Front cover and contents pictures I have chosen:

This is the picture I have chosen to have as my front cover image. 

I chose this picture because I think it looks better with 2 students interacting and it shows them in correct uniform making them look smart and 'practical' for a school theme magazine rather than having them in non-uniform which would confuse the reader.

It also a good picture as it has space at the top of their heads for text to be used without having to edit the picture too much. It is a fairly close up image so this will help when it comes to using photoshop for the second time round. The closeness of the image is similar to previous covers I have looked at and researched so I have therefore created the image I wanted without having to zoom in using computer software.

 

I also wanted to have some smaller images on the contents page so that the reader will have an idea of what the article/page will be about before they have got to the page. For example, for a sport page I would have a small picture of a student in the school tracksuit to show that it will be about a sporting event or extra curriculum activity.

Below are the images I have narrowed down out of the selection I had to use on my contents page. These will relate to: Sport, Teachers help, Sixth Form, GCSE and A-Level and Extra Curriculum Activities. 

School Magazine Pictures

Here are some of the pictures I took this afternoon and the ones which I think I will use in my magazine on the contents page.

I am unsure of the picture I will use for my front cover yet but it will most probably be a picture of one or two students looking at the camera rather than doing something. (A posed picture rather than an action shot!!)

Next Step

Now I have sort of finished my first draft of a cover to a magazine and analysed what I thought was hard and what I though could be done better, I will now move onto the next step of the 'project'.

The next step is to create a magazine cover and contense page for a school magazine.
I will use a close up shot of 2 students, one sixthformer and one lower school student. This will show the differences in appearance and also the communication between both ages.

On the contents I will say what will be fatured in the magazine. Here are some ideas of what I think could be in a school magazine:

Extra curriculum activities (sport, cooking)
School Events (sports day, house events)
Interviews from students (why they like attending jcg)
Interviews from teachers (why they like teaching jcg students)
About sixth form (for younger students)

There are so many more topics which could be in the magazine, these are just a few.
The magazine will not be 'overly big' as it is just a school magazine.

The cover will have the picture as described above and some quotes from inside the agazine to encourage students or whoever want to read it to pick this magazine.

Some other things to think about are:
Free or have a price?
Large magaine or small magazine?
Shops/library/school?

Here is a contents and cover page which I think will work for the magazine:

First Draft

Here is the first draft of my own attempt at doing a music magazine front cover.

It isn't finished because I found it hard to actually do some of the things I wanted so it took longer than expected.

I have posted the original picture below as well as the cover because I think it's good to see what I have changed on the actual picture as in contrast, definition and changing skin colour etc. As well as making it look like a magazine cover with titles, barcode etc. 

I like this picture because it looks quite natural and not too 'posed' but the problem with it being so natural is that the background on the original picture doesn't really work as that is one of the main things which took me so long to edit. So, I realised that if I took the picture on a plain background/screen then it would be a lot easier to then edit later on if I wanted just a block colour as the background like I have done for the cover, white!

The background on the original was 'the sky' which was dull at the actual time so it didn't do anything for the person in the picture as as you can see eyes and skin look darker than normal and 'less attractive' than if they were highlighted by a studio light/un-natural light.

When I take the 'actual' picture for my cover I will use a screen background and lighting to make the picture do as much work on its own as possible and then I will therefore have less editing to do when it comes to using photoshop.

The main thing I found difficult apart from editing the background was editing the actual person. Making skin and eyes all the same colour was quite difficult because it either looked badly smudged or 'unbelievably  perfect'!

First attempt at cover

This week I have been working on a front cover.....from scratch!

I started by taking pictures of what I would like to be on my front cover, I have used a picture Jordana has taken of myself and have began to edit it on photoshop.

I'm finding it quite hard to remember how to do everything and effectively without looking cheap and un-finished, but I am getting there it just takes LOTS of practice!!

Below is the cover I am trying to replicate and I will later but my copy of the cover onto the blog.

I have chosen this cover as I like the background just being plain white and I like the colour of the text and the layout so hopefully after some work mine will look similar.

Mood Board

Now I have finished the research part of this 'project' I have now moved on to the actual planning and making of the magazine.
I have started by printing out the images I scanned in and liked from other magazines and will use these on the mood board because I think they will help when I begin making my magazine.

Here is the finished version of the mood board (posted Tuesday 21st October):

I found it really useful to do this as it gave me a chance to put down al of the idea I had about what I though magazines were all about:
Celebrities
fashion
Etc.

The one thing I found difficult when doing this was that there were too many things running through my mind at the time about what a magazine was about so I couldn't put it all down. But, I got down as much as possible ont the board and am happy with the outcome of it.

Things to do: Monday 15th Sept

Print Pictures and begin mood board and planning exactly what I am going to do.
Take pictures of Ross and decide how to present them for cover.
Decide what to base articles on and why.

All to be completed by Monday 15th September.

Target Audiences - Final Ideas

I have chosen to base my magazine on the Rolling Stone magazine edited by Will Dana.
I have chosen to do this because I especially like his style of magazine and what he chooses to put into it.

When you appear on the cover of Rolling Stone you know you are successful!! (Being on the cover is any 'new comer' into the music/media industries dream!!)

I will be focussing on targeting my magazine for older teens and young 'adult' music/media/fashion lovers!
The magazine will not just be based on music it will have all kinds of different things in it to interest wide range of people, both men AND women!! So depending on what mood you are in, this magazine will satisfy you as the Rolling Stone mag does this because it is known as a 'music mag' but doesn't just contain stuff about music.

So now you may have the kind of idea what I am trying to create, a magazine including: music, fashion, articles, ad's info and some sort of gossip but not the type you would find a classic 'heat magazine'. this gossip will be related to music and will be about the person's career and where they are going next with it, not what they ate for breakfast!!

Finally, I have chosen to use my brother on the front cover of my magazine and include an article about him and where he will be going with his music career as he is a musician himself and even though it might sound quite 'typical' seeing as he is my brother but he actually does have the indie/long hair/musician look! So I think he will work perfectly!!

magazine Report

While looking through some magazine focussed on men I personally found that there were a lot of fashion ad's which kind of defeats of point of it being a man's magazine as it should feature more 'man stuff'!!

If a man wants a magazine about fashion shouldnt he buy Vogue or Elle?

Most of the ad's which appeared in the magazines were for Diesel, Ralph lauren and Tommy Hilfigure.
These makes of clothes are usually represented with 'pretty boy's' who enjoy fashion and looking good and not being manly and being a lad!

The differences I noticed between all of the styles and layouts of the magazines:

Backgroung colours

Text size

Text style

Picture of man/woman?

Price location

Barcode location

Other pictures on front or just main photo?

Promotion of free gift?

 

There were a lot more differences but these were the main ones I noticed and questioned about. 

The things I have listed above are also the main things which make up the front cover of the magazine. A main picture, a barcode, a price, a title, briefs of what is in the mag.

These are the compulsory things which have to be on the mag in order to give the buyer enough infomation about the magazine without opening the cover and actually reading or looking at the magazine. 

Homework for Thursday 11th Sept

Go through 'Stuff" and GQ magazines and mark pages which give ideas.

Ad's
Pic's
Articles

Why women on covers?
Why magazines focussed on attracting men to buy them?
Do women not listen to music?

Change of Plan

Instead of going on the 'High end Fashion' route using Vogue as a main example to follow, idea has changed to producing a music mag instead.

Kerrang


GQ


Rolling Stone

These are a few magazines I have looked into and will do further research into to choose one to follow.

What to look out for in the magazines:

Layout of the front cover?
Who is on the cover?
What the articles are about?
Who are the articles on and what about?
Photographers used?
Writers used?

Planning 1

Use Tasha prince's shots from her profile ( www.chicmanagement.com.au)
Base magazine (Main article) on tasha and use her story from 'liverpool echo' as the text. (Double page spread).

Tasha's model career
SEP 3 2003 BY RACHAEL TINNISWOOD, LIVERPOOL ECHO
THERE aren't many girls who can command £30,000 a day and who can count Bryan Adams as one of their best friends.
But as one of Britain's top models, Tasha Prince quite literally has the world at her feet.
Since she was spotted at the tender age of 17, Tasha, from Aughton, has gone from strength to strength.
Not only has she appeared on the covers of some of the world's best read magazines - French Elle, Italian Glamour and German Vogue, she has also mingled with stars such as The Corrs and top designer John Richmond and appeared in Robbie Williams' Rock DJ video as one of the skaters.
And now Tasha, who can be seen modelling in this month's edition of Elle magazine, is about to join the ECHO as a columnist for LOOK!, lifting the lid on the world of models, rock legends and film stars and telling us exactly what goes on when the models strut off the catwalk.
"I am really excited to be joining the ECHO," she says.
"Over the next few months I am looking forward to telling the readers all about the sort of things I do and the places I go to in my role as a model."
Tasha's job has taken her all over the world - she has lived in New York, Tokyo and Paris - and as her status has grown, so have the pay cheques.
"It is a lot of money for my age," she says, "but I worked so hard for so long for no pay at the beginning. Usually when the money does come in you think, well I've worked for this."
"I have worked on some great jobs - when I appeared on Robbie William's Rock DJ video we had to meet at 6.30am and got driven with Robbie and his crew to a studio and spent the whole day skating and dancing around.
"Robbie seemed quite intimidated by all 40 models, but was still very cheeky and funny! It was so much fun. I will never forget that day."
And, she says, even top models have "ugly days".
"People might think I always look beautiful, but I actually have worse ugly days than everybody else.
"I am used to looking my best on shoots, but the next day when I see myself I may think: 'What am I a model for?'"



Modern Vs Retro
Expensive Vs Charity shop
Black & white Vs Colour
Creative Vs Tacky

Planning 1

Above is the 'Daily News' section from the Vogue website.
This will help by giving me topics to have in my magazine which I can relate pictures and articles to.