AS Media Preliminary Task

1. Preliminary task evaluation

2. As you can see, here is my final work for the front cover and content page of the school magazine.
First of all, one of the first elements of my
front cover that grabs audience’s attention
is the title. It is quite easy to remember
and stays in the reader’s mind. It also
creates a good effect as “Achievement
Road” makes them think about their
personal achievements. This matches the
title requirements when comparing my
magazine with a real professional
example.
Before starting to create the actual
magazine cover and the content page, I
have drawn three plans for each to plan
how layouts would look like. I was
focusing my design on my plans however
the content layout plan was the most
useful as the idea of organisation of
different elements was creative and
suitable for my target audience.
The title of the magazine plays an important role in the
whole magazine as it is the one of the first elements
that is noticeable when picking the magazine.
Therefore, it has to be something that grabs the target
audience’s attention. As you can see my title is
“Achievement Road”. I have carried out some research
before trying to think of three suitable magazine names
for the magazine and I have talked about it in my
blogger. I have chosen this one as I think that it is the
most appropriate one. I think that this title is easy to be
remembered for a long time what will create a good
effects as readers as it will make the magazine better
known.
The title was presented in a bigger and bold font size
what emphasizes the effect more. Moreover the word
“Achievement” is coloured in red. The reason for this is
that it is very meaningful. Achievement is something
that is desired by a massive number of people on the
world, so therefore it has to stand out so it stays in the
reader’s mind.
It doesn’t just need to be clear and readable, but it also
has to match the genre and the flow (general outline)
of the magazine. Apropos, you can see that the colours
included on the title are also included on the clothing of
the student. That creates a great contrast of the colours
that work very well together.

3. Furthermore, I have instructed my model to
wear a shirt that can be recognised as a sport
symbol. A reason for this was that I wanted to
make the contents page to consider more
topics about primary school sports. Therefore,
the shirt with the club logo appears perfect.
The light exposure of the photo taken was
good. It has helped me to underline the details
of the model’s face However, I have still
decided to use Photoshop in order to edit the
image little bit. I have chosen to increase the
contrast level, because it helped to place the
focus on the model’s face. Additionally, the
colours look lively what grabs attention as well.
Lastly, as the posture of the model was cut out
in the Photoshop, some cutting marks were
visible around it as the picture wasn’t cut out
100% accurately without any sign of
manipulating with it. In order to overcome that
problem I have inserted a small amount of dark
glow to in order to make the image smooth
and appear in good quality. Then the picture
was ready to be pasted on a background of a
football pitch what meets the topic
requirements of the magazine.
As you can see, there is a medium close up image
presented on the front cover of the magazine.
This also meets the requirements of the task.
After all of the research I have carried out before
the task, I can say that there are also similar
images included on any other school magazines.
I had to find a model that would pose for the
front cover image. When planning to take the
final photograph (medium shot) I have also
considered the target audience and therefore you
can see a primary school student/boy which suits
the required purpose very well. Using a picture
with this model has helped me to represent
certain social group which in this case are the
primary school students. This will also encourage
children to pick up the magazine as they would
be able to someone in the similar age on the
cover (interference with the reader).
We can see that the boy on the front cover
picture is smiling what is well associated with a
person of success. This idea also links with the
magazine title which is the “Achievement Road”.

4. The content page that I have created is kept simple
and it includes the most important features such as
topics of the articles and the page numbers they
are included on. The reason why the content page
is simple as it has to be easy to understand by the
target audience so is less confusing for them to find
what they would like to read about.
At the very top of the page there is a name of it
presented in the bigger font (“content”) what
straight away informs the reader what they can find
on that page. Content page needs to be easy to find
as it is the main page that leads the reader through
every other pages contained in the magazine.
The font style was also kept straight forward and simple to
make everything clear and readable. The font is also quite
big so it helps as well. In addition, all of the topics listed are
very colourful and arranged at different angles. This fancy
feature is very useful as I though that it would suit my
target audience because I know that students will be
reading the magazines. That layout might catch attention.
There are also some images that match the idea of the
primary school. Those images are briefly describing the
school life. As you can see there is an image of the school,
view in the classroom and a picture of the school football
team success.
Furthermore, next to the each topics there are page
numbers of where to find certain articles. Moreover the
page background is white to make it even more simple
to use this page as a navigation of the magazine.

5. Overall, small details of the professional
magazine are included. This includes
barcode, price etc. This is another
evidence that my magazine uses
convection of real magazine.
First of all, the price is placed towards
the top of the right corner on the front
cover. The price (99p) is written in the
bigger font size and is presented on a
red background. All of this combined
together catches attention of the target
audience. This is very important as
sometimes the price can decide
whether the magazine is going to be
afforded. Therefore it has to be very
visible and easy to fin on the magazine.
On the top left side of the page under
the title of the magazine, you can see
that there is a month listed
(“November”). This shows us that this
is a monthly magazine and informs the
reader which issue it is. It means that a
new magazine is released in every
month.

6. The features presenting the most important
content of the magazine were listed on the
sides of the magazine. In order to emphasize
the effect of importance of certain features,
they were written in a slightly bigger font. For
example the word “stars” was written in the
different and bigger font to make it stand out as
this topic was needed to be shared with every
reader as it describes the achievement and
success obtained by the members of the school.
Making the word unique, it grabs the attention
of the readers and persuades them to have a
look.
This also brings advantage to the magazine
when distributing it as that particular word
might catch someone attention or an area of
interest what might persuade a person to buy it.
That will also benefit the profit (economy) raise
by the publishers of the magazine.
You can also notice that those features include
all of the colours that are visible on the model’s
clothing (shirt). That was for the presentational
purposes. That helped me to create nice and
smooth balance of colours, calm for the eyes.

7. Through out the whole process of the
preliminary task I have used many different
technology and ICT techniques to make
sure that my task is up to the highest
standards and requirements of the task.
Using wider technology techniques
provided me with an excellent opportunity
and practise for the main task which
involves the music magazine.
I have mainly used Photoshop in order to
manipulate and develop my images that I
have used in my front cover of contents
page.
AS I have mentioned before, Photoshop
was very useful in applying some
techniques onto my final main image. It has
allowed me to change the brightness and
increase the contrast of the photo. I have
also used this software to cut out the
posture of the model as then I was able to
paste it onto a different background which
was the football pitch. All of this was done
in Photoshop.
I personally think that this software was
very effective to use as it allows the users
to work with layers. It is a very good
programme as it allows to manipulate even
with the smallest details of the images.
Furthermore, I have used Adobe In
Design in order to structure my cover
page and also the contents page.
This programme helped me to add
all of the elements onto my
magazine work. This included all of
the writing around the main image,
the title, price etc. I have also
changed the selection of colours and
fonts using Adobe In Design.
There were also some other little
computer skills involved to be used.
This covered the uploading of the
images onto the computer and also
skills to present everything very
neatly.
Finally, I have used “Blogger” in
order to present my whole journey
through the tasks. I had to update
my blog regularly, including clear
presentation of how I have
completed my researches, what I
have learned and how my progress
looked.