what have i learnt from the progression of the preliminary task to now?

Above is the preliminary task next to my finished final front cover. The differences are very clear in the fact that my skills in creating the magazine has developed far.

The angle of the image in the preliminary task does not drag in the reader at all. Its not personal and doesn’t even make eye contact. Ive learnt that these things are very important in the selling and attracting the target audience. By shooting the image in the way that I did in my main front cover (to the right) you can see a clear difference. The image is more in depth and personal and draws the reader’s eyes. The eye line appears to be staring out to the reader and its much more interesting than the image to the left.

The difference between the titles are that the preliminary task has a very simple cheap looking title with a tacky texture imbedded. The title that I have created for my final cover has graphics created on Photoshop by following instructions. I researched titles which would fit in with my style of magazine online and then found one I liked and followed the steps, altering it to my magazine taste slightly. Layering is also used to add interest to the overall piece. The title also links much better with the overall magazine feel, better than the preliminary task appears to.

The cover lines in general are so much more interesting in my final piece. There’s a key colour scheme to the final piece, where the only colour scheme in the preliminary appears to be the same dull coloured blue. Both magazines have similar text alignment in the way that the cover lines follow the page making it appear neater; however by adding highlighted boxes to my final, it appears to be more interesting and makes things stand out like a spot light effect. I also made text on the page stand out by using tools such as highlighting effects on the font and drop shadows. This is something that I didn’t use on the college magazine and I feel if I had of done, it wouldn’t have had such a cheap 2 layered feel to it.

The space reduction was also changed in my final to a way that I felt worked best. This is something that ive learnt since doing my preliminary task therefore it wasn’t used in the college magazine.

The main image in the final cover photo had to be blended into the background so that it didn’t look cut out or odd. This is a very useful technique that I have learnt and it’s much more effective than using one image as the entire cover.

The overall layering of the final magazine cover works so much better than the college magazine in a way that I’ve used a larger amount of layers to give the feel of more content. This is the main thing making the college magazine feel cheap, as it’s literally 2 layers.

I used rulers on Photoshop to insure the measurements of the overall image lined up. This makes the magazine feel more expensive and more professional giving it an overall better appeal. This is an important thing as it would help sales and help the target audience be attracted to the magazine.

I read through several media articles before writing my double page as this helped to get feel of the style of writing and how it connects to the audience. From this I learnt that a friendlier informal feel connects to the reader better than a very factual piece which is hard and almost boring to read. I took this into consideration when drafting my piece.