Q6: What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

During the process of creating my magazine, I have used a range of technologies, both online based and computer programs, also I used some physical equipment. All have played a key role in the creation of the magazine.

Equipment

Nikon D3500 Tripod Mobile phone flashlight

Adobe Photoshop Publisher Adobe Light room Blogger

Software

Equipment

I learnt my lesson from my prelim task when I used only a mobile phone (Samsung A5) to take the pictures, its low resolution and terrible focus meant capturing the shots was made 10 time harder. Action shots were also ruled out by the bad shutter speed.

So in order to improve the quality and ability of my pictures I employed the help of a professional camera; the Nikon D5300. A DSLR camera, the Nikon D5300 is the most reasonably price one in the Nikon family with it being retailed at around $400. Despite the improved quality, the D5300 was a nuisance to carry due to its large size and weight, making it unsuitable for the location shots.

The camera was a big step up from the mobile phone 12mp camera and it came with a lot of helpful features. The feature I used the most when capturing my images was the “Low Lighting” feature. This allowed me and my model to go out to take photos in the daytime but make it look later than it actually was without having to manually edit the pictures. I also liked using deep focus pictures with high aperture as it added to the overall quality of the image.

When taking pictures in the dark tunnel and when it got later on in the day and the D5300’s flash wouldn’t cut it I used an iPhone 6 add on that powers your own little flash light. This allowed me to capture my model better in the low light environment.

Software: Blogger

Firstly, of course, I used blogger to display my preliminary task, planning of my music magazine and my final magazine. It is a useful tool as I can look back at my posts  in chronological order and make changes if necessary. I have learnt how to blog successfully and to embed files (such as prezis/slideshares)  using the HTML tool, it also enabled me to upload all of my work onto a format that is creative and fun to use.

I have used prezi quite a lot in my planning stages, it's been useful on posts such as the construction process of my magazines as it has many types of text boxes and the information can flow freely around the prezi, so it's useful for a step by step process. I also used it to create mind maps on how I created my masthead name and they typical conventions for a rock magazine. The format made it easy for viewers to pan and zoom freely.

Software: Photoshop & Publisher For creating my magazine I used the software Adobe

Photoshop, the program allowed me to construct the structure and layout with little to no effort. Its easy to understand layering system meant that it was harder to make mistakes and being specific was encouraged by the software. I have had a lot of experience with Photoshop before, but nothing like making a magazine. I incorporated all my previous knowledge of the software from when I worked as a graphic designer into my work. This saved me a lot of time looking up tutorials and learning how to use the tools and features.

When writing stories for my magazine I used the Microsoft program Publisher. Publisher let me write all of my magazine’s transcript and helped me plan how to set out my double page spread by using one of its templates as a reference.

PresentationI have used of different sites to present my work with. To begin with I used blogger to create my blog on as I felt from research it would be the easiest to learn quickly, also it was what my teacher had recommended . I had not used blogger previous to my preliminary task so I had some learning to before. Some of the many things that I learnt was how to edit the layout and insert search bar and tabs on my blog. I learnt how to embed codes of online programs into my work. To present my posts I used a multitude of different sites; Slideshare, Glogster, Piktochat, Prezi, emaze. All of these sites were new to me so I had to create accounts an use tutorials on YouTube on how to use them. I managed to pick them up quickly, although some were easier than others. I found that Slideshare was the easiest to use as you simply upload a powerpoint of your choice. Where as I found Emaze quite difficult as I struggled to find certain features. I had learnt how to use; pintrest, and Prezi before hand so I didn’t have to learn anything more about them.

Social Networking

In terms of social networking, I used a few websites to mood board my ideas. For example Polyvore  is a community based social commerce website where members create 'sets' based around portraying fashion, craft of interior design videos using a database of shared images, It was very useful for creating mood boards in a creative way as I could use a wide range of fonts and templates.

Sites like Twitter, and Facebook were a favourite of mine for doing my research on, they allowed me to reach out to my target audience and gain helpful feedback on posts and my magazine (as seen in previous posts).

Also, I used Pinterest, which is a visual discovery tool that users use to collect ideas for their various projects, interests and ideas. People create and share collections (called “boards”) of visual bookmarks (called “Pins”), I used it for my photoshoot and magazine layout boards as a vast amount of high quality 'pins' could be used to quickly 'brainstorm' some initial thoughts

Hardware: iMac

For all of my computer work, I used the hardware school iMac computers, they have a large, high resolution screen to enable me to clearly see my editing and construction processes, Also they are very reliable and fast, meaning I could get my work done quickly. I didn't use the mac operating system, I  used windows 7 operating system on their as I feel I know more about it and I am more used to it. In the future I will use the mac operating system to make use of it's full potential. I have mainly used it for editing as I don't have the software at home. At home I used my Lenovo 7781 hardware computer, it has a very powerful and fast processor so I did most of my blogging at home, I didn't really learn about it as I use it a lot for work, and it runs on windows 7 which I have experience of.