Evaluation

The name of the magazine: When deciding what I wanted to call my student magazine I wanted to make sure that it is pretty obvious what the magazine is about and who it is aimed at so when people look at it they know straight away. So, I came up with the idea 'Student Survival'. I thought this was an appropriate name for the magazine as it clearly states what it is about and the 'survival' gives the idea that this magazine is essential to college students in order to know what they need to get by.
The masthead: For the masthead I decided to use the font 'impact' because it looks very bold and eye catching when it is in capitals, which draws attention to the magazine, and also doesn't look childish which is what I tried to steer away from as this may put the student off it. It's also in the colour black to match the colour scheme, which also gives the impression of a more sophisticated look, and also appears more striking against the white background. I used the font size 48 which was the largest font used on the page as the masthead is the most important, however, I made sure I didn't make it too big as this could take over the page and draw less attention to the center of visual interest, the model.
The cover star: For my magazine cover I used a student from my college aged 16 to model for the center of visual interest. The photo of him is taken from the mid-section up so we concentrate more on his face rather than his whole body. I asked him to dress how he would for a normal college day to give a more natural look to the magazine, and I thought it would be a good idea for him to be smiling whilst looking at the camera as this instantly gives a more positive feeling towards the magazine, giving it a more welcoming appeal. The lighting used was positioned so it highlighted the face naturally without creating too much shadow on one side which could make the photo look more darkened and negative.
Other colours used: The only other colours used on the front page of the magazine were red and white. I decided I only wanted to stick to the three colours because they go very well together and compliment eachother as they are all very contrasting, helping the text to stand out. I think it also makes the magazine look a lot more classy as everything is colour coordinated, which again gives a more sophisticated impression, which college students may find appealing.
Types of stories: As this magazine is aimed at college students male or female, I tried to include stories that appeal to both sexes. Music was one as this addresses both girls and boys, and is great for students as music is very popular with people of that age. For girls, I used coverlines giving advice on beauty tips as appearance is an important aspect for females who are attending college as they like to look their best. However, for the boys I included coverlines showing fashion tips and college essentials which students at that age will most likely be interested in especially as today fashion is very important and essentials for college will definitely appeal to them as they'll want to know what they may need.

I think the technology used definitely enabled me to achieve the task as it has allowed me to do many things to make my magazine look professional and real which I wouldn't of been able to do without it. It is a lot easier to produce magazine covers and content pages now with the technology we have to today, considering before we had all this everything we made by hand, which would of been a lot harder to make. When creating my magazine cover and contents page I used the internet, a digital SLR camera, Photoshop and InDesign. I found them all very useful and wouldn't of been able to do it without using them as it provided me with images and the technology to crop and re-arrange things until they're perfect.

I have learnt many things whilst using Photoshop that I had no idea how to do before, which includes cropping images of people and pasting them onto a background using the magic wand tool to rub out any unwanted background space. I learnt how to change the gradient and contrast of the image to give it the perfect lighting and  layer objects and text to make things stand out more. I also learnt how to wrap text around an image so it is visible to see without ruining the image itself. When using InDesign I learnt how to create a page with columns and insert frames and lines to give a more artistic look to the magazine. I also learnt how to change the effects of the font and colour so that everything is coordinated and matching.

I think blogging my work is a great way to keep track of what I have learnt because I am able to look back over it whenever I want and edit it if I want to change it, also, other people are allowed to see it if they want to which is also useful for when it comes to revision and looking over notes. I also think it is a great way to present my work too as you are able to write and upload any photos you want to share. I think the technology definitely helped me however there were some confusing aspects to it, which I managed to overcome.