Final magazine - double page spread

Final magazine - contents page

Final magaizne - front cover

Evaluation! 07 Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Evaluation! 06 What have you learnt about the technologies from the progress of constructing this product?

Click play above! - Please refresh tab if it doesn't play or click on this link: http://www.powtoon.com/p/cloQUsh9AUz/

Evaluation! 05 How did you attract/address your audience?

 Click on each image below to get a link to Flickr note's I've made on aspects of my magazine that attracts/addressing my audience!

Evaluation! 04 Who would be the audience for your media product?

Evaluation! 03 What kind of media institution might distribute my media product?

Evaluation! 02 How does your media product represent a particular social group?

Earlier during the day, I interviewed 3 people that fit into the social group that my magazine represents. You can hear what they said on the recorded SoundCloud tracks below:



“Definitely represent mine and maria’s social groups, this is the sort of stuff we‘re into..." Dipak

"This is the sort of music I listen too..." Maria

“...pictures of artists and guitars which really appeals to my age group and especially the kinda social that we’re in..” Tia 

“I really like the way that the debut album is shown... getting involved in getting the album and this new music” Tia 

Evaluation! 01 In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

We have been given several different evaluation question to answer to round off our coursework in media, the very first one is looking at the different ways in which our magazine follow conventions of real magazine. I've created a prezi presentation to show how my magazine does this!

Creating Blink 182's logo

On my front cover I wanted to add one the logo/iconic imagery of the Blink 182. At first I had just copy and inserted on the logo found from google images, but then was told by a teacher that it could involve copy right issue. And so to over come this, I created a similar logo myself using paint and powerpoint.

The original version  

My created version 

Left image shows using paint to create the actual logo, and the right image shows the arrows added in, and all the selected items being group together to create one image

Editing my double page spread image

For my double page spread, I realised that making the picture bigger to fit across the two pages made the image pixelated and look dull. So by using photo shop I managed to sharpen the image, but also make it brighter and get rid of the creases in the white back drop.

The original image  

Brightened using photo shop 

Editing using photo shop - using the Healing Spot Tool to get rid of creases on the back drop 

Final version the one that I will be using for my double page spread 

Final touches

To all three of my peices I added some final touches and decided to add some effects to the text. I added drop shadows to the text to make it standout from the darker background

Added a drop shadow on  'this summers full gig list' to make it stand out  

Added outer glow to 'Contents' for the effect of it not looking bland

Added drop shadow to 'Alex Ozzy Osborne' to make it consistant throughout all three pieces, and to make his name standout

Double page



For my double page spread as the whole band couldn't make it in my inital layout for my double page spread had to change, and during the photo shot I had to improvise and take pictures of the bassist. Due to this I had to experiment with the images that I took that I've done.



Experiment with my first potenial image

On the image above I have also experimented with using a different colour for my pull quote, I've used a green as on the colour wheel, it compliments the colour red, but I chosen not to use it as its not a key convention of magazine double page spread as they usually stick to the theme colours of the magazine.



Experiment with second image



Editors letter!

For my editors I waned to have signature to sign off my letter as I've seen in many magazine that this is convential factor to have. So I found a website called Coolonlinetools.net which I used to create a signature for my name.


A range of text I can use to create my signature



My chosen signature, included on my contents page

Contents page so far

For the past few days I have been working the contents page, and this is what I've done. Added all the images I'm going to use, and added the subheadings for each category, and added text to my first category under News.

Feedback from my peers include to make the following changes that I will take action on;

-Making the red banner at the top of the page smaller 

-Move the Live Reviews up so the space at in between is covered up since there will be no one cover lines under News. 

Starting contents page...

I've moved onto my contents page now and have decided to do it on Photoshop. Since Photoshop doesn't let you line up text sometimes it can be difficult lining it all up and making sure its correct. In order to avoid that happening to me I created myself guidelines using a table on Word Document and inserted it into Photoshop. Also I created a banner to put on the top of my page of my contents page, with a bold red strip going across the top with my magazine name on it. This was inspired from looking at Q's content pages as they do this too, and its seen as a common feature across many music magazines.

Guidelines created on Word Document 

Banner created on Power Point Presentation 

What my contents page looks like with the banner and guidelines 

Inspiration Q magazine contents page  

Front cover

I experimented with colour on my front cover, from using orange and green where I got influence from looking at Karrang magazine, but then realised it didn't work out with my logo, and so I decided to stick with only using the colours, red, black and white.




Old version of my front cover, using the colours orange, green, red and black



New version of my front cover, only using the colours red, white and black

Article typed!

Here is my article for the double page spread, I combined the interview and some of my own ideas into creating it.

Article title: ALEX OZZY OSBORNE

Articles stand first: we get into the gritty details of becoming a rock star, with the bassist of Amaryllis, ALEX OZZY OSBORNE, what an adventure its turns out to be...

Ozzy, as we know him on stage tells us about his adventures on becoming a part of Amaryllis. Can you believe it; it started all of on YouTube! Sat in Cafe Nero’s with him, in his home town Guilford; inside from all the noise, crowding traffic and pouring rain, we start the venture of our own and relive his most precious memories yet.

Of course, we all want to know when and where all our stars first learn to play their music, but Ozzy at the age of 15 receives a bass guitar for Christmas?

“Yes that’s right! I first started playing bass guitar at the age of 15, wow, what a memorable Christmas that was. I enjoyed it a lot, in fact wrote a song within the first 5 minutes! But it was pretty shit I must say. I really got into it though, and literally played it whenever I got a chance to!”

Playing the bass guitar all the time lead him on to the most exciting time of his life, performing on YouTube. YouTube, the home hub of young talented stars, wouldn’t you agree?

“YouTube is my ultimate soul mate. Not even exaggerating it! Without it, my fellow band members wouldn’t have found me, and I’d still be making short videos of the instrument I play, guitar bass and the drums”

His journey has only just begun, officially the bassist of Amaryllis, but who has inspired him?

“Ah there are a lot of artists that I look up to, the most inspiring people in the music industry for me has to be the bassist of Green Day, Mike Dirnt and Dec Hart from lower Than Atlantis. Oh you got to love them! They have done so amazing for themselves, can’t forget You Me At Six either, they have become so big, it’s just so inspiring and shows that if they can do it then so can we!”

In what ways have Dec Hart from LTA and Mike Dirnt from Green Day inspired you?

“I look up to them and the way I dress is based off their style, also, adding to that list, did mention there are a lot of artists! Oli Sykes, the way he dress is just classic punk rock, I make his style my own, and bring in originality as I’m more of an alternative rock/rock artists”

Not so long ago, Amaryllis released their new debut EP, how much has this meant to you?

“The release of our EP meant so bloody much! Our phone were going off the scale, comments from Facebook, Tweets, likes on YouTube all the notifications flooding in, we got over 100 downloads in the first hour, it was storming wild! I remember, during the recording we had some technical hitch ups, and all of us were in doubt, but as soon as that hurdle was jumped, we strives through and Amaryllis’ EP was out!"

We all love knowing what happens behind the scenes of bands recording their new songs. Share with us a memorable experience!

“Well for a start it was a bit a long journey getting to our very new recording studio!  A memorable experience has to be that whole week, where we were recording. Woah, which just seems like the highlight of my year so far! Getting there, and seeing the professional equipment ready for use, seeing a Fender Precision Bass guitar just for me, it was love at first site! I remember, at the start of the week it was chucking down with snow, and we got together indoors and just practice before recording, the whole studio got a new vibe, we completely changed the atmosphere and that where we knew, we knew we could do it! Results show now, we have over 350 downloads!"

For any band that would of been a breathe taking moment especially Amaryllis. As of all interviews we do with our rock stars, it burns us knowing what their current favourite song is, Ozzy explains his...

“Hmm, it’s either, Calmer by... No not! It’s, Lower Than Atlantis – Going On Strike! That is a MAJOR Song! Every time I listen to it, I just smile; you can’t not smile at the start! What a tune it is! The entrance Mike Duce makes singing “taking my life back...” just bring that grin to my face!”

Download Amayllis’ debut EP now! : amaryllisuk.bandcamp.com

My logo

I have chosen to call my magazine, AR Magazine, standing for Alternative Rock. To create a logo, I did some experiment with colour. To help me with this, I looked at Q's magazine logo and SPIN's magazine logo. This heped me as I was able to create something that was similar and in the market.

 

After experimenting, I chose to go for a red backgroud and white text, and this is my final logo:

New flat plan!

Since all member of Amaryllis couldn't make it for the photo shoot and only Ozzy the bassist made it in I then decided to base my magazine around him. In order for me to progress on with the front cover I had to make some changes and so decided on a image that I wanted to use and was suitable for my front cover, printed it out and drew on the different graphics and text that I will be including.

My interview!

Here is the voice recording for my interview:

Interview question!

Here are some questions that I will be asking Ozzy, the bassist of Amaryllis, for the interview tomorrow. They are basic question which I'll be improvising on during the interview so its more fluent and not just firing questions out at him!

Let's edit!

Using a website called Befunky.com I used some of the tools on there to edit an image I look at the photo shoot. This process helped me as I was able to apply different types of effects to it and play around with it, so I have a better understanding of what I can do when it comes to doing the actual production of the magazine.

Applying black and white effect to the image

Using 'Paint Mode' to gain back the original colour of the hat  

Again using 'Paint Mood' again to gain back the original colour of his eyes 



Before and after image from editing it



I used the editing tools above to make the image look more attractive and engaging. Also, the black and white background gives it the more rock feel and having the two features in its natural blue tone, the hat and his eyes, standsout and makes it look like he's in direct contact with the audience he's looking out at. 

Grids!

After taking the images I decided to put a couple of them into paint and see if I followed the conventions and drew on the grid which would help me when it comes to production. The grid divides up the image into sections which then can be used to place text or image and helps with placing graphics too.

These images 3 images that I've taken might be used for my front cover as the eyes lie near enough to the first horizontal line that meets the vertical line which is where they are suppose to be at.

The photo shoot :O

So on the 23rd January I had invited Amaryllis into school for a photo shoot, unfortunately due to the bad, snowy weather only the bassist could make it in, along with a friend of my that knows him. On the day of the photo shoot I had to improvise and think of two shots and single shots that I could possible use. This went down well as just before the the shoot, we has a double lesson with a professional photographer and he gave us lots of tips on using lighting with a single person and how that can create an image. Taking all this on board, I went ahead with my photo shoot...

Shot list!

Before the photo shoot could take place I had to create a shot list, with different shots that I would like to take. This included thinking about mise en sense, props, angles and shot type.

my shot list for the first photo shoot

Practicing shots shots...

Early today I did a practice shots so I know what I'm doing for the actual photo shoot, although I have used a green back drop in these photos's in the actually photo shoot I will be using a white and black back drops.
I also did some practice with photo shop on a few images, changing the background and looking at different features I can change.

 

Flat plan feedback!

Today we looked everyone's flat plans and did a bit of peer assessing and got back great feedback which will help me improve and develop the ideas i have for my magazine when it comes to producing it. Below is the peer assessing sheet of my flat plan, which points out that I'm heading in the right direction in terms of keeping up with magazine conventions. A few comments made which I can act upon to ensure I'm achieving at the best level possible were: adding more cover lines on the front page and having a variation in font size too.

Peer assessment sheet 

Add some colour why don't we?

So you can see now how I've progressed from having a basic flat plan into a coloured one which is annotated too, this will help me when doing the final products as I will know which colours I want to use and then can get straight on to it. Before doing added colour to my flat plans I did quick colour practices to experiment with different  colours I could use.

Colour studies

Front cover 

Contents page 

Double page spread

Flat Plans, look at what I've created!

After doing research I attempted to create my flat plans, below you can see the front cover, contents page and double page of what I'd like my pages to look like!

Front cover

Contents page 

Double page spread

These flat plans are deigned to help me with the actual production of the magazine. Also has helped me narrow down what features need to be included and what I wanted to include in them. Before creating them, I made lists of things that were conventional to all three to make sure I included them but also the little things such has remembering the page numbers and titled features of different articles.