Thursday 27 January 2011

Update

Over the past two lessons I have been working on improving my contents page layout and I am now going to start my evaluation on my completed products.

Contents page

When looking back over my contents page I believe that the page was too over crowded so then I decided to re think my layout and try some new formats to try and solve the problem.

When first rearranging I thought by breaking down the content of the magazine it may break the block colour allowing there to be a better flow. However I believe that this did not work successfully as moving the text around meant that writing was over lapping the image which then made writing hard to read. I also believe that it made the bottom half of the page looked even more cramped than before, so therefore change this did not have an over all success.

With this image I decided to move the title of the page and place it along the left hand side, I believe this worked very successfully as it allowed more space to be freed to add content to. I decided to keep the image in the same place as I believe it allowed my magazine to have a slightly different look. I believe this contents page looks much better as it is not as cramped however I believe that I still need to adjust the text in the middle section still to make sure they are all in line and placed in the best place.
With this copy of my contents I decided to add the editors letter as I believe it was a key feature in my original contents page and now I had freed enough space for it to be placed. However one issue I believe with placing this in meant that all text under neither looked out of line so this is something I would have to re-arrange but I did like the general out line of the contents.


On this layout I decided to move the placement of the image. I did this so the writing could be read easier as the purple text would now not over lap the dark image. I believe the placing of the contents page now worked much better and was much clearer to read. Also when placing the the image the models foot lays on the text of 'contents' which I believe interact with the magazine and really make her part of the page.  With this layout I also placed the cover stories in the middle of the contents although this mixed the page numbers up I believe it worked well as it allowed the cover stories to re main the main attraction with in the contents page.

Finally I believe this will be my final contents page which I will take forward. However I want to gain feedback on this before making it my final copy of the contents page.

Thursday 13 January 2011

Front page re - think.

After recieving comments on my front cover from my target audience I decided to review if it was working to it's best ablility. Once I had reviewed this I decided that some major things were not working with my magazine front cover. The major issue I found with my magazine front cover is that the image was not working aswell as it needed to. I needed my image to look attractive and appropratie to the target audience and I also need this image to draw the target audience into reading my magazine and buying it when it would be sold. So I believe the model and the set up of the shot was working well to attract my target audience, however the major probelm I found was that the model in my photo was not giving direct eye contact to the audience meaning alot of the emotion in the image was lost. I believe by this emiontion been lost it would be diffcult for this magazine to attract my target audience. So therefore I decided to change the cover shot used on my front cover. The second issue I found with my front cover was the fact that my front cover lacked detail which meant there may not be enough information to attract my target audience.

First change to front cover
This was the first draft used with my new cover shot. But as I found in the past the background staging of the photo was too dull and therefore drew away from the main focus of the cover shot (model). However I believe the general image worked much better as eye contact was made to the target audience from the model but the attuide I wanted to show was still shown by the model looking over the shoulder. So now I needed to address the problem of the background taking away from the model. So I decided to go back on my orignal layout and cut the model from the image and place it on a black background.

Second change to front cover

This is my front cover with the model cut out and more detail added. I believe that the colours stand out with better effect on the black background which is why I chose to go back with my original idea of a black background. I believe this is the most effective copy of my cover so therefore will be taking it forward.

Tuesday 4 January 2011

Double Page Spread

First copy of double page spread



 Second Draft of double page spread