The aim of the Preliminary Task was to create a college magazine cover and to produce a rough draft of the contents page so that those of us who were not familiar with the software could gain some experience from this task with In Design and Photoshop. Before I began my Preliminary Task, I did a few other quick tasks so that I could familiarise myself with the computer software; In Design and Photoshop so that I could use them efficiently and to the best of my ability when it came to producing my music magazine.
I'm glad I've had the opportunity to perform those quick tasks and my Preliminary Task because not only have I gained some experience with the two main pieces of software which I will be using to create my music magazine. Not only that, but also because it's triggered off a chain of ideas for my final product in my mind, which is proving to be useful as now, I have a clearer idea of what I would like my final piece to look like.... Now all I need is to think of a decent colour scheme and I doubt that's going to hit me any time soon (You'd think that after doing two years of GCSE Applied Art I'd have a keen eye for colour and be a confident about my choice but unfortunately... I'm not; one thought comes to me, I think it's good but then another hits me, I think that's better and it blasts the other out my head.. it's quite discouraging but it's something I'm just going to have to get over if I ever want to get my final piece how I want it). However - back to what really matters - as well as giving me ideas for my final design, it's also pointed out to me my mistakes giving me the chance to acknowledge my mistakes. To be completely honest, I've got to admit, even though I'm quite pleased that I've been able to get a firm grasp on the software I'm going to be using, I don't like my Preliminary Task much. I thought I could probably make a decent looking College magazine cover but now in hindsight, the sketch of my contents page looks better to me than the actual cover does.
From looking a my Preliminary task it's plain to see that I have in the past had absolutely no experience with In Design and that I've had a little with Photoshop but not much. Despite the disappointment I feel about my cover it isn't complete and utter disappointment; I know that when it comes to producing my final product I can extend the skills I've acquired on Photoshop and In Design and improve them so that I can use them to the best of my ability to ensure that I create my final piece the way I want it. Because of the lack of experience I have with In Design, it took me a while to get used to the software and a while longer to feel confident or even comfortable using it.
As the software was new to me, when creating my Preliminary Task, I had initially decided to have the background white with a bold mast head that stands out, at first I had originally thought of keeping the mast head black however when I was creating my cover I played around with a few colours so that i could see which was the best option for my mast head. I looked to see if blue was a good colour for the mast head but it didn't quite stand out as much as I had intended for the mast head to. I changed the blue to black and i was fairly pleased with how the mast head stood out but before making a definite decision to keep it black I changed the mast head red and saw that this stood out too against the white background as well as the black did. I decided to keep the mast head red as its not very often you see magazine mast heads in red, even on college and school magazines. I felt that because it's out of the norm for a mast head to be red if I were to keep it that way it would bring more originality to my magazine and grab the attention of onlookers more than if the mast head was black as we often see black and white but not very often that we see red and white and when looking at it intrigues the onlooker of what it is and so grabs attention that much more than black and white. On the original plan of the cover of my Preliminary task I had actually decided to keep the font in which "SMC Shout Out!!" was written the same however I changed my mind and decided to have "SMC" in one font and "Shout Out!!" in another as I felt that on my mast head, the words "Shout Out!!" should stand out more than "SMC" . Therefore I went on the www.dafont.com and looked at the many fonts they have to offer, I decided "SMC" should be written in a more schooly kind of font so I chose the font 'Marcelle Script' as to me it looked like a font you'd find on the letter head of an old school due to the slightly faded top of each letter. In order for my mast head to stand out i chose to have the main title in a font named 'Varsity Regular' a font I found on the same website. I chose this font because once again it shows that SMC is a learning institution, however at the same time it also shows that it's something for students, containing the sort of stuff they'd want to know about. I feel i made a good decision to colour the mast head red as it jumps out and grabs the attention - not on that, it also symbolises shouting out and the concept of being loud as red is a fairly loud colour.
As for the images I don't think i can really complain that much as I did an alright job of taking suitable pictures for the magazine cover. Except I do feel as though the Image on the left is a little dark - well obviously because he's wearing black but - if I'd have used auto correct then I think the image would look a little lighter and better. I'm pleased with the pictures I took before starting to do my Preliminary Task as I had intended to take pictures of students when they're at their best and just well being typical students e.g like the other image I've used on my cover, I like it as it just shows a glimpse of how students are in the cafeteria when they're surrounded by friends. I had taken other images but, like I said because I didn't have much experience with InDesign or even Photoshop, it took me a while to get the swing of it so most of the time I had to create my Preliminary task was - I'd say wasted because well naturally in any case when you have a deadline one would say wasted but it would be a blatant lie if I did because it wasn't, most of the time we had to create our Preliminary Tasks was spent getting a hang of the new software.
As for the articles which I chose would feature in the college magazine, it took me a while to think of suitable articles which could feature in the magazine, but I got there in the end =D . I'm pleased with the kind of article's I have chosen as I think they are appropriate and will appeal to the target audience; college students. Posted at the top of this post are images of: the plan of my magazine cover, the sketch of my contents page and the magazine cover I produced using InDesign and Photoshop.
No comments:
Post a Comment