Music + Magazines ???

As the preliminary task is now over we have moved onto the main task, creating a front cover, contents page and double page spread of a music magazine.

To begin we discussed as a class different types of music magazines and different genres of music. We talked about what we liked about certain magazines and what we disliked; this allowed us to start thinking about our favourite features and how we could use them in our own magazine. We also looked at different styles of music magazine and how there are links between genre and certain styles.

We're singing in the rain ... apparently !!

I am using Photoshop to create the entire front cover following my plan. I firstly edited the photo so that the background was blacked out with a run-through of purple so the whole cover is drawn together. I then added the text also using Photoshop. I used the desired colour scheme as selected by the results of the questionnaire.

Here is the finished product!

What will you see ??

I then created a design for the front cover of my magazine. I used my picture that I have already chosen. I then decided on the positioning of the text on the page, and the actual titles that I will be using! As my main title is “we’re singing in the rain!” - due to the picture. I therefore, thought I could bring the whole issue together with a musical theatre theme. All the sub titles refer to different musicals; I also bring in the articles desire by the audience (as established by the questionnaire).

My design can be seen printed out.

We also had to design our contents page though we are not actually going to make it.
Here is mine.

See printed work.

What's happening elsewhere ???

Before we finalised the design of our own school magazine we looked at some from other schools to find out what the conventions are. I discovered that school magazines often include the Schools name, web address, telephone number and the issue number/ edition. They often have a main headline centre page, followed by sub-headings grouped towards the bottom. The image is connected to the main headline and usually documents a recent school event / upcoming event.

Here are some examples of High Profile magazine ... an actual school magazine.

Not quite a Vogue fashion shoot !

Still referring to the information I discovered in my questionnaire i had to decide on an image for my front cover. I wanted to show a student at work, I decided to use a picture of a drama production, as I thought it stood out more than the rest of the pictures.

Here are some I took!

This is the picture I decided to use !!

Crazed !?

Before I could continue with my magazine I had to learn some basic skills using photoshop. I learned how to edit photos - such as blocking out backgrounds, changing colour concentrations ect. I also had to be able to add text (change colour and font) and understand how to adjust positioning. Now I new what I could achieve with the program it allows me to start thinking about what I what to appear on my front cover and effects I may want to use.