MEDIA - QUESTION 6 What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

HARDWARE + SOFTWARE

Hardware is the machines and physical components of a computer or other economic systems. For example keyboard, mouse, computer (MAC), camera, SD card reader and more.

Software is the programmes and operating system used on a computer such a Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft word, Safari, Photoshop and more.

HARDWARE – COMPUTER (MAC)

The computer I have been primarily using for creating and analysing my media product of a music magazine is the Apple Macintosh or Mac. This piece of hardware was first introduced my apple creator Steve Jobs on January 24th, 1984. This personal computer is very popular to date and is state of the art. It’s appearance over the years has changed to suit the year and style and is very popular around the globe. It is marketed towards the middle to upper market due to it being quite expensive starting from around £800 and upwards. They run on the operating system MAC OS 9. This exact MAC is the MAC G5 which was released in 2004 but is still up to date due to the operating systems.

HARDWARE - MOUSE + KEYBOARD

The mouse and keyboard comes with the MACs when they were bought. The keyboard again like the MAC is still in style and keeps up to date because of the clean, sharp look of the white. The buttons are firm but easy to push which makes my typing and work very easy. The mouse like the keyboard stays modern and is extremely easy to use.

HARDWARE - CAMERA

The camera I used varied from an actual IPad camera to a cannon. The IPad camera has actually taken a very nice front cover image which was exactly taken by accident when I was experimenting with effects on my IPad, I liked the picture so used it for my front cover. The cannon I sued to take all of my other pictures for my contents and article. The quality was extremely good and the images came out very well. This piece of hardware was very important towards my article as I needed it to take my images to make my magazine visual and exciting. This is called the cannon 120. It was created as a camera mainly for holidays and travelling pictures but it has faired very well in this situation to take pictures for my magazine.

HARDWARE - SD CARD READER

The SD Card Reader was used to get the images from my camera to the MAC. It is a small device called the Integral Single Slot Secure Digital (SD) Card Reader. It takes your card and goes effectively into a USB and transfers the images across to any computer you choose that has a USB slot.

SOFTWARE - PHOTOSHOP

The programmed I used to make my music magazine was Adobe Photoshop. It’s initial release date was 19th February 1990 and runs on the windows system. I used Photoshop to construct my cover, contents and article. This software has many tools and effects to make my magazine more visually appealing. It also helps me follow the forms and conventions of a music magazine.

SOFTWARE – MICROSOFT WORD

Microsoft word was a very useful tool in the creation of my article mainly as I needed a lot of text for this piece of work especially. I used this piece of software to type up my article and all small text fonts to make it quicker and easier to see what I am creating clear and effectively.

SOFTWARE – MICROSOFT POWERPOINT

I have been using Microsoft PowerPoint to create my analysis, planning and other questions. It has been used for all of these to make it clear and precise, it has worked extremely well as everything is easy to find. It has used themes that fit my pop theme, such as vapour trail in these bright colours.

SOFTWARE – SAFARI (INTERNET EXPLORER)

Safari or Internet Explorer has been very useful for research, planning and the creating of my Music magazine. I used google images a lot to help me decide what my cover, contents and article was going to look like. I used it to create my blog on so that I can record my progress and post my work to the exam board. I have used it for gaining information on how to use other software on demonstrations shown on websites such as YouTube.