Flat Plan Constructions

 My first ideas for my front cover was created through a flat plan (to the right). The idea itself looks okay(ish) but needed more work. As I started to try and create this front cover, the picture I chose and the articles didn't fit well with what I wanted, so I ended up completely changing my style and how I created it.

 My second flat plan construction for my front cover was more realistic and easier to construct. I changed the front cover picture to two people, rather than one, which made the magazine look more like a music than a fashion magazine. I put in more advertisements and side-headings and added more music-based articles.

 The construction of my contents page was easier in my opinion. I knew how I wanted it to look like and where I wanted what to go where. After researching other contents pages to get an idea on how their lay-out worked and what information went where, I was able to draw up a plan of my contents page. There were obviously things I wasn't going to fully follow, but the basic idea of it was created through my flat-plan.

Front Cover, Contents and Double Page Spread Completed

 

Front Page Construction

Throughout my process of editing, cutting, putting together etc.. I took some screen grabs of potential front covers and what photos I cut out.

Even though my ideas aren't final and I will probably/most likely change them, I do have some first ideas. 

The couple of screen grabs below are some first ideas I had for my front cover. This was only of one person.
My main concern for my first ideas was that it would of looked more like a fashion magazine than a music magazine, and my pictures were too hard to cut out, so the finishing effect wasn't as good as it could of been.
The main tools I used to cut out these photos were the magic wand tool, and then the magnetic lasso for the extra bits that the
magic wand tool didn't get. 

My second pictures for my front cover were a lot better than my first. This time I had two models, both wearning similar coloured clothing and made them do a pose which represented a music magazine more than a fashion magazine. I found that with two people on your front cover that it worked better as they worked well together as they got ideas from eachother's poses. Again here I used the magic wand tool to cut them out.

 After getting the picture on a plain background, I started to look at what colour the backdrop could be, I'm still not too sure on the one I have at the moment though.
The tools I used to get this background was the paint bucket tool. To get the colour I got a sample from the model on the right's clothing. Then made it a little darker.



The picture for the front cover in my opinion was too light and just looked like a normal picture. To give the photo a bolder look, I turned down the brightness and turned up the contrast a little.

The original colour I wanted for my main title didn't work well. The colour scheme I would of used would mean that a lot of my sub-titles wouldn't of been readable and therefore making my magazine pretty pointless. I changed the colour to a similar colour as the model on the lefts nail varnish is. I took this colour and made the colour darker. I added an idea for the main title of my front cover, by using a website: www.dafont.com, I found a decent font to represent my title.

So, the dark lilac colour didn't go too well. I found a nice light blue and dark pink to work with. Again, I will probably change this colour but for now it seems to be working well. My fear again is that my magazine is going to look more like a fashion than a music one, but hopefully with the finishing touches it will look more like a music magazine.

 I went back to the original colour scheme of a burgundy title. I thought this resembled a music magazine more than a fashion magazine. Using burgundy, black, light blue and white, I was able to make a colour scheme which actually worked, for once.

FINISHING PRODUCT!
Still keeping to the scheme of the burgundy black white etc.. My finishing product was produced! To make some cover lines more noticeable, I outlined some of the titles in the opposing colour to it, e.g Black writing - white outline, white writing - black outline. This made my magazine stand out more and eye-catching.

Peer Assesment

In lesson we had a peer assessment on other students work and our own. Obviously telling someone else that their work could do with improvements was much easier than giving yourself constructive criticism an receiving it!

The criticism I received about my front cover was both good and bad. My title name and font was said to be good and imaginative, whereas I had two different views on my colour co-ordination. One view was that the choice of colours was good and another was that the two didn't go together.
The text below 'summer festivals' had the same feedback, that it needed to be easier to read.

I know myself I have a lot to work on with my front cover and am yet to fully complete it, and the feedback and positive/negative criticism has helped me to improve.

You can see from the scanned in picture above, that the comments varied. Obviously I know where I need to improve and have taken this into consideration. 

Front Page Research

To get some more ideas for my front cover, I decided finding some of my favourite covers from a variation of magazines which fit into my genre and style of music, would help me develop more ideas for my front cover!

 The Rolling Stone Magazine edition of Adele really caught my eye. The basic photo of just her face with a pouted expression looked different to others. The way her hair looks as though it's been blowing in the wind shows a more natural look to her too. The three use of colours for the font (black, red and white) would usually come across as boring and dull, but where these colours fit in with the style of music Adele sings, it works well. 
My thoughts on the straight forward headline 'Adele: Heartbreak Superstar' is that it gets to the point, and doesn't need all these other sub-titles coming off of it.

 Again, another Rolling Stones cover stood out to me, but this time of Amy Winehouse. Different to Adele's cover, the colours used for this were not the original Rolling Stone colours like red and black, for he main title. The colours used such as blue and red were as if they had been faded out a bit, to create a vintage look, which is what Winehouse's style was interpreted as. The picture shows Winhouse with her iconic 'bee-hive' hairstyle, tattoos on show and extreme eye make-up, which is what she is recognised for. The heading 'The Diva & Her Demons' fits in well with what Winehouse is known for, such as drugs and alcohol abuse.

 Billboard's cover of Lily Allen is slightly similar to the Rolling Stone cover of Adele. With a medium close-up of Allen's face, the shadowing around her defined cheekbones makes the picture seem less edited. The use of the pink and white contrast well and go together, the different fonts for each title also go well. The pink and white go well with the picture, as the headband Allen is wearing gives off a 'girly' vibe and the pink and white are associated as 'girly' colours. 

Personally, the Jamie T front cover for NME is my favourite. The picture of Jamie represents his laddish behaviour and attitude. The idea of the picture being that he looks like he's been stopped in mid-sentence brings out the naturality and genre of Jamie's music. The headline 'Broken Britain, Broken Man?' implies Jamie is patriotic. If you've ever listened to his music you'll know he is portrayed as a 'jack the lad' sort of guy. The colours are the traditional NME colours, red, black and white.