The student created a magazine cover and contents page for a Halloween-themed school magazine. For the cover, they used conventions like the "Z" formation and included cover lines, sell lines, and images to attract readers. Halloween colors and fonts were used to match the theme. For the contents page, they included a 50/50 split of images and text. The magazine represents students informally with Halloween props but also aims to appeal to parents, teachers, and different age groups within the school. While creating the magazine, the student learned how to use blogger to track their progress and InDesign to create the contents page, finding Photoshop easier to use.

1. School Magazine - Evaluation

2. Front Cover Contents Page

3. In what ways does your media product use,
develop or challenge forms and conventions of
real media products?
I would say that my magazine follows conventions of a magazine front cover well. I’ve used the
‘Z’ formation which means readers would look at the masthead first, then the exclusive article
and main image, then the second most important image and lastly the barcode so they can
decide whether they want to purchase the magazine or not. I’ve also included cover lines to
inform the reader what the issue is about, Sell lines to attract the reader and the date so
readers know when it was published. My main image is the most important because it allows
the reader to work out what this particular issue is about, I created a Halloween issue which is
why the model on the front cover has a witches hat and a pumpkin. The other images also
allow the reader to work out what articles would be inside the issue. I’ve also used the colour
scheme to carry on my Halloween theme, I've used orange and green which are traditional
Halloween colours which can impact on the readers mood for example the colours I’ve used
can remind them of Halloween and autumn. As well as the colour scheme the font can also
impact on the readers mood, I’ve used a formal serif font for my masthead which would be
used on every issue so it is easy to recognised however for this special issue the rest of my
fonts are Halloween themed which makes the front cover more exciting and doesn’t give the
reader the wrong impression for example you wouldn’t use the fonts used on my front cover on
a Christmas issue because it would mislead the reader.
For my contents page I used the convention of 50% images and 50% text I did this by
including 3 images and the rest of page was text.

4. How does your media product represent
particular social groups?
While creating my magazine I have represented students in an in-formal way
because of the Halloween props. However because this is a special issue, as
Halloween is only once a year so I have tried to reflect the Halloween theme in
my images as well as the fonts and colour scheme. Furthermore my magazine
is aimed at students, parents and teachers as different articles will appeal to
the different groups. Students would read the articles that include school trips
or events while parents and teachers would read articles that include exam
results, events and open evenings. In the images of my front cover and
contents page they are pretending to look scary and serious to carry on with
my Halloween theme, however in other pictures they look happy and joyful
which represents their time at school. I have used sixth form students for my
images because they are at the top of the school and represent the other
students also the other students look up to them as role models during their
school time.

5. What kind of media institution (publisher)
might distribute your media product and
why?
Generally a school magazine would be created by students or teachers
therefore a media institution wouldn’t be used as comprehensive schools
usually wouldn’t be able to afford a professional media institution also
students wouldn’t understand the main conventions of a magazine
therefore it wouldn’t look professional. However private schools may have
a media institution or a professional looking magazine because they would
be able to afford it.

6. Who would be the audience for your
media product?
When I created my magazine I kept my target audience in
mind which are the students of Chislehurst School for Girls,
aged 11 to 16 and the sixth form students aged 16 to 18.
Although the students of the comprehensive school are my
main audience of the magazine it is also aimed at teachers
and parents.

7. How did you attract/address your
audience?
While creating my magazine I kept my target audience in mind, I
attracted my main audience by using students in my images, this
appeals to the students to buy the magazine because they wouldn’t
want to buy a magazine with their teachers or their parents on the
front. However in my images I used different parts of the school as
the background so it appeals to the teachers and parents as well as
they are familiar with the schools surroundings. However because
my magazine is a Halloween issue I used different props like the
witches hat and pumpkin, fonts that are considered ‘scary’ and drip
like blood and colours like orange and green to catch the audiences
eye and carry on the Halloween theme. I also used san-serif fonts
because they are more interesting and catch peoples eye.

8. What have you learnt about technologies
from the process of constructing this product?
While planning and creating my magazine I created a blog using
Google blogger, this is where I kept all of my progress and work until I
had finally created my final magazine front cover and my contents page
although it was my first time using blogger it was easy to use and work
out. Using blogger is an easy way for not only me but my teachers to
keep track of my progress and make comments that could help me
improve my magazine. Blogger is also an easy for an examiner to
check my blog, all I have to do is send them the link and they can
easily access my blog. I will continue to use blogger to keep track of my
progress in other media projects as I like how easy it is to post text,
images and videos. You can also change the layout of your blog so it
isn't boring and suits what your project is about.
I also learned how to use InDesign to create my contents page. I didn’t
like InDesign because it was hard to use and wasn’t very user friendly. I
prefer using Photoshop, which I used to create my front cover, I already
knew how to use it although it is easy to pick up if you don’t know how
to use it.