Progress On My Front Cover - So Far

Before completing the front cover I decided to play around with different colours as I wanted the colour scheme to be vibrant "DANCE" orientated colours, however after experimenting this front cover below was the best option as it looked more professional and suited the image and mast head the best as the vibrant colours made the magazine look to young, and not the type of theme i overall wanted for the magazine.

This week I made a lot of progress on my front cover. As I only had the image and only edited it a small amount, therefore I had a lot of work to do. I started by finishing the editing on the photo, I done this by removing the background, brightening the image and highlighting certain parts for example her eyes and the necklace. this way I could proceed onto the rest of the attributes a front cover requires.

When editing and putting together the front cover I found that I was spending a lot of time trying to make the main sell line stand out, I eventually got the effect that I wanted and made it stand out as much as I can without making it look to over baring on the magazine front cover.

When I completed the front cover I thought that I had done a very good job, considering I had only just learned how to use photoshop. putting this aside I think that the magazine cover looks quite professional and I am proud for this magazine cover to be a representation of me.

Photographic Techniques.

THE TECHNIQUES;

• Shot distance
• Use of tilt
• Shot composition
• Eye line
• Tone
• Line
• Colour, including vivid, primary and monochromatic colour
• Texture and hints on creating texture
• Patterns and hints on capturing patterns

SHOT DISTANCE TYPES

ELS/LS- Good for showing the insignificance or character or for showing the characters as powerless within and overpowering environment. Also good for establishing location.

MLS/MS- Good for showing movement or for a balanced tracking of character and their environment.

MCU/CU- Good for portraiture or for moving image interviews.

BCU/ECU- Good for showing the significance of character or for showing characters as powerful. Also highly useful drawing attention to characters emotions. 

TILT SHOT

Tilt up shot (low angle)- used to convey power or dominance.

Tilt down shot (high angle)- used to convey vulnerability or weakness of a person in shot and to demonstrate dominance of point of view.

TONE

Control of tones, including variations of light and dark, emphasizing important parts of the image, and colour, generally set the “mood” of your photograph.

Tone of control can be used to emphasize the shapes of the most important elements in your image.

PHOTOGRAPHIC/MOVEMENT IMAGE TECHNIQUES

You need to think very carefully about how you compose a photograph.

Many photographers place their subject in the middle of the photograph, which can often result in a dull image.

Use of off center composition can create a focal point .

FOREGROUND/BACKGROUND

When designing a shot remember to keep in mind both the action in foreground and the background.

FRAMING

Keep the RULE OF THIRDS in mind when designing your shot. The viewer’s eye is drawn to the cross-sections of a frame; this is where your action should be taking place.

LINES

Lines are useful for emphasising and leading the viewer towards a main area or subject.

They may also divide up the picture pace into segments, which may vary in size and shape. The shape of lines and their general pattern can strongly influence the mood of the photograph.

You can easily control the appearance of lines in your pictures by camera viewpoint.

USING COLOUR

Taking control of the way in which colour is used in your photos is a key way of improving your images.

Keep eyes open for vibrant coloured subjects, but also look for delicate colour subjects and ones with muted tones.

Colour sells- bright, bold colors are used on magazine covers so choose or plan the slots that you will take when producing your magazine cover.

TEXTURE

Most of the time when we are taking photographs e think about the subject but there is another way of approaching picture-taking, which involves thinking beyond the subject and looking at it in terms of textures and patterns.

Photography is especially effective at conveying the impression of texture. This is a quality, which can be extremely powerful close-up.

Direction, height and the quality of lighting make a big difference to the appearance of textures.

After looking at all of these shots i have decided on a range of shots i would like to use for my own magazine. for example close ups and mid shots. I have also decided to use the tones to emphasise part of my models outfit and accessories. I have decided to use lack of colour in my models clothes so it wouldn't clash with the conventions of my magazine front cover, for example to mast head and the sell lines.

Arranging to meet the model.

 

I text my friend asking her about modelling for my magazine, She was happy with the arangements and agreed on the time I suggested.

Costume, Hair, Makeup & Model Ideas.

CLOTHES

Before taking the pictures for my magazine I wanted to do some research into costume ideas. I took inspiration from tumblr, As some of the models on the social networking site have the appearance and clothes which I would like to have in my magazine. The style I want is a Grunge style as I want my model to be alternatively looking, I will do this by dressing her in leather clothing and loads of different types of jewellery.

HAIR

As my model has blonde hair I looked for inspiration to suit this hair colour, however as the styling for the shoot is in a certain style I wanted the hair to be very plain and simple, this is why I think it will be better if my model just has long wavy hair, I plan to use her extension to get this effect, this way they hair will be long and i can style it the way I want.

MAKE-UP

I wanted the makeup to match the whole look, this is why I chose to look for makeup which had bold eye makeup paired with either a nude lip or a bold lip, however I think after looking through the makeup and taking my model into consideration i have decided to use a nude lip, just because I don't want it to be too over the top. I took most my inspiration from Taylor Momsen as she wears the type of makeup that I want for my photos.

MODEL INSPIRATION

My friend Melissa has the type of style that I want to apply to my magazine shoot, as she wears the makeup, hair and clothes of the style I want for m magazine. I will use her and her photos as inspiration for my model that I am using.

MODEL

For my model I chose to ask my best friend Rebecca, I chose her because I feel confident that she will be able to pull of the hair, makeup and clothes that I have chose to represent on my magazine. I will style her the way I want, and I will take the photos.

When styling her I will make these changes;

-Hair

-Makeup

-Clothes

-Footwear

Looking At Previous Students Work.

What did I do?
As part of my research and planning I looked over the students work from the year before me, by doing this I would hopefully get a better idea of what I want to do in terms of setting out my magazine and how I would want it to look from another persons point of view. I looked over and reviewed 5 other students magazines. When looking at each magazine I was asked to identify its strengths, weaknesses, the grade I would of awarded the piece of work and the reason why.

My review of the students work.
When identifying the strengths I found that I was complimenting the magazines variation of fonts, and text sizes, which I think might be helpful when I design my magazine as I want the page to have a mixture of sizes, to avoid the page looking flat and boring. As well as the variation of fonts and sizes I noticed that the models positions on each front cover really set the whole front page off, this is because it was the first thing I would look at, therefore I know now that my image needs to be acceptable. When identifying weaknesses I tried to be as fair as possible and take into consideration the designers view of how they would of wanted the magazine to look, and I carefully picked out elements of the magazine that would need improving just to make the magazine look more dynamic and well put together. A common problem I found was that there was spelling and grammar mistakes, this is why I need to be extremely careful and look over my work numerous time to prevent this happening. Another common weakness was there was too much writing on some of the double page spreads which caused the page to look cramped and over crowded which I feel put me off reading the articles as they looked far to big and would take a long time to read.When I gave each magazine a grade I looked at the marking scheme and tried my best to fit each work to the grade that I thought the piece of work was worthy of, therefore 2 out of 5 received a grade D, because they had too many spelling mistakes, the images weren't very well edited, the contents pages were messy and didn't include the typical contents page conventions. I gave another 2 out of 5 a grade C because they their articles were good but there was some spelling mistakes and the editing of each images was very poor. The final piece of work received a grade B because the amount of colors and images was very good however the photos weren't edited very well.

What have I learnt?
By looking at other students work I have learnt ways I can use different fonts and text sizes to improve the appearance of my magazine. I also learnt how to use different types of images for example posed images and more natural/casual looking images of my model. By having a variation I can use more casual images in my double page spread and contents page and then have a more posed image on the front cover. I've also being given an idea of how I want my work to be set out and how I don't want it to be set out based on the other students work I now have an idea of what looks good and what doesn't. After looking at one of the students work I also learnt that too much writing on a double page spread just looks far too messy and over crowded, which is not what I  want, I want my magazines to look very simple and easy to ready, and not too frightening to the reader as I feel like too much text can be slightly intimidating to the audience as its overwhelming.

Colour Scheme.

This is the colour scheme that I have chosen, although the black white and grey aren't particularly appealing I think that they will help make the vibrant neon colours stand out more, they will also compliment them. I think the yellow, blue and pink represent the dance genre well as they are fun vibrant colours.

I plan on picking out parts of the magazines contents page, DPS and front cover with these colours and using these colours to arrange them, and make it all tie into one.

Font Ideas.

I was asked to go onto "DAFONT.COM" to search for font ideas for my magazine, here are some fonts I have picked out for my mast head;

I chose this font because i think thats it is quite traditional but also is a font which will draw the reader to the magazine, if I was to use this font I would make it bolder and longer so it would stretch across the top of the front cover, however i think that this font doesn't really relate to DANCE music, this is why I would be most likely to chose another more basic font which is edgy but ties in with the music genre I have chosen.

I chose this font because i like he way thats the font has a futuristic feel to it, which i think ties in with DANCE music very well. this font I would make larger and stretched, I wouldn't make it any bolder because the font itself is quite bold, This for me could be one of the negatives of this font, because I think it might be too bold for my magazine and what i want to present to the audience.

I really like this font because I think it is something that you wouldn't typically see on a magazine. I think if i used this font i would change the colour inside the outline, by doing this I could tie the writing into the image I plan to use for my front cover. However if i did you this font it would need to be bigger, and longer to fit across the  top of the front cover. Unfortunately I don't think that this will represent the DANCE genre very well.

For this font I think it is a good representative of DANCE music as it is very out there and bold, I like the way there is different sized lines so the font doesn't look too over powering, if I was going to use this font I would again make it larger and longer, A negative about this font would be that it might look distorted and pixelated when I edit it to fit the page, and when I change it to look how I want it to look to able it to be on the front cover of my magazine.

This font is very similar to the one above as it has the same characteristics, for example the line size variety. I think that this font would be a great representative of DANCE music as it also has a futuristic feel. if i used this font I would make it larger and longer to fit the top of the front cover, I don't think there is anything wrong with this font therefore it will be a great candidate for the font of my mast head.



I was then asked to search for fonts which I would like to used for my sell lines, these were the options I have given myself;

This font I think is very well presented in itself, I could improve this by adding a contrasting background behind it to make the sell lines more outstanding, however I think that the letters aren't as defined as I would like as I want it to seem more edgy and more suited to the DANCE genre criteria. when putting it on the front cover I would make it smaller so that it wasn't too over powering, this way it would make the head mast and image more superior.

This font is very similar to the one above, however I think that this is more defined and edgy, this way it is more suited to the DANCE music genre. I think that this font will tie in well with the magazine and its contents that I plan to add on a later date. When putting this font on my front cover I will also make it smaller and more compressed as I want it to stand out but to also compliment the mast head.

This font is more futuristic so ties in well with the music i'm writing about. I feel that this font is more edgy therefore will accompany the font for the mast head very well,  by changing the colour and adding a banner behind it I feel that it will compliment it very well, and wont be too distracting, as I want the main focus to be the image and mast head.

 

I then wanted to see if the two fonts tie in well together as I don't want them to clash on the front cover;

I feel that they don't class at all and do compliment each others features. after reviewing them both together I feel that these font will be more suited to my magazine and represent the DANCE music genre very well, as they are futuristic feeling and are edgy, which is what I wanted.

Potential Problems I Could Face.

Initial Proposal Plan.