Evaluation Question 7

Looking back at your preliminary task (the college magazine task), what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?
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Here you can see the front cover from my preliminary task and my final music magazine cover. On my college magazine the photograph is not eye-catching and the masthead is boring. The final cover looks like a more attractive magazine  overall, it has clean lines and a more sophisticated font. The shapes on the college cover have been taken from clipart so they are very simple and boring, whereas the ones on the final one look much more professional. The preliminary magazine looks overall more childish and the music one looks like it took a lot of time and hasn't been rushed.

 On the right is my contents page from my preliminary task and from my music magazine. The contents page on my college magazine is uninteresting and unprofessional, the font is childish and it is arranged poorly on the page. It does not make you want to continue reading the magazine. The font is far too big and the photographs aren't interesting. My music magazine is arranged better on the page and has a better overall style. The font is clear but looks good on the page. The photo and pulled quote grab your attention and lead your eye around the page.

I have gained several new skills in Photoshop during this project, I have discovered the use of layers, layer masks and blending modes in order to make some elements of my magazine look more effective and stand out more. In my music magazine I experimented with this and used a lot more shapes and lines to make my magazine have a good layout and style. In my music magazine I used text alignment to make sure all of my paragraphs were lined up properly and the text was in exactly the right place.
I also learnt to feather the edges of my selections and adjust the hardness so that the edges weren't so hard and were blurred slightly. I paid much more attention to detail in my final product and this shows when you compare them to my preliminary task pieces.