this also makes it look more feminine, attracting my target audience. The last thing I did was apply a drop shadow. This insures that the masthead can be seen on any coloured background. It also makes the masthead look a lot more professional. With the drop shadow, it lifts the masthead off of the page, making it look more 3D and helping it to stand out.

Contents page comparison

The first draft of my contents page was quite basic. After stepping back and looking at this product I noticed that it looked very basic and everything was the same colour. I also noticed that the picture wasn't very good quality. I completed another photo shoot where the pictures were much better quality. I also learnt how to make text look more 3D by using the stroke tool and applying a drop shadow.  I also wanted to carry the brand identity onto the contents, page, so I decided to place the Masthead at the top of the page, rather than the word contents.
I felt as thought the cover stories needed to stand out more. I was looking at examples of contents pages and decided that it looked quite effective having them on the picture.
I think that with these small changes my contents page looks a lot more professional and as though it would attract my target audience.

Information on magazine publishers

Bauer media
Bauer media is a magazine publisher, based in Germany.  They manage over 600 magazines. Some of these include, Kerrang and Q. They also manage a wide range of other media platforms, like radio and television stations. This would be a good publisher to publish my magazine with, as they have a good reputation and they would be able to help to get my magazine on the market, and would help with the sales, as they know how to advertise and what does and doesn’t work well with a magazine. They also have experience with other music magazines so would be able to guide me.
Hearst 

Hearst co-operation is a magazine publisher based in New York. They produce 15 daily and 36 weekly newspapers, as well as more than 300 magazines. Some of these include, Company, Elle and Cosmopolitan.  They mainly focus on magazines for women and are a very large company. I think they would be a good company to publish with, as they a very large and would help me to publish my magazine, with a high standard; however they don’t publish any music magazine titles, so they wouldn’t be as experienced to help me with my magazine, as Bauer would be.

Self publishing

I have decided that I probably wouldn’t self-publish my magazine, due to the fact that it is very hard to become successful. Many self-published magazines have a very short shelf life and rarely make it to four years. 

Looking back at your preliminary task (the college magazine task), what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product

I have learnt about many different things in the process of making my products. For example, I used lights, when taking my pictures, as I felt that this gave a more professional and studio look to the pictures, I believe this gives a higher end look to the magazine, helping to attract my target audience, of teenagers in the A-C social classes.

I used survey monkey in order to create a questionnaire that I could use to ask what my target audience would like to see in my magazine, using survey monkey meant that it was easier to get people to answer my survey, as I could email them the link to people who I would like to answer it. This meant that I could get results quicker, as I didn’t have to go around and ask questions. It also meant that the people I asked could do the questionnaire in their own time.  However, it did mean that any misunderstandings couldn’t be sorted out straight away, and this may have led to unanswered questions. Also with me being there I couldn’t monitor the questions being answered and may have been answered incorrectly.

I used a more professional camera (Sony nex 5n) when I took my photos. Compared to the point and shoot camera that i used on my preliminary task. This meant that I had better quality images for my magazine; this also helped to give a more professional feel to the look of the magazine.

I used Prezzi to complete a part of my evaluation. This made it is easy to compare my magazine with other magazines, and in a more professional way. This was also less time consuming, as I was able to complete it online.