Final Front Cover

Final Contents Page

Final Double Page Spread

Preliminary Task - Front Cover

This is my finished preliminary task front cover.

Preliminary Task - Contents Page

This is my preliminary task contents page.

Evaluation Question 1 - In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of a real media product? – Contents Page

Evaluation Question 1 - In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of a real media product? on Prezi

Evaluation Question 1 - In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of a real media product? – Double Page Spread

Evaluation Question 1 - In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of a real media product? on Prezi

Evaluation Question 2 – How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Evaluation Question 2 - How does your media product represent particular social groups? on Prezi

Evaluation Question 3 – What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Evaluation Question 4 – Who would be the audience for your media product?

Evaluation Question 5 – How did you attract/address your audience?

Evaluation Question 6 – What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Evaluation Question 7 – Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Double Page Spread Update 5

I decided to add tags onto the main image to show readers who the band members are. This isn't found amongst music magazine double page spreads because the bands featured in most magazines are well known, because these bands are new it would be helpful to readers to distinguish who each of the members are.

Double Page Spread Update 4

 I moved the quote onto the left side of the double page spread slightly overlapping the main image. After moving the quote I added a shadow under the quote to make it look more 3D.






Another change was the title, instead of making the quote the title of the double page spread I changed it to the band's name.






Following the style of the KERRANG! double page spread I added two other images which can be found in most other music magazine double page spread.

Double Page Spread Update 3

I decided to re-type and correct the small text on the double page spread to accomodate the actual interview. The text colours still follow the colour scheme of the whole magazine.

I've added the interview text, I noticed in the KERRANG! double page spread they used different colours to indicate who is the interviewer and the band members.

Contents Page Update 4

This is what I have added after moving the 'Diva Edition' title. This convention challenge will show readers AMPZ's personal list of female musicians. This supports the 'female artists only' issue because of the pink colours used.

I then decided to add a black paint-like brush effect behind the 'Diva Edition' to make it more visible and the sparkles visible.

Contents Page Update 3

I changed the placement of the Diva Edition for another component which I will place in later. As you can see I have already added the first article of the list. I copied the 'Interview' bar style from NME's contents page and I copied KERRANG!'s text style.

This is the finishing list of articles for my contents page. Following the same test style and design I have kept the house style consistent. The Album Reviews section was copied from KERRANG!'s contents page.

Also copied from KERRANG!'s magazine is a tag for the main image of the contents page, this will show readers what page the main topic of the issue is on.

Contents Page Update 2

After reconsidering my choice of image on my Contents Page I decided to change it due to the background being too dark as well as lacking the simplisticy to enable me to add the 'list of articles' convention. Whilst choosing a different photo for the main image I followed MOJO's style of photo choice; a photo with a large amount of a white in the background where the list of articles can be placed.

The way the photo was taken was an advantage because the top of the photo from corner to corner captures the white sky allowing me to make the rest of the top of the my contents page white without any major editing.

Another change I made to my contents page is the title; I removed the temporary 'AMPZ' title and replaced it with a title saying 'CONTENTS'  whilst having the same colour, design and a similar looking font (I intended to use the same font used for the 'AMPZ' title but I couldn't find the same font).

The next step in updating my contents page is to add more articles and change the black background for the Diva Edition and further editing to the photo used.

Front Cover Update 4

This is the finished piece.

Front Cover Update 3

I've added coverlines on the bottom in the same style as KERRANG! listing female artists that are featured in the magazine.

I then added the main coverline with the colours matching the colour scheme; the 'OMG' in white and the 'irls' in blue matches the colour scheme as well as to show readers the wordplay of the band's name. I made the text stand out better by editing in black blocks behind the text so it can be made easy to read.

I've also added coverlines onto my magazine, 2 on the left side, 1 on the top right corner and a 'FREE POSTERS!' on the bottom right corner. The coverlines stay with the Diva Edition theme to build more support for the convention-challenge.

Front Cover Update 2

I start my new front cover by inserting the previously edited photo which was used in the first front cover.

Next I insert the 'Ampz' title/logo at the top of the page and moved the layer under the layer with the main image to make the photo overlap the title.

After the file corruption I had decided to challenge the basic magazine conventions by making my magazine a 'Diva Edition', I did this by making an extra title and placed it on the right side of the title.

To make my 'Diva Edition' in its girly and sparkly design I used the Horizontal Type Mask Tool in Photoshop which allows me to type out the text I need but instead of creating the font it produces a selection of the shape of the text. The next step was to use the brush tool and a variety of pinks to colour the selection in. I then decided to add some sparkles to the text to make the definition of 'Diva' stand out.
Next I manipulated the original shape of the text so it now has a wave-like shape.

The paint-like brush effect behind the 'Diva Edition' helps make the sparkles that I added visible.

This is when I noticed that the black text 'LOVE!' which is included with the 'Ampz' title is now unreadable because of the black brush effect, to fix this I decided to select the section of the text which is unreadable and changed the colour to white making it stand out from the black and therefore readable.

Front Cover Update

I had progressed halfway through producing my front cover when a technical problem caused my file to become corrupt and I was unable to open the file properly on neither the school's Photoshop program and my personal Photoshop program at home. This was due to the change in file type when saving it in on my older version of Photoshop making it unopenable on the school's latest version of Photoshop. Although the file in visible on the preview at the bottom of the 'Open' box once opened it appears as a corrupted image with nothing but odd pixels.

Since it is impossible to recover the corrupted file I had no choice but to start over again. This time I will take precautions and save a back-up copy of my front cover as well as a JPEG file if the Photoshop copy fails to open again.

Double Page Spread Update 2

On my double page spread I added a convention which is found in most music magazine double page spreads which is a quote, usually from the artist/band themselves. The quote is the largest text found on any double page spread in order to make it the very first thing that readers will see when they turn the page. In my double page spread the quote is blue and pink, bright colours to match their child-like nature, I gave it a black background in order to make the colours stand out even more rather than leaving them on top of the white background. I used pink to highlight the more outstanding words to catch the readers attention. This is based on KERRANG!'s double page spread where I noticed they used a different colour for the eye-catching words. I made my quote similar to their's by making it slightly askew.
A short amount of text is usually followed after the quote which relates to the quote and ends with a cliffhanger making readers want to read more.

At the top of the page I added a tagline indicating who the featured band is in the magazine. This usually spreads across the whole two pages but due to my design and layout I made it look as though it continues on under the paper layer.

To add to the scrap-book design I created small cellotape pictures on Photoshop and placed them so that half of it goes over the main image and the other half on the background making it look like it has been stuck on. To make the cellotape I used the Polyganol Lasso Tool to make the shape of the tape and then using the brush tool with a dirty hay yellow colour with an opacity of 40% I coloured in the selected shape and for the details I changed the size of the brush and coloured the details in, because of the transparency of the colour the details become more opaque.

Double Page Spread Update

The next step was to create the background for my double page spread. For my design I decided to give it the appearance of a scrap book which is why I cropped my photo in the shape of a piece of cut-out magazine.

In order to make my scrap book design I used the selection tool on left side and slightly past the middle section of the double page spread to fill it with a dark navy colour.
Where the dark navy colour stops I used a previously downloaded brush effect called 'torn paper brushes'.

I then selected the torn paper layer and used another previously downloaded brush called 'old print paper', this gives the torn paper layer a slightly scrunched paper look. I then used the burn tool to darken the edge of the torn paper layer.
Next I placed the main image onto the top layer and added a shadow on the torn paper layer to give the main image a 3D effect.
Because the torn paper layer is above the white background it makes it look as if the torn paper layer is a torn page in the magazine.

Double Page Spread

For my double page spread I decided to use KERRANG! as my reference. Amongst all the double page spreads which I have collected as reference, I have noticed the main convention for every one was the large amount of space that the photos were took up, keeping this in mind I decided to use the left half of my double page spread for images.
I have been using the school's Photoshop program as well as my personal Photoshop program at home. Using my version of Photoshop allows me to use a wider variety of effects and brushes that the school's program does not have. Before I start my double page spread I had to pick which photo I wanted to use for the main image and edit it. I decided to choose this one.

The reason why I chose this photo is because the girl band have a 'child-like nature' which will be noted in the information included on the double page spread.

I first used the saturation tool to enhance the colours of clothing, hair, eyes and lips. Any incorrect colours were changed with the colour replacement brush tool. Finally I adjusted the contrast to make the light colours lighter and the dark colours darker.
After I finished correcting and improving the photo I cropped the photo into a shape which resembles a cut-out piece of magazine for the intended design of the image compilation. This is what my photo now looks like.

Contents Page Update

Whilst following the conventions of a contents page that I had seen in the MOJO music magazine I added a big 'Ampz' title along the top also with a smaller 'Diva Edition' text next to it. I then added a small tag underneath the title containing the date the issue came out and which issue it is.

I then moved onto the necessary convention of a contents page which is the list of articles representing the topics included in the magazine. The style of my list of articles is similar to KERRANG!, the reason why I chose KERRANG!'s style is because it allows the text to be more readable against the background when the texts have a block of colour behind it which contrasts against the background colours. Just like lists of articles found on contents pages the text following the bigger title of the topic it is always smaller, this is so that readers' attentions are caught by the slightly bigger title of the topic and are then given a small taste of what the information that the topic will include thus making them want to read on.

Contents Page

For my contents page I decided to make mine familiarize to MOJO's contents page where they have a main image for the whole page. I used an image I had taken in the school hall where a large section of the hall's stage is in the background.

Before using the photo I edited the colours to look more attractive. I used the saturating tool to enhance the colours of the hair, clothing, eyes and lips. To finish the photo edit I added a purple/sepia filter giving the photo a slightly vintage appearance.

This is the finished image. After I finished editing the photo I added black bars with a white outline at the bottom of the page and the top.

Music Magazine Contents Page plan

Whilst I am producing my draft contents page I will consider using conventions from a variety of music magazines such as Kerrang!, MOJO, NME and Q.

In this Kerrang! magazine contents page it uses tags with the page number and artist/band name, I like this convention and I will consider replicating something similar to this.

This is the MOJO's contents page. The positioning of the featured topics and a short description text about the topics are have reasonably sized text which I find appealing. I also like how the title of the main story in the magazine is red, this contrasts against the black and white background making it eye-catching.

This is NME's contents page and what caught my eye about this was the right side of the page, it gives a list of the featured topics within the magazine using big, bold, white texts against a black bar making them stand out.

This is Q's contents page which takes up 2 pages featuring all of the topics that are included, this gives off a message to the reader that they are getting their money's worth of information about these artists and bands. Compared to other magazines I have seen Q uses the biggest images on their contents page.

Front Cover

For my final music magazine front cover I had taken a number of photographs of people who are the artists/bands who will be the main image for the front cover, the photos include different poses, camera angles, people and backgrounds.

These are the original and prior edited photographs I took:

I had difficulty choosing which photo to use for my front cover, each one having pros and cons. The main con with a couple of the photos is that they're blurry making it difficult to edit as well as looking unprofessional. A problem with the bottom left photograph is that it has captured too much light making the peoples' skin in the photograph white. On the other hand I am satisfied with the majority of the photographs; the positioning of people, the expressions being given, the lighting and contrast of colours with each photo makes most of them eligible as my front cover image.


Since I had a hard time choosing which photo to use I decided to edit them all by initially cropping out the background and edit them afterwards. Doing this would allow me to see which photo would look best when applied to the magazine cover along with the magazine conventions (to do this I save each one as a Photoshop file and as a separate layer).

I did this by using the Magnetic Lasso tool along the edges of the people in the photograph, then afterwards I used the Selection Tool for the smaller details I had missed to avoid partial sections of the background ending up on the final image. After that I edited the colours, I used the Sponge tool and chose the Saturate option to enable me to brighten and exaggerate the colours I want in the photograph (mainly the clothing, hair, eyes and lips). I had noticed that the black leather jackets the 2 people on the left/middle are wearing have been affected by the natural lighting giving it a slight blue tint, to show readers that the jackets are actually black I used the Desaturate setting on the Sponge tool to increase the grey scale of the jackets.

Music Magazine Front Cover draft

My photo choice ranged from a variety, the majority is set in a different setting from the other; 10 on a flight of stairs and 2 others are in a dark dusty hallway within the school.

These are the draft photos I took. I decided to choose this photo:

This photo shows each person clearly and all are close enough to stay central without any major gaps between them. They are all keeping eye-contact with the camera therefore has the effect that they are looking at the reader.

After choosing my photo I then needed to edit it. The colour with the original photo was too dull to be a main image for a magazine. To fix this I saturated the colours (extra saturation for each persons' hair).

Before                                                                          After

I had also decided to edit the walls on both sides of the photo, I used a liquid manipulation tool to "drag" the walls outwards to make the image distorted and to give the photo a focussing effect on the main people of the photo. I also changed the contrast of the photo making the bright areas brighter and the dark areas darker.

During the edit I had noticed that one of the band member at the back had bright reflections in their eyes.

Before                      After

This was something I don't need so I had to edit them to look normal. I did this by colouring over the bright area with the brush tool coloured black and I reduced the opacity, I then darkened the brushed area by using the Burn tool to make it look like the pupils of the eyes.

In order to make the readers' focus on the band on the cover I decided to desaturate the colours in the background, making the band contrast against the dull background.

I have kept a consistent house style within the front cover, the main colours being purple and white. I have also kept the fonts for the anchorage texts the same.