View This Presentation fullscreen to learn how you can critique your magazine and improve its design structure, editorial content and overall appeal to your readers.
Grace McNally is evaluating the construction of a magazine they created. The evaluation will address the magazine's use of conventions regarding forms, progression, distribution, technologies, and representation of social groups. It will also consider the magazine's target audiences.
The evaluation compares the magazine's front page, contents page, and double-page spread to real media products, highlighting both similarities that develop conventions as well as challenges to conventions. It represents teenagers in a way that challenges stereotypes by portraying them as free-spirited and happy rather than angry or destructive. The target audience is identified as young, alternative, and indie people who value freedom and spontaneity.
The document discusses genre conventions for magazine design. It provides examples from existing magazines and describes how the student incorporated genre conventions in their own magazine design. Specifically, it discusses using bold titles, fonts suited for the genre, images of models that fit genre expectations, and layout of cover lines and contents pages similar to other magazines. The student aimed to create a magazine that would be recognizable to the genre while also adding their own creative touches.
The document discusses how the creator's media product uses and develops conventions from real magazines to create a magazine cover, contents page, and double page spread for an alternative metal magazine. Key influences were taken from magazines like Kerrang! and NME in terms of layout, design elements, and targeting an audience of older teenagers interested in alternative metal music. The creator aimed to emulate conventions from existing magazines while putting their own spin on the designs.
Here are a few key points about how you incorporated multimedia aspects into your media product:
- You used Facebook, a social media platform, to share images of your front cover design. This allowed you to get feedback from a wider audience beyond just your classmates. Facebook is a multimedia platform that combines images, text, and social interaction.
- Sharing your design on Facebook leveraged the social and multimedia capabilities of the platform. People could view and comment on the image, having a discussion around your design. This gave you feedback from potential customers.
- Images are a core multimedia element. By posting your front cover design as an image on Facebook, people could view it directly and get a sense of how it might look and feel
The student used their preliminary work to learn important lessons about planning, design, and software skills for their media product. They realized the importance of proper time management and referencing real magazines. While their early drafts were quick, the final product required more effort and attention to detail. The student feels they improved at using Macromedia Fireworks over the course of the project. Posting images on Facebook allowed the student to gain peer feedback, demonstrating how multimedia enhances media products.
The document discusses how the media product was influenced by existing magazines like Kerrang! and NME. Elements like the masthead design, front cover layout, and group photo style were adapted from these magazines. The front cover features a banner across the bottom with taglines, as well as a central image showing the band standing together shoulder-to-shoulder. The design challenges conventions by including models with different expressions rather than all looking angsty. The target demographic of older teenagers and genre of alternative metal were also considered in the representations.
The document discusses lessons learned from creating a preliminary music magazine project. The planning and research phase helped the creator understand what similar magazines contained so they could develop original ideas while avoiding duplication. However, ambitions grew too large, which led to missed deadlines when ideas changed mid-project. For future projects, the creator will set more realistic goals and detailed timelines to avoid rushing at the end. Overall, the experience highlighted the importance of planning, time management, and balancing ambitions with constraints.
This document provides information on verb tenses and the passive voice in English. It discusses the present, past, and future tenses, including the present progressive, present perfect, past perfect, future perfect, and future perfect continuous. It also covers using verbs in the passive voice and provides examples of converting sentences from active to passive voice. Exercises are included to identify auxiliary verbs, convert state meanings to habit meanings, and complete a story using verb tenses.
Grace McNally is evaluating the construction of a magazine they created. The evaluation will address the magazine's use of conventions regarding forms, progression, distribution, technologies, and representation of social groups. It will also consider the magazine's target audiences.
The evaluation compares the magazine's front page, contents page, and double-page spread to real media products, highlighting both similarities that develop conventions as well as challenges to conventions. It represents teenagers in a way that challenges stereotypes by portraying them as free-spirited and happy rather than angry or destructive. The target audience is identified as young, alternative, and indie people who value freedom and spontaneity.
The document discusses genre conventions for magazine design. It provides examples from existing magazines and describes how the student incorporated genre conventions in their own magazine design. Specifically, it discusses using bold titles, fonts suited for the genre, images of models that fit genre expectations, and layout of cover lines and contents pages similar to other magazines. The student aimed to create a magazine that would be recognizable to the genre while also adding their own creative touches.
The document discusses how the creator's media product uses and develops conventions from real magazines to create a magazine cover, contents page, and double page spread for an alternative metal magazine. Key influences were taken from magazines like Kerrang! and NME in terms of layout, design elements, and targeting an audience of older teenagers interested in alternative metal music. The creator aimed to emulate conventions from existing magazines while putting their own spin on the designs.
Here are a few key points about how you incorporated multimedia aspects into your media product:
- You used Facebook, a social media platform, to share images of your front cover design. This allowed you to get feedback from a wider audience beyond just your classmates. Facebook is a multimedia platform that combines images, text, and social interaction.
- Sharing your design on Facebook leveraged the social and multimedia capabilities of the platform. People could view and comment on the image, having a discussion around your design. This gave you feedback from potential customers.
- Images are a core multimedia element. By posting your front cover design as an image on Facebook, people could view it directly and get a sense of how it might look and feel
The student used their preliminary work to learn important lessons about planning, design, and software skills for their media product. They realized the importance of proper time management and referencing real magazines. While their early drafts were quick, the final product required more effort and attention to detail. The student feels they improved at using Macromedia Fireworks over the course of the project. Posting images on Facebook allowed the student to gain peer feedback, demonstrating how multimedia enhances media products.
The document discusses how the media product was influenced by existing magazines like Kerrang! and NME. Elements like the masthead design, front cover layout, and group photo style were adapted from these magazines. The front cover features a banner across the bottom with taglines, as well as a central image showing the band standing together shoulder-to-shoulder. The design challenges conventions by including models with different expressions rather than all looking angsty. The target demographic of older teenagers and genre of alternative metal were also considered in the representations.
The document discusses lessons learned from creating a preliminary music magazine project. The planning and research phase helped the creator understand what similar magazines contained so they could develop original ideas while avoiding duplication. However, ambitions grew too large, which led to missed deadlines when ideas changed mid-project. For future projects, the creator will set more realistic goals and detailed timelines to avoid rushing at the end. Overall, the experience highlighted the importance of planning, time management, and balancing ambitions with constraints.
This document provides information on verb tenses and the passive voice in English. It discusses the present, past, and future tenses, including the present progressive, present perfect, past perfect, future perfect, and future perfect continuous. It also covers using verbs in the passive voice and provides examples of converting sentences from active to passive voice. Exercises are included to identify auxiliary verbs, convert state meanings to habit meanings, and complete a story using verb tenses.
The document discusses the fading promise of marriage for many couples today due to failed expectations and disillusionment. However, it argues that lifelong commitments in marriage can be better than many believe if couples renew their vision of what marriage can be. The four phases of a good marriage discussed are expectation, covenant, disillusionment, and fulfillment, showing that marriage is a testing ground of faith that can provide promise for this life and the next when couples follow basic principles.
Online Engagement: Growing Your Online Communityjordanbehan
My slides for a workshop on Online Engagement, part of a four part series on Social Media for Social Change, presented by Hollyhock and Octopus Strategies.
This document provides details about Rev. Harry Clark's Sunday activities on May 16, 2010, including preaching and continuing education. It lists members of the state council and schools of ministry. It also lists several churches in North Carolina where Rev. Clark provides pastoral care, administers sacraments, and focuses on evangelism, social outreach, lay empowerment and administration. The document concludes with a quote about making disciples through baptism.
The document appears to be a collection of assignments from a student named Daniel. It includes short passages about Daniel's interests like rap music and the TV show Everybody Hates Chris. He discusses not liking school except for PE and recess. Daniel also writes about playing sports like football and basketball. The document touches on aspects of everyday life at Daniel's age.
- Data is a precious resource that can last longer than the systems themselves (Tim Berners-Lee)
- Hadoop is an open-source framework for distributed storage and processing of large datasets across clusters of commodity hardware. It provides reliability, scalability and flexibility.
- Hadoop consists of HDFS for storage and MapReduce for processing. The main nodes include NameNode, DataNodes, JobTracker and TaskTrackers. Tools like Hive, Pig, HBase extend its capabilities for SQL-like queries, data flows and NoSQL access.
This research proposes a maturity model that focuses on providing organizations a holistic view of the alignment between BPM/SOA in their current situation and in relation to their desired state. As such, it supports the organization in evolving towards BPM/SOA alignment, striving for a truly agile and flexible business-driven service-oriented enterprise that is highly responsive to the market dynamics in collaboration with their partners, customers and stakeholders within the ecosystem.
The document discusses different learning styles and theories, including:
- VARK theory which categorizes visual, aural, read/write, and kinesthetic learning styles.
- Kolb's learning cycle which involves a process of experiencing, reflecting, thinking, and acting.
- Honey and Mumford's learning styles which include activists, pragmatists, reflectors, and theorists.
- Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences which identifies eight types of intelligence including linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, musical, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalist.
The document outlines a career path for becoming a value-added financial advisor through Mutual of Omaha, beginning with obtaining the necessary licenses in the first 1-3 months, then growing your client base and skills over 2-5 years by completing additional designations, attending training, and mentoring other advisors, with the goal of becoming a trusted financial advisor and leader of your clients' financial team.
The document consists of repeated extracts from the book "Programación orientada a objetos usando java" by Héctor Arturo Flórez Fernández. Each extract displays the book title, publisher (Ecoe Ediciones), page number and a URL linking to the page, followed by copyright information for Ecoe Ediciones. The extracts span pages 41 to 80 of the book.
To print from the Equitrac system, users must first purchase an Equitrac card for $1 at the pay station and add a minimum of $1 to the card's printing value. The card can then be used at the pay station by inserting it, selecting a document and printer, and having the document automatically print once enough value remains on the card. Users should keep and recharge their Equitrac cards as needed for future printing.
This document provides an overview of how children are portrayed in the biblical texts of the Old and New Testaments. It discusses how children were seen as blessings from God and vital members of the community in both the Hebrew Bible and writings of prophets. The New Testament writings of Jesus and Paul continued this theme of welcoming and affirming children for their inherent worth rather than just their potential. Overall, the biblical texts demonstrate that children have always been an essential part of God's family and the church community.
This document evaluates a media product by analyzing several of its components:
- The color scheme and fonts are used to make the magazine unique and highlight important parts.
- A full bleed image on the cover gives focus to the model and what content will be about.
- The target audience of teens interested in music is represented through an image of a music group.
- Learning technologies like Photoshop and using a digital camera took practice but improved skills.
- Reflecting on preliminary work, skills have increased in using software like InDesign and Photoshop, but further improvement is needed to make images clearer.
The document discusses what was learned from a preliminary magazine design task to the full product. Specifically:
- The importance of justifying design decisions based on how it attracts the audience and fits genre conventions.
- How to integrate different aspects like images, text, and design professionally without clutter.
- Images add depth and impact overall design; photos with plain backgrounds avoid distraction.
- The final product had more depth through analysis of other magazines and use of conventions. Font choice was also improved to fit the genre.
The document discusses the fading promise of marriage for many couples today due to failed expectations and disillusionment. However, it argues that lifelong commitments in marriage can be better than many believe if couples renew their vision of what marriage can be. The four phases of a good marriage discussed are expectation, covenant, disillusionment, and fulfillment, showing that marriage is a testing ground of faith that can provide promise for this life and the next when couples follow basic principles.
Online Engagement: Growing Your Online Communityjordanbehan
My slides for a workshop on Online Engagement, part of a four part series on Social Media for Social Change, presented by Hollyhock and Octopus Strategies.
This document provides details about Rev. Harry Clark's Sunday activities on May 16, 2010, including preaching and continuing education. It lists members of the state council and schools of ministry. It also lists several churches in North Carolina where Rev. Clark provides pastoral care, administers sacraments, and focuses on evangelism, social outreach, lay empowerment and administration. The document concludes with a quote about making disciples through baptism.
The document appears to be a collection of assignments from a student named Daniel. It includes short passages about Daniel's interests like rap music and the TV show Everybody Hates Chris. He discusses not liking school except for PE and recess. Daniel also writes about playing sports like football and basketball. The document touches on aspects of everyday life at Daniel's age.
- Data is a precious resource that can last longer than the systems themselves (Tim Berners-Lee)
- Hadoop is an open-source framework for distributed storage and processing of large datasets across clusters of commodity hardware. It provides reliability, scalability and flexibility.
- Hadoop consists of HDFS for storage and MapReduce for processing. The main nodes include NameNode, DataNodes, JobTracker and TaskTrackers. Tools like Hive, Pig, HBase extend its capabilities for SQL-like queries, data flows and NoSQL access.
This research proposes a maturity model that focuses on providing organizations a holistic view of the alignment between BPM/SOA in their current situation and in relation to their desired state. As such, it supports the organization in evolving towards BPM/SOA alignment, striving for a truly agile and flexible business-driven service-oriented enterprise that is highly responsive to the market dynamics in collaboration with their partners, customers and stakeholders within the ecosystem.
The document discusses different learning styles and theories, including:
- VARK theory which categorizes visual, aural, read/write, and kinesthetic learning styles.
- Kolb's learning cycle which involves a process of experiencing, reflecting, thinking, and acting.
- Honey and Mumford's learning styles which include activists, pragmatists, reflectors, and theorists.
- Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences which identifies eight types of intelligence including linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, musical, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalist.
The document outlines a career path for becoming a value-added financial advisor through Mutual of Omaha, beginning with obtaining the necessary licenses in the first 1-3 months, then growing your client base and skills over 2-5 years by completing additional designations, attending training, and mentoring other advisors, with the goal of becoming a trusted financial advisor and leader of your clients' financial team.
The document consists of repeated extracts from the book "Programación orientada a objetos usando java" by Héctor Arturo Flórez Fernández. Each extract displays the book title, publisher (Ecoe Ediciones), page number and a URL linking to the page, followed by copyright information for Ecoe Ediciones. The extracts span pages 41 to 80 of the book.
To print from the Equitrac system, users must first purchase an Equitrac card for $1 at the pay station and add a minimum of $1 to the card's printing value. The card can then be used at the pay station by inserting it, selecting a document and printer, and having the document automatically print once enough value remains on the card. Users should keep and recharge their Equitrac cards as needed for future printing.
This document provides an overview of how children are portrayed in the biblical texts of the Old and New Testaments. It discusses how children were seen as blessings from God and vital members of the community in both the Hebrew Bible and writings of prophets. The New Testament writings of Jesus and Paul continued this theme of welcoming and affirming children for their inherent worth rather than just their potential. Overall, the biblical texts demonstrate that children have always been an essential part of God's family and the church community.
This document evaluates a media product by analyzing several of its components:
- The color scheme and fonts are used to make the magazine unique and highlight important parts.
- A full bleed image on the cover gives focus to the model and what content will be about.
- The target audience of teens interested in music is represented through an image of a music group.
- Learning technologies like Photoshop and using a digital camera took practice but improved skills.
- Reflecting on preliminary work, skills have increased in using software like InDesign and Photoshop, but further improvement is needed to make images clearer.
The document discusses what was learned from a preliminary magazine design task to the full product. Specifically:
- The importance of justifying design decisions based on how it attracts the audience and fits genre conventions.
- How to integrate different aspects like images, text, and design professionally without clutter.
- Images add depth and impact overall design; photos with plain backgrounds avoid distraction.
- The final product had more depth through analysis of other magazines and use of conventions. Font choice was also improved to fit the genre.
The document discusses what was learned from a preliminary magazine design task to the full product. Specifically:
- The importance of justifying design decisions based on how it attracts the audience and fits genre conventions.
- How to integrate different aspects like images, text, and design professionally without clutter.
- Images add depth and impact overall design; photos with plain backgrounds avoid distraction.
- The final product had more depth through analysis of other magazines and use of conventions. Font choice was also improved to fit the genre.
The document discusses the cover design of a college magazine, comparing it to real magazine covers. It notes several key conventions used: a prominent masthead at the top, distinct cover lines highlighting the magazine's contents, and a main central image to draw the reader's attention. The cover lines and main image are used to advertise what is inside the magazine. Additional features like competitions and ads for other companies were also included to promote sales.
As Media Preliminary Task - Niamh Reillyniamhreilly23
Niamh Reilly created a preliminary student magazine to learn skills in Photoshop and InDesign. She used techniques like the eyedropper tool to maintain consistent colors throughout. Using layers helped organize different elements. Positioning the masthead in the top third and a dominant central image reinforced magazine conventions. However, including more large pictures on the contents page than typical magazines challenges some conventions. The magazine is free to appeal more to students and includes a letter from the editor like most magazines. Cropping and angling images draws attention to the page. Borders around pictures using the box tool also make them stand out.
My preliminary task evaluation finished.asmediac12
The document provides an evaluation of a college magazine cover and contents page created by the author for an assignment. It compares the author's work to examples from real magazines. The summary highlights how the author's cover uses conventions like prominent images and cover lines but challenges conventions through a darker color scheme. The contents page also uses conventions like separating text into boxes but challenges conventions by making information the focal point rather than images. The author learned about considering camera angles and lighting when taking photos and using software like Photoshop for editing and layout. Comparing to real magazines helped with design but making the magazine original was challenging.
In what ways does your media product usebillionair72
My media product challenges conventions of real magazines by emulating their form and structure to appear professional. It includes elements like a masthead, date, issue number, coverlines, barcode, headings, sub-headings, and photos placed throughout in a similar style to rea magazines. The layout, text formatting, and organization aim to look as formal as possible while keeping a unique structure adapted for the specific magazine.
The document provides guidance for researching existing music magazines to inform the design of a new magazine. It outlines several elements to examine such as color scheme, photography style, writing style, overall look, and text-to-picture ratio. Students are advised to look at a minimum of 3 magazines in depth and analyze design choices in relation to the target audience. Analyzing real examples will help students understand magazine conventions and the audience better.
The document summarizes the student's media magazine project. It discusses how the magazine uses conventions of real magazines through elements like mastheads, cover lines, and consistent branding. It represents the R&B music genre and 16+ audience through imagery of artists and topics. The student learned skills like photo editing and importing text. Overall, the student improved at magazine design from their preliminary task by creating conventional multi-page spreads and doing additional research into the music magazine genre.
The document provides an evaluation of the student's FMP (Final Major Project) for a magazine. It summarizes the strengths and weaknesses of the student's research, planning, and time management. It then describes the aesthetic qualities and design elements included in the magazine to appeal to the target audience. Finally, it summarizes feedback received from peers, noting praise for the aesthetics and readability but also suggested areas for improvement like using a consistent theme, improving the logo and text formatting, and adding more content to some pages.
The document discusses how the student's media product follows conventions of real magazines in three key areas:
1. The cover uses vibrant colors, sans serif font, and features the issue number and barcode like real magazines.
2. The contents page includes the issue date, logo, page numbers, and variety of reference images like magazines.
3. The double page spread uses a heading, article, images of the topic, pull quotes, and page numbers similar to real magazines.
This document provides a checklist for a media production project, outlining areas to address at different stages:
1) Research, planning, and pre-production including researching similar products, target audiences, actors, locations, costumes, props, and time management.
2) Construction of the main project showing understanding of conventions, variety, accurate language, appropriate technology integration, and a variety of material.
3) Evaluation questions addressing the product's forms and conventions, representation of social groups, potential institutions of distribution, target audience, methods of attracting audience, learned technologies, and lessons from preliminary work.
The document describes the key things the student learned during the process of constructing their media magazine product. They learned how to use technologies like SlideShare, Adobe Photoshop, and Adobe InDesign. In Photoshop, they picked up skills like editing images, applying effects like strokes and levels adjustments. In InDesign they learned how to layout the double page spread and incorporate images. Overall, the student gained valuable experience applying design principles and using industry-standard software to create a professional-looking media product.
Writing Informative Texts Education Presentation in Blue and Orange Grid Line...NioAbaoCasyao
This document discusses strategies for effective writing. It begins by explaining how strong writing skills are important for success and outlines key areas like selecting ideas, developing topics, and using precise language. It then delves into various aspects of successful writing like planning, understanding the audience, sentence structure, and revision. The document emphasizes developing a "writer's eye" through techniques like shifting perspectives, focusing on conciseness, and sharpening descriptions. It concludes by recommending resources for improving editing abilities and notes that the editing process is iterative.
The document summarizes how the student's college magazine product uses and develops conventions of magazine design. It compares the student's front and contents pages to a Teen Vogue sample. Both products use mastheads, cover lines, and sans serif fonts. However, the student's front cover features a college-focused selling line and image instead of professional photography. The student also uses colder colors and a close-up student portrait. For the contents page, the student includes multiple images and an editor's message, while arranging sections differently than the sample. The document discusses using Adobe tools like Photoshop and InDesign to design the magazine pages.
The magazine represents a middle-aged audience through its sophisticated articles but uses a bright cover image from the popular musical Wicked to also appeal to younger audiences. The simplicity of the bright colorful cover aims to attract both younger and more sophisticated readers. Technologies like Photoshop, Blogger and SlideShare were used and taught the author new skills, while making the production process easier. Bauer Media would be a suitable company to distribute the magazine globally due to their wide range of brands. The intended audience is middle-aged to elderly musical theatre fans seeking acceptance, though the magazine aims to promote musical theatre as an art form for all genders and identities. The author learned about pre-production materials like style sheets and interviews through progressing
The document describes the stages of development of a college magazine cover and contents page created by the author. It includes draft designs, original images, and descriptions of editing photos and layouts in Photoshop and InDesign. The final covers and contents page include various design elements like fonts, colors, images and effects to make the magazine appealing to students. The author evaluates that they overcame initial problems learning the software and are happy with the professional-looking final magazine design.
This document summarizes the ways in which a magazine product uses conventions of real magazines. It includes recognizable elements like a title font, strips along the top and bottom of pages, cover pictures to entice readers, exclusive interviews, lists of featured bands, separated articles and features, page numbers, small article summaries, a subscribe offer, a drop cap to start articles, column-formatted text, larger article titles, image captions, and ads. These conventions are used to help readers easily navigate content and be drawn into reading the magazine.
1. The magazine cover uses conventions of real magazines such as a masthead, cover lines, and barcode but differs in some ways. The masthead does not span the full width of the page and there are no sell lines. The background is grungy rather than plain.
2. The contents page is designed to stand out with a fresh style inspired by Vibe magazine. It features captions to identify articles and a "subscribe now" section. There are fewer pages focused on content than a real magazine.
3. The double-page article spread uses conventions like a raised first letter and consistent color theme but lacks a sub-heading and multiple images to create a mysterious tone. The background continues the g
4 steps to reuse and recycle your content so you save time and moneyNandy H
Learn how the old fashioned editorial calendar (now also known as content calendar) can help you improve your content. Plan how to re-use or recycle your knowledge across media platforms. You'll reach your stakeholders more effectively while saving time and money
Acolyte Episodes review (TV series) The Acolyte. Learn about the influence of the program on the Star Wars world, as well as new characters and story twists.
Here is Gabe Whitley's response to my defamation lawsuit for him calling me a rapist and perjurer in court documents.
You have to read it to believe it, but after you read it, you won't believe it. And I included eight examples of defamatory statements/
An astonishing, first-of-its-kind, report by the NYT assessing damage in Ukraine. Even if the war ends tomorrow, in many places there will be nothing to go back to.
Essential Tools for Modern PR Business .pptxPragencyuk
Discover the essential tools and strategies for modern PR business success. Learn how to craft compelling news releases, leverage press release sites and news wires, stay updated with PR news, and integrate effective PR practices to enhance your brand's visibility and credibility. Elevate your PR efforts with our comprehensive guide.
El Puerto de Algeciras continúa un año más como el más eficiente del continente europeo y vuelve a situarse en el “top ten” mundial, según el informe The Container Port Performance Index 2023 (CPPI), elaborado por el Banco Mundial y la consultora S&P Global.
El informe CPPI utiliza dos enfoques metodológicos diferentes para calcular la clasificación del índice: uno administrativo o técnico y otro estadístico, basado en análisis factorial (FA). Según los autores, esta dualidad pretende asegurar una clasificación que refleje con precisión el rendimiento real del puerto, a la vez que sea estadísticamente sólida. En esta edición del informe CPPI 2023, se han empleado los mismos enfoques metodológicos y se ha aplicado un método de agregación de clasificaciones para combinar los resultados de ambos enfoques y obtener una clasificación agregada.
2. An expert evaluation of your magazine? Seems like a great idea.
There’s valid reason to have industry professionals apply their judgment to aspects of your
publication that fit their expertise; but in the end, the results may seem subjective or superficial. At
worst, what if a reviewer just doesn’t “get” your title?
The value of a critique rests on the credibility of the reviewer, and on a coherent rationale behind
the evaluation. Like the blind wise men and the elephant, the focus may be on only one area—like
editorial, design, workflow, budget or marketing—resulting in an unbalanced and out-of-context review.
A proper evaluation should be based on specific criteria that address all parts of the magazine
creative process and conducted by the best evaluation “experts”—the people who know the title
most intimately. No outsider knows a magazine like the staff who produce each issue. That’s why this
10-step critique is designed to guide you through evaluating your own publication.
Three Big Ideas BIG IDEA 1 Magazines that have applied meticulously to a template that
The basis of the critique rests on three distinct and clear “personali- organizes your magazine’s scope into
broad ideas about what makes magazines ties” perform better than those easily definable and navigable sections.
successful. Even if you don’t agree with that don’t. Branding, a well-defined
these ideas, accepting them as valid editorial scope, unique content and a BIG IDEA 3 Interesting approaches
criteria can still supply valuable insights, consistent editorial tone are the major to “selling” content enhance a
because they demonstrate one approach components of a magazine’s personality. magazine’s readability. How editorial
to applying practical ideals that span the Just as you get to know and admire is presented in your publication is just
whole creative thrust of a publication. certain people, readers like to “know” as important as the content itself. Your
the magazines they read, and that leads cover, TOC and even the openings
to loyal subscribers. of departments and features are all
valuable opportunities to engage your
BIG IDEA 2 Clear structure, con- readers and help them begin to absorb
sistency and tight fit ’n finish are the content before they read the first
hallmarks of good publications. A sentence of copy. Moreover, less obvious
magazine isn’t just words and pictures considerations, like page navigation,
on paper; it requires craftsmanship and visual theme and variation, and story
attention to detail. Editing, writing, rhythm, are all part of the magazine
typography, image, page layout and experience that engages and encourages
prepress production each contribute readers to enjoy the entire issue—and to
to a finished product. That product come back for more the next time.
should reflect sophisticated skills
2 W W W. A U R A S .C O M
3. Evaluate How Well 3. Consistent visual and typo-
Your Pub Performs
Ultimately, any critique needs to answer
graphic language distinguishes
the publication. The visual language
A magazine
the question, “How are we doing and of your publication is created through
what can we do to improve?” The
10-Step DIY Critique uses the three
the application of a deliberate palette of
typographic, color, art and layout choices.
isn’t just words
Big Ideas above to create criteria Even the most sophisticated or complex
for evaluation. The following five
performance criteria are at the heart of
design needs an underlying aesthetic
sense to pull the publication together and and pictures on
the critique. make it memorable to readers.
1. The concept fulfills the mission 4. The magazine meets the needs paper; it requires
of the publication. Is the scope of and retains the interest of your
craftsmanship
your magazine fully covered in the primary audience. Change is the
content? Does it match the audience only constant for any creative endeavor,
and advertising potential that are part of and magazines are no different.
the original intent? Finally, is the content Understanding your readers and their
structured to keep readers and advertisers
alike excited about the magazine as an
priorities is key to keeping the magazine
fresh and developing a growth strategy.
and attention
ongoing periodical? To really understand Creating a direct relationship between
how well your magazine performs, you
need to evaluate your publication not
your readers’ expectations and the way
the editorial structure and content to detail.
only as an issue, but also as a volume. address them over time is the challenge
of every periodical.
2. The design and structure com-
municate the tone and scope of the 5. Attention is paid to the design
publication. Your publication needs to details of your magazine. The second
communicate to loyal and new readers Big Idea demands high craftsmanship in
alike what it’s all about. The choices in your publication. Typographic styling,
structure for the book (grazing section, the fit of images in your grid, even
front matter, features, back-of-book the quality of your illustration and the
sections) and clear concepts for each of color correction of your photos make
these parts—described through depart- a big difference, because readers notice
ment titles, heads and decks, and even details that show up on every page.
the way things are grouped—are oppor- Sloppy execution, tolerance for error
tunities to explain how your magazine and random inconsistency are just bad
is important for readers and why they business. Most important, they cause the
should continue to subscribe. credibility of your publication to suffer.
3 W W W. A U R A S .C O M
4. Doing the Critique everyone fill in the statement indi-
Since this is a do-it-yourself critique, vidually, then compare and discuss the
what’s the most valuable approach to results. Choose a master mission state-
using this material? ment to use for the subsequent steps by
working as a group to craft a document
Choose a small team and review that everyone finds appropriate.
this document first. Anyone familiar
with your publication, from the pub- Score the rest of the steps individu-
lisher to a writer to a loyal reader, can be ally. A group dynamic can sometimes
on the critique team. It’s best to go over influence scoring. It’s hard to contradict
each of the 10 steps first to make sure a publisher or an editor, and the goal of
that everyone understands what they are many internal group interactions is to
supposed to do. find agreement. That’s not what we want
here—not yet, anyway. (See “Now What”
Each step begins with a SHORT ESSAY about at the end of the 10 steps.) Score with the AURAS
the subject area that explains the ratio- Exclusive Mag-O-Meter
nale for the ACTIVITY that follows. The Review the individual scores as a [FPO] Labs has developed this state-of-the-art
activity usually involves examining one group at the end of the critique. “instrument” to score each step. (It must be
copy of your magazine, but sometimes On page 17, we’ll discuss the best way to accurate because, as you can see, it’s digital.)
“Too Little” or “Too Much” can be rated from -10
you’ll need a few consecutive issues. (For conduct the final review of the critique points to -1 point, while “In The Zone” can be
Step Two, you’ll need an entire volume to and draft an active makeover document. rated from 1 to 5 points. This makes it hard to
count the pages and ads.) The EVALUA- score positive results if there are mixed scores.
TION section that follows explains how to How to Score That’s the way it should be. If the scores are
use the information you’ve collected to Subjective evaluations are always mixed, there’s no consensus on what constitutes
a better product, and that’s the point.
arrive at a score. Each step has a SCORING better understood with objective
GUIDE to help you get the most from your quantification—so it’s easier to see how
critique. We’ve provided a SHORT MISSION you’re doing with a visual scale. In this Too little and too much are both neg-
STATEMENT FORM for you to use in this case, though, there’s a catch. When it atives, so it’s more a “sweet spot” that
document, but it’s better to make a copy comes to understanding your publication, needs to be hit than a point on a sliding
for each member of the critique team. it’s important to see if you’re doing too scale. Evaluate how well your publica-
The same is true for the WORKSHEET, little or too much. For instance, using tion finds that “zone.” Doing too little
located at the end of the document, a few interesting type families helps to make the publication distinctive robs
which you will use to collect information establish identity, prioritize content and the magazine of character; doing too
and compile scoring. build navigation through your book. much makes the publication busy and
However, too few font variations and the hard to define. Examine each part of
Do the mission statement together. book lacks excitement and looks flat; too your publication and critique it on how
Everyone should pitch in and create the many and the book lacks identity and well it meets the Big Ideas as expressed
mission statement as a group. First, have becomes unfocused and busy. in the five performance criteria. [ƒ]
4 W W W. A U R A S .C O M
5. 1 1.MISSION
2.CALENDAR
3.ISSUE STRUCTURE
4.VISUAL LAYOUT
MAKE IT YOUR MISSION
The mission statement is the document
that puts everybody on the same page.
The foundation of every magazine
is a clear MISSION STATEMENT. And the
ability to critique every magazine is
dependent on being able to evaluate how
well it meets the criteria of its mission.
Using the Short Mission Statement Form
The Short Mission Statement is a quick method of describing the purpose
and scope of your magazine. As a group exercise, it’s a great way of seeing if
everyone involved with your publication is, well, on the same page.
5.COVER The most important elements of any
The exercise consists of independently filling out the form, then comparing the results as a
6.CONTENTS magazine are the SCOPE (the range of
group and honing a final version that can serve as the bare bones of a longer document.
content and the rationale for inclusion),
7.DEPARTMENTS
the AUDIENCE (the potential readership It may seem self-explanatory, but here’s what each blank needs:
8.FEATURE TREATMENTS and reason for their interest) and the
9.BRANDING TONE (what defines the unique approach Our magazine, ( MAGAZINE TITLE ) Your magazine name goes here.
to the way content is presented).
10.C/P/R is a ( PRINT SCHEDULE ) How often is it published per year?
( MAGAZINE TYPE ) Is it a consumer, business-to-business (B2B), controlled circulation, etc.?
ACTIVITY: Completing this Short Mission for ( ADJECTIVE ) ( COMMUNITY ) Describe your audience with an adjective and a simple
Statement Form is an exercise in creating demographic. For example, if your magazine were called BusinessWoman your answer
a basic set of criteria for your publication might be (adjective) busy (core audience) female executives. Your total potential
—just fill in the blanks. The words you audience is your universe; they are a potential part of your community of readers
choose—especially the adjectives, which
describe the tone of the magazine—are who need ( ADJECTIVE ) Describe the type of content tone in your publication:
critical in defining the missing elements. accurate, cutting-edge, secure, safe, out-of-the-box, etc.
information on ( ADJECTIVE ) ( PRODUCTS, PROCESSES, ISSUES ). Describe your magazine scope
When you’ve filled out the
E VA LUAT I O N : with an adjective and a noun. Using the above title again, you might put down (adjective)
form to your satisfaction, it’s time to pro- corporate (noun) employment, management strategy, business networking, etc.
ceed with the evaluation of your magazine.
Compare your Short Mission Statement Unlike ( COMPETITION ), Your closest competitor. If you have none, then list other
against the magazine’s content and the sources of similar content that readers might choose instead of your magazine.
H O W TO S CO R E: Rate
your way that content meets the needs of your
our coverage has ( DISTINCT APPROACHES ) How is it different? Be
consensus. The easier it is to defined audience.
agree on the mission statement, specific: more in-depth, less boring, better researched.
the more points you should
award. You shouldn’t get any and also has (unique CONTENT AREA[S] ) This is your secondary interest area, which
positive score if anyone says, might be a growth direction for your title or an attempt to broaden the scope for more
“Oh, so THAT’s what we’re readers. Again, using the above example, you might write fashion, lifestyle, relationship.
supposed to be doing.”
content that interests ( ADJECTIVE ) ( SECONDARY AUDIENCE[S] ) What kind of
secondary audience? Using the above example one final time, you might answer
(adjective) ambitious (secondary audience) younger entrepreneurial women.
5 W W W. A U R A S .C O M
6. Short Our magazine, (MAGAZINE TITLE)
Mission is a
Statement (PRINT SCHEDULE) (MAGAZINE TYPE)
Form for (ADJECTIVE) (COMMUNITY)
who need information on
(ADJECTIVE)
(ADJECTIVE) (PRODUCTS,PROCESSES,ISSUES)
.
Unlike ,
(COMPETITION)
our coverage has ( D I S T I N C T
APPROACHES)
and also has
(UNIQUE CONTENT AREA[S])
content that interests
(ADJECTIVE)
.
(SECONDARY AUDIENCE[S])
6 W W W. A U R A S .C O M
7. 2 1.MISSION
2.CALENDAR
3.ISSUE STRUCTURE
4.VISUAL LAYOUT
CHECK YOUR CALENDAR
T poles hold up
ent
your pub—in a good way.
A single issue of your magazine should
be representative of all issues of your
magazine, but not necessarily exactly the
same in length, content or structure. In
fact, looking at your magazine as a single
Gather a year of issues and count
AC T I V I T Y:
the total pages and the number of ads in
each issue. You can also count the number
of copies distributed, as that can be signifi-
cant in some publications. Input the figures
5.COVER volume of issues opens up approaches to on the chart below to make a volume chart
6.CONTENTS content that you might otherwise miss. for the year.
Readers can be lulled into boredom
7.DEPARTMENTS
if every issue has the same rhythm and The more placid your chart,
E VA LUAT I O N :
8.FEATURE TREATMENTS similar content. Think of a magazine the less your magazine takes advantage of
9.BRANDING with a static issue map, page count and the benefits of “special” issues. If your chart
10.C/P/R feature structure as a steady but uninter- has two or three spikes generated by special
esting beat of a drum. issues that have a greater number of pages
The periodical structure of the and/or advertisers, or special distribution to
magazine and building an interesting larger audiences, it’s easy to see why those
annual cycle allows so much more. issues are often called “TENT POLES”—they
Making several issues “special” issues hold up the rest of the year.
creates a much more dynamic rhythm
in the yearly cycle. Instead of a simple _ _
_ _
cadence, a change-up in the content cre- _ _
_ _
ates a more sophisticated beat, one that _ _
generates anticipation in readers and _ _
_ _
keeps them as subscribers. _ _
_ PAGES _
SPECIAL ISSUES can have franchise con- _ _
_ _
tent (material created for and specifically _ ADS _
reflecting the core mission of the publica- _ _
_ _
tion), special seasonal content, or simply a JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC
H O W TO S CO R E: The
flatter focus on one topic in a typical issue.
your chart, or the more _ _
random the dips and peaks,
_ _
_ _
the lower the score. Positive if you are trying _ _
_ _
FLAT FALLS FLAT
points are achieved by having to hold your readers through _ _
a few regular “peaks,” which the year. Deliberately designing _ _ in
_ _
THE TALLEST TENT POLE
should correspond to special issues with different page counts,
_ PAGES _ the industry is the Sports
issues or content. special content and even expanded
_ _ Illustrated Swimsuit Issue. The
distribution is a smart business _ _ 2004 issue used other franchise
tactic. It encourages readers to _ ADS _ concepts too, like an anniversary
renew their subscriptions and _ _
advertisers to go into more issues. _JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV
_
DEC
theme, a Hall of Fame premise
and even a free CD-ROM.
7 W W W. A U R A S .C O M
8. 3
C1
C2
HOUSEKEEPING 1
HOW DOES YOUR PUB SHAPE UP?
2
3
4
5
GRAZING
Your issue map should create interest
6
7
and identity, one section at a time.
8
9
10
11
DEPARTMENTS
12
13
1.MISSION Just as variations from issue to issue Two variations on your issue map
AC T I V I T Y: ISSUE STRUCTURE 14
15
2.CALENDAR make your magazine more interesting, will help you understand your magazine. should be easily
16
apparent in the
variations in the ISSUE MAP give your First, decide how many coherent sections paginated content 17
3.ISSUE STRUCTURE
magazine shape and definition. Your your pub has. Easy choices are features chart on the right.
18
19
4.VISUAL LAYOUT
publication might have scintillating (A and B features), advertisements, front-of- This magazine A FEATURE 20
has eight distinct
5.COVER content, but if, for example, its structure book, back-of-book, etc., but you could also sections of editorial
21
22
6.CONTENTS consists entirely of eight-page stories in have things like advertorials, grazing sections, and advertising. 23
the same typographic style and layout— classifieds, columns or service sections. Yours could have 24
7.DEPARTMENTS fewer, but too few 25
like many academic journals—the reader Things like the cover, TOC, Editor’s Page and your magazine 26
8.FEATURE TREATMENTS
will soon become bored. and Letters fall under the “Housekeeping” has no rhythm. 27
28
9.BRANDING A magazine is like a fine dining rubric. However you define the structure of B FEATURES 29
10.C/P/R experience. We want an amuse bouche your book, include every page. 30
This time, we are making two vertical
31
to get us started, a nice appetizer to 32
add piquancy so we enjoy our entree grids, with each horizontal bar representing 33
all the more. Then, we want to finish a page of the issue. The examples show a 34
35
with something light, sweet or savory typical layout of a 68-page book, with each CLASSIFIED 36
that rounds out our meal. We enjoy the page divided into 6 equal segments to make 37
38
familiarity of the order of the meal, but positioning ads easier. The left chart shows 39
we want to be pleasantly surprised by the amount of space in an issue devoted to 40
ADVERTORIAL 41
what we find, too. each section, and the right shows page-by- 42
Just as the parts of the meal vary in page how material is distributed in the book. 43
44
SIZE, STRUCTURE and INTENT, so should 45
your publication. And, like a meal, the Your book should have clearly
E VA LUAT I O N : 46
defined sections and enough of them
47
structure of your magazine should have 48
natural groupings that are clear in scope, to create an interesting rhythm. If your 49
with theme and variation defining each first chart shows too few variations, your 50
51
part. book will be visually simplistic. If there 52
H O W TO S CO R E: If
you have are too many, your book will be busy and 53
54
fewer than three sections, award unfocused. This is more easily shown in 55
negative points; if the sections ADS
the second chart, where you’ve laid out 56
don’t appear obviously grouped 57
the book in page order. The sections, even
in the pagination chart, also 58
award negative points. Positive interspersed with advertising, should still be 59
discernible. As we’ll see next in the critique,
60
points should be given for an 61
issue map with clearly defined each section should have its own unique 62
and positioned sections and a visual navigation and design. 63
bias for coherent editorial pages. 64
C3
C4
8 W W W. A U R A S .C O M
9. STRUCTURE
IS DESIGN
Lead [
InspI
re [
e x p Lo
re
SEP TEM
BER -OC
TOB ER
200 9
ST. JOHN
SCOUTING MAGAZINE MATRIX 64PP SELF COVER troop 5’s ca
campgroun ribbean
d
JANUARY MARCH APRIL JUNE AUGUST OCTOBER DECEMBER
FRONT OF BOOK
COVER
TOC 2-PAPGES
CEO LETTER
LETTERS 1 PAGE WHEN WE HAVE ENOUGH
SCOUTING MAGAZINE ISSUE MAP/64PP PLUS COVER
rg
zine .o
TRAILHEAD (GRAZING)
gmaga
coutin
The Danger
NEWS & NOTES (News Briefs) s Of
w w w. s
What You Obesity
New Scou Can Do
DID YOU KNOW? Promisest Handbook
Adventure
SHOUT OUT! (GOOD NEWS, PAT ON THE BACK)
LOL ( 1 or 2 humorous anecdotes, replaces Worth Retelling) EDITOR’S
COVER AD WELCOME/ AD AD TOC AD TOC AD
GOT TO HAVE IT (single product notice) LETTERS
THIS OLD PATCH (collector’s item or interesting background)
WAY BACK WHEN (historical tidbit) FRONT 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
COVER
MARK YOUR CALENDAR
COUNTDOWN TO 100
GOOD READ AND/OR WATCH IT NOW (single book or dvd notice) CHIEF’S TRAILHEAD/ TRAILHEAD/
MESSAGE/ AD TRAILHEAD TRAILHEAD AD AD TRAILHEAD AD TRAILHEAD AD
MASTHEAD
F O B D E PA R T M E N T S ( L E A D E R S ’ R O U N D TA B L E )
Merit Badge Clinic (methods & resources for teaching MBs) 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19
What Would You Do? (replaces Front Line Stuff)
Cub Scout Corner
Advancement Trail or Advancement FAQs
ROUND ROUND ROUND
Ethics Column (Using Scout Oath & Law in Daily Life) TRAILHEAD TRAILHEAD/
AD TABLE
ROUND
TABLE AD ROUND
TABLE
ROUND
TABLE TABLE/ ROUND
TABLE TABLE/
The Nature of Boys (behaviorist traits, age appropriate) AD AD
Q&A Leader Interview (What I’ve Learned)
20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29
B O B D E PA R T M E N T S “ G R E AT O U T D O O R S ”
FIT FOR FUN (health & fitness for outdoor activities
GET IN GEAR (specific line for equipment review)
ROUND AD ROUND AD ROUND AD ST. JOHN ST. JOHN ST. JOHN ST. JOHN
TABLE TABLE TABLE
TRAIL TIPS (brief look at hike or river route)
SURVIVE THIS
DUTCH TREAT (dutch oven recipe) 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39
GROUND RULES (best practices camping techniques)
FOOD FOR FUEL (camp menu for strenuous outdoor activity)
WHERE AM I? (reader contest guesses outdoor location from clues) ST. JOHN ST. JOHN ST. JOHN ST. JOHN ST. JOHN BSA NAT’L BSA NAT’L FAT FAT FAT
ESSENTIAL INFORMATION (the planning stage of an outdoor trip) MEETING MEETING CHANCE CHANCE CHANCE
MY FAVORITE CAMPSITE (generated by readers)
40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49
OPCOVER III: COOL CAMPS--SINGLE PHOTO OF BSA CAMP
FAT FAT SCOUT SCOUT SCOUT SCOUT SCOUT SCOUT PUMPKIN PUMPKIN
CHANCE CHANCE HANDBOOK HANDBOOK HANDBOOK HANDBOOK HANDBOOK HANDBOOK CHUNK CHUNK
F E AT U R E S
A Feature--New Boy Scout Handbook Debuts
50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59
B Feature--Scout Leaders Combat Youth Obesity
C Feature--Venturing Crew on Chisholm Trail Cattle Roundup
D Feature--Boy Scout High Adventure Fishing in Alaska
PUMPKIN PUMPKIN OUTDOORS OUTDOORS OUTDOORS OUTDOORS OUTDOORS OUTDOORS/ OUTDOORS OUTDOORS/
CHUNK CHUNK AD AD
60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69
IN EVERY ISSUE ADS TRAILHEAD FEATURES ROUNDTABLE OUTDOORS
9 W W W. A U R A S .C O M