AS Coursework - Preliminary

The brief I have chosen to do is Print. For my preliminary task I am designing a front cover for a school magazine.

Before being able to make a decision on how I would design my school magazine I analysed some other school magazines which would help me to identify typical forms and conventions of a school magazine.

The first thing that i did was to research similar products. I looked on the Internet to find several examples of school magazines. I annotated them and shown my understanding of why different features, such as font sizes and colours, have been used.

First school magazine Analysis

This magazine was taken from a college. I have used annotations to show features of the magazine and also why they have used these conventions. The targeted audience for this magazine i would say is more towards the teachers or parents of the students. this is shown by the picture which is dominating the front page.

Second School Magazine Analysis

This magazine was taken from a secondary school. I have again analysed reasons for typical forms and conventions and why they have used them. The targeted audience for this magazine would be more focused on the students. We can see this by the background and the article featured.

Template

Before I can start designing my school magazine I need to plan and design a template. I have decided to use the school name as the magazine title as I noticed other school magazines that I had found did not have a name but used the name of the school. I also found that a typical form and convention of the school magazines I had found used a main picture in the background which dominated the whole page. i also found that they used pictures of students or teachers on the front cover, usually as a mid-shot. I will be using the school colours as this will make it more personal from the school and the readers will be able to associate the magazine with the school. I will target my magazine at the students of the school as I found most school magazines were aimed at the students although i did find one magazine aimed at parents and teachers. The title 'Waseley Hill High School Magazine' will be the largest text on the page.

After I had created a template for my school magazine I then took a few mid-shot photos of a person so I could choose which one i wanted for my magazine. I also took photos of the school surroundings so i could use this as the background picture.

Final Production
After selecting the pictures I wanted to use I created my magazine using Adobe Photoshop. I used a variety of text effects such as drop shadows and glow. I added the photo of the school surroundings in the background and added a new layer and cit out a photo of the head boy that I had taken. I added this photo in front of my background.