The end of I Love House

Dear Moderator,

My name is Charlee Millar and my candidate number is 9040 and centre number is 16829.

I have come to the end of my media coursework and have finished producing my I Love House magazine.

I have really enjoyed completing the work and along the way I have learnt lots of new things. I hope you enjoy marking my coursework :)

My Evaluation

I have finished evaluating my I Love House magazine and have put it onto a prezi.

I Love House Magazine Evaluation

Complete final DPS

This is my final double page spread (DPS), saved as a JPEG image:

Complete final contents page

This is my final contents page, saved as a JPEG image:

Complete final front cover

This is my final front cover, saved as a JPEG image:

Evaluation of my final DPS

Good points:

• The layout of my DPS i think is good. I made sure my text boxes werent to big so that i could allow for an 'interview' image and the larger image of her singing.
• Iv taken into considerstion the fact its two pages, so iv moved text about to make sure it hasnt got the crease going down the middle of it, and making it hard to read.
• Iv changed the boxes from dark purple to the lilac so that you could read  the interview text properly, and i also used a bold font to make the question number stand out.
• I used little image reminder things to make sure that my audience know which picture represents which e.g. to the left and to the right.
• Aswell as placing my logo in the top left hand corner i also used it in one of my Q+A.

Bad points:

• It once again has a limited amount of pictures which not because i didnt have enough but i just though less would be more, seems not in this case.
• I could of used certain relative things to fill in some of the gaps.
• I could of tried to make the interview picture bigger too.

Evaluation of my final contents page

Good points:

• I have made sure that all the text in my lilac text boxes is in line e.g. the page numbers down the left side are in line and then the text for that page is in line without any text going underneath the page number.
• Iv used stroke to put emphasis on all the images, and only used images which relate to the stories I have mentioned.
• Iv made it look proffesional by putting which page the image will feature on and what story it is linked to e.g. the girl  is Carry Campbell and the dog is the reason she became a gig expert, which is why she's linked to page 19.
• I have made sure i have embedded my logo within the page so that it fits in with the house style of the other pages and you'd recognise it was the contents to my front cover.

Bad points:

• The main heading for each of my text boxes could be made to look neater by lining it up with the text following the page numbers, as it looks out of place to the far left.
• My contents is not dead center, its just off and this is so noticable due to the funky colour of it. I could adjust it so that its in the complete middle.
• My 'comment from the 'editor' could have been alot more interesting, with maybe a different colour background to the text box, so that it just doesnt blend into the background of the page.

Evaluation of my final front cover

Good points:

•  I have kept a consistent house style across all elements on the page, i.e. text colours, fonts.
•  I think i have used my main image to its advantage. I made sure i got a shot with eye contact so that when i positioned her on the page, she would have direct gaze for a reader, I also made sure her eyes were eye line on the page.
• Iv kept it simple with just two images but made sure they speak volumes, with the way i shot them and the text to explain what they are about.
• I used text boxes down my left third as on the shelfs in a shop thats what you'd see first as other mags may be on top of it, and the text boxes make it alot neater. I also made sure they were the same size.

Bad points:

• Although i think my magazine looks good with minimal pictures, on the other hand it could of benefitted with more as they could of been used to illustrate more stories happening in my magazine, to draw the audience in.
• I could of made Global Gathering on two seperate lines so that it would of looked neater on the page, as the way it is now, it sticks out a bit.
• I could of used more text on my front cover, for the same reason as the images- to highlight more key stories.
• I also could of used stroke around the image of the Plain Sailing boys in the bottom right hand corner as this would of made it stand out a bit better on the page.

Final DPS

After i thought i had finally finished my DPS, i realised i hadnt actually taken into consideration the fact its across two pages. Originally if i had left it how it was then the crease down the middle would of been right through my heading and quote in the middle of the page.
I havent saved it as a JPEG yet, so this is just a photoshop file but il have the JPEG uploaded on here tomorrow.

IPhone stuff

This is me using technology on my iPhone to post blogs and create my Prezi on the go:

Proof read of Front cover

I proof read my front cover for my magazine and discovered I had made no mistakes throughout all the text:

Proof reading of contents page

I proof read my contents page as well so that i could correct any mistakes i had made. I hadnt made as many on my contents as i had on my DPS, i think this is due to the fact that i havent got as much writing on my contents. I added and extra 'E' onto house e.g.

I have highlighted the mistake with the black ring, then i corrected this mistake:

This now looked alot more proffessional and better quality.

Proof reading on my DPS

I proof read my DPS so that i could make it 100% proffesional with no errors. For example in my first column of my interview block i found that id misspelt surreal.

E.g.   I put 'surrea;' instead of surreal. then i corrected it

 

I also spelt been wrong, i spelt it as 'beem' and then i corrected it-

Embedding my logo cont.

To make sure my logo was embedded into my DPS i did a usual technique of magazines by using my logo when my first interview question was asked. For example when the inteviwer said hello to the artist, i made them say hello back to the magazine i.e.

Embedding my logo

Before my final contents was created it was a bit all over the place. I eventually decided to embedd my logo into the contents by doing 'inside ...'

This is quite normal in magazines and i got inspiration from various music magazuines.

Continuous house style

I chose my house style as bright and funky so that it would emulate my genre of magazine. I used a bright yellow for the backgroud, and on the front cover due to my photo not being as large as the page, i made the title across the yellow background, so that it looks like the whole background would be yellow but its covered by my image. I wrote the numbers down for the yellow colour so i got the exact same yellow colour for my contents and DPS. I chose a contrast of dark purples, lilacs, and reds for the text, and text boxes and also kept this throughout all pages, aswell as the fonts. I used a max of four fonts, these were:

 

 

  Orator Std

 

 

 

 

 Tahoma

 

 

  Stencl Std

 

 

 Showgard Gothic

 

 

 

        

Equipment use

This is photo's of me using the equipment to create my magazine:
This was me on Photoshop

This was me on Blogger

An these were me on Prezi

Editting to DPS

I have editted my DPS page so that it wont cut out any text along the fold in the middle. Iv lined it up with each page side and also added in an arrow in the top left corner to fill a gap. I also changed 'before' to 'my' so that it would work with the new layout.

Final draft DPS

This is my final draft for my double page spread!

Final draft contents page

My final draft for my contents page, wooo

Final draft front cover

This is my final front cover, finally!

Magetic lasso tool

The magnetic lasso tool came in very handy with certain elements of my magazine. I used it for four things altogther across the contents and double page spread. On my contents i used it for my picture of kyle and alex and the picture of sophie. This is how i done it

Step one:

I dragged the picture from my documents onto the page. I amde sure i duplicated the background so i had a background copy to.

Step two:

This was when id jut started using the tool. Everytime you click, a black dot appears, you would normally click if your going round a tricky bit, so that the tool sticks, cause although its magnetic it does sometimes wander.

Step three:

After you have gone all the way round, you must get back to the point you started and click over it. Then a dotted line will appear round them which means its finished. Then you click ctrl+c to copy.

Step four:

Once id clicked ctrl+c, i opened a new page and clicked ctrl+v which pasted it onto the page.


This tool really benefitted me because some of the photo's were good but the background didnt fit, so due to this tool i could use it and paste them onto the background i wanted.   

The process of my 'contents' text

Orignally my text 'contents' was just a solid colour. I changed the colour of it a few times before i actually chose to give it a gradient, to give it a bit more edge. Iv done print screens of me doing it on another text saying 'contents' to explain how i did it.
This was the first step:

I had to right click on the contents layer, click on the option 'blending options'. This then took me to a little box which gives me the option to change anything really. I had to click on gradient overlay aswell as tick it to change it to a gradient colour.

This was the second step:

 

I had to click on the arrow of the gradient colour box, this allowed me more options of colour and style of my text. I clicked the small arrow which gave me a list of options and i clicked on noise samples as it was the one which stuck out to me the most.

 

This was the third step:

 

 

I clicked on the very last one along the bottom, and decided it was the gradient style i wanted. You can see how it looks in the little preview box next to it.

 

The final step:

 

 Finally on my contents i wanted to make it even more better, so i added stroke. Its a black outline round the edge which gives it definition and emphasis on the page.

 

 

The text

Throughout all three parts of my magazine, i have used lots of different elements to change the text to improve it. Either by making it stand out more, giving it a shadow, or colour or pattern.
For example: stroke

                                                         bevel and emboss: before

 

after

 

 

 

 How i changed the colour of my text:

 

                                                                              How i gave my text a drop shadow:

                                                                           

 

 

evaluation of my magazine so far

So far throughtout the process of creating my magazine i have made lots of decisions to better the weaker areas of my magazine, and to even make the better bits the best they could be. Iv stuck to my pitch scheet, keeping my house style the same, using as many of the same colours as possible and keeping it consistent through every page. I have made sure that on all three parts i have my logo embedded within, so that if the pages were dropped, you would know which three bits were mine so that they matched.

Influences

I have looked at a varity of magazines to give me ideas for my whole music magazine, but when i noticed my contents page was so weak compared to my front cover and DPS, i looked at non-music magazines to. I thought if i mix it up a bit, it will give my magazine variety and will give me even more ways of re-inventing my magazines contents so its not so weak.

My final and finished DPS

Though i have not yet saved it as a JPEG, this is my final DPS. I am completely happy with all the elements, the house style and the layout.

picture for previous post

Adjustments to front cover

I also made some adjustments to my front cover. I changed the shape of the text boxes on the left, so that they were in line better and looked neater. I made them have stroke round them as this put emphasis on them more. I made them all the same size as one of them was bigger and longer than the other, so i moved the text around inside it to, to accomadate this. I changed the colour of 'global gathering' and 'creamfields' so that it stood out against the text with it because its the important part of that section. I put stroke around the 'rainbow' so that this stood out more, and put bevel and emboss around the cover line 'exclusive miguel.p..'. I still have a few little adjustments to make to my front cover, but not too many.

Contents completed up to date

This is my third contents draft completed, i have made lots of little changes as iv gone along. Iv made the 'interviews and music news' on two seperate lines so that its not sticking out. I have put stroke and bevel and emboss and drop shadow on all of my text boxes so they have a bigger impact on the page and stand out. Iv put inner shadow and stroke on all my headings in the three seperate text boxes. Iv also put stroke round each of the square shape pictures, but not on the pictures i used the magnetic lasso tool on. I put the page number with the picture it matches as i thought this looked more proffesional, i also put stroke around the page number so that its easiar to read agaisnt some of the pictures with brighter colours. I changed the position of my 'editors comment' to the far right bottom corner, with the text boxes background colour blended into the actual background colour of the page, but to make it stand out with a stroke around the box. The editors picture also has stroke around the edge. I changed the position of my logo aswell, i moved my contents higher up the page and sort of blended the logo in, by saying 'inside i heart house' with elipsis. Also with the editors comment box, i did have it higher but then the picture above it had the legs underneath showing and it looked silly, so i moved the box down to hide this.

How i got exact colour matches

To make sure i got exact colour matches, on the colour changer for each colour there are a certain amount of letters with specific numbers. When i found the perfect purple i wanted for my text boxes on my contents, i wrote down each number for each letter so that for each seperate text box all i needed to do was to enter the numbers so i got the exact same colour. Before i chose the purple for definate, i done this with the blue aswell, incase i chose the blue and needed it for all three text boxes.

text boxes on contents page

I decided to put my information on the left of my contents page into text boxes. This will benefit me because it will make it look alot neater, and will also give me a sort of margin for my text to finish, so that it is all in a straight line format, and not just sentences finishing everywhere. I also chose two colours for my text boxes background, a blue and a purple. I compared the two and chose the purple as it fitted better with my house style, and the blue was slightly to dark. I made sure all the text boxes in line either side, and one wasnt bigger in width than the other.

adjustments to contents page

After i got my final drawing draft of my contents completed, i started to create it. Throughout the proccess i made changes, by putting page numbers with the pictures so that my audience can go straight to that page if they like the picture. I think this way is alot more appealing, and looks better on the page. 

Final drawing draft

This is my final drawing draft of my contents. I am keeping it this way as I'm alot happier with this layout. I may make a few changes in the process of making it but I shall be sticking to this drawing.