1. Looking back and your preliminary
task, what do you feel you have
learnt in the progression from it to
the full product?

2. When creating my preliminary task, I did little
product research. I did not look into any other
magazines for inspiration or to study the
conventions.
Overall I believe that my main task was a lot
better than my preliminary task.
With my preliminary, it came out looking a lot
more like a school students piece of work rather
than professional. In comparison, my main task
looked a lot more like a professional magazine.

3. Research
My lack of research for my preliminary
meant that I wasn’t aware of the different
conventions that were needed in order to
make the magazine look good. My main task magazine front cover
For example, with my preliminary task, I did
not include a bar code or price. The bar
code and price is something that is found on
all magazines front covers, so they are
fundamental parts of a magazine. Missing
out these vital components led to my
magazine looking incomplete and
unprofessional.
My preliminary magazine front cover

4. Research
Doing research and analysing different music magazines
helped me know what would make my magazine look
better.
This is definitely an aspect that helped me develop.
Looking at the way different magazines created their
magazines and also asking why they did certain things
helped me gain a better understanding into what is
necessary to create a magazine.

5. Research
Looking at different music magazines helped me realise that there
were certain tactics and conventions that are used to help convey
the music genre.
For example, I saw that magazines such as NME and Kerrang used
a lot of dark colours to convey the rock genre. Having this
knowledge helped me when creating a colour scheme, as I chose
colours that I felt reflected my genre of indie music.

6. Research
All in all, doing research helped me realise that
every little thing that I did had to have some sort
of purpose that would help to reach my
audience. This is not something I really thought
about in preliminary, as I just essentially chose
things that looked good to me rather than
thinking about what my audience would want.
I put this knowledge into practice by analysing
every thing I did for my magazine. For example,
I thought about my audience a lot more (shown
in my reader profile) and also about the genre of
music I was focusing on. These things made my
final magazine look much better than my
preliminary magazine as the more I thought
about them; the more likely I was to create a
magazine that reached out to my desired
audience.

7. Software
My knowledge of software improved and was a big part of my
development. The main difference in my preliminary task and my
main task is that I used Photoshop with my main task rather than
using Microsoft Publisher like I did with my preliminary task.
I cite the use of Photoshop as a big reason for why my
preliminary task came out looking unprofessional. With
Photoshop there was a lot more I could do, so I wasn’t as limited
with my options. For example, Photoshop gave me more of a
chance to edit my photographs by giving me more styles and
tools to change how the photos looked.
Therefore, developing my knowledge in different software’s
helped me develop and is a big reason for why there is such
difference between the quality of my preliminary magazine and
my main magazine.

8. I think that by doing a preliminary task, it helped me to
evaluate where I went wrong. I saw the main task as
sort of a ‘second chance’, where I could correct where
I went wrong in my preliminary in order to make a
magazine that was much better.
Overall, I think I progressed and developed a lot, and
this is shown by the quality of my final magazine
being much higher than my preliminary. Whilst I still
saw mistakes in my final product, I was pleased with
it, especially in comparison to my preliminary
magazine.