Preliminary Task

Stephanie Straw

Masthead

Both mastheads are very different and this is for the following reasons. When creating the prelim school magazine task, I wanted the masthead to be formal as it was relating to a school magazine in which would have to show a good example of presentation and punctuation. Therefore using a sharp, formal text would correspond well with this. However, I decided not to consider using white as a masthead colour against a white background for my music magazine as I believe this makes the magazine look plain and boring and possibly hard to read for some people. This is why I chose a indigo blue for my music magazine was it works well against the white background. When taking into consideration my music magazine masthead, I wanted it to have a more stylish font style to match how pop music artists are very much associated with style and how my target audience would be more entertained with a stylish font. Therefore both mastheads are very different but for each magazine I did considered carefully how the style of writing and the colours can convey the context of the magazine and also by looking at other connotations of a music magazine such as Billboard for my music magazine, also allowed me to consider the style and fonts of the mastheads.

Front coverNow looking at both magazines, it is easy to compare and pick out the improvements which have taken place over the construction of my music magazine. Similarly, I have kept to 3 main colours on each magazine to maintain a professional look throughout the magazine. Each colour has been carefully chosen. For example, ‘OTOTT’ magazine colours are white, red and black to represent the St Bedes uninform and my ‘Uplugged’ music magazine colours like red and black were chosen to give the magazine colour, which is typical of any pop music magazine and the black was to allow important information to be seen clearly. However, it is now clear that the structure of the ‘OTOTT’ magazine was not well presented. I have a pull quote randomly on the page which makes it look out of place, the cover lines are also spread along the page instead of keeping them structured neatly. Therefore with my music magazine ‘Unplugged’, I have made sure that my cover lines have been structured well underneath each other and that I have not randomly placed them anywhere on the page as this would take the focus off the main picture. Furthermore, I have created a strip along the bottom to show important information to be seen by the readers. Again, this is a different way of presenting text so the readers don’t get bored looking at a page full of writing. My prelim magazine has nothing advertised and therefore doesn’t make the magazine have something exciting for the readers to find out about.

Contents PageWhen looking at both contents pages, it is clear that my music magazine contents has been structured in a more organised and presentable way compared to the school magazine. Firstly, the ‘OTOTT Contents page’ heading is taking up unnecessary space due to the square black shape behind the writing. Also, it doesn’t look professional with the contents pages being scattered about over the page as it will make it more confusing for the reader to find the page they want. Importantly, the writing of the subheadings near the page numbers are different sizes. Again this is unprofessional as it makes the page look messy and the images have been carelessly placed not allowing the reader to see if the contents has a main picture to be interested in. Therefore, when considering my music magazines contents, I decided to simply put a headline ‘Contents’ to allow more text to fit on the page. I also structured my contents pages and subheadings to the left hand side of the page which is connotations of typical magazine. The page numbers where also made a size bigger to allow the readers to clearly view the page numbers. The pictures on my music magazine has also been presented better and more originally to allow the magazine to entertain the readers instead of looking at straight structured pictures.

ImagesWhen taking the photo of my model for my prelim task school magazine, I did not take into consideration the lighting, background and the effect of the pose of the model. This can be conveyed by the skirting board in the background of the picture which obviously would not be present in a professional magazine.

Also, in the prelim task photo, the lighting of the photo has not been taken into consideration as the light reflecting on models head is making the picture look shiny. Therefore when taking the picture of my model for my pop music magazine, I took into consideration the location, background, lighting and the pose of the model. This can be seen be how much sharper the picture looks and how professional it looks compared to the prelim task photo. Also, costume was another important factor as the audience can be drawn into a magazine by the way the models are presented. Therefore after looking into the conventions of the audience who buy pop magazines, it was easier for me to style my model.

Images

Furthermore, I used celebrity photos for my prelim task so I cannot compare my pictures with these. However, I would say the measures I took to create various different shots using different poses and prop’s, shown in these pictures would suggest my confidence to take photos like these as they emphasise how my confidence has helped me become more adventurous with taking pictures and getting the right light to reflect on the models correctly. Overall, these pictures convey my progress throughout the construction of my music magazine by experimenting with these different shots in order to bring style to my magazine.

Conclusion

In conclusion I believe I have made a lot of progress in the last few weeks while making my final magazine. I feel like I was able to adapt the prelim task quickly and realise the mistakes I made and how to improve them to enable my music magazine to be successful. I now understand why I had to put in a lot of planning into the magazine as it saves time in the long run. All of this has helped me improve my work and I am happy and confident with the end result of my music magazine.