College Magazine Evaluation

I read the brief it said we had to produce a new school/college magazine featuring a photograph of a student in medium close up plus some appropriately laid out text and masthead. Additionally I had to produce a mock up of the contents page. we began by creating an account on ‘Blogger’ and typing up the brief and the key concepts.
I started by looking at existing college magazines to see what sort of things would usually appear on a typical college magazine. I uploaded a few pictures of some examples of college magazines onto ‘blogger’ and deconstructed them. I used the key concepts of LIIAR (language, institution, ideology, audience and representation. I also found out what might be the denotation and connotation of the magazine front covers. I found out from my research that most of the college magazines i looked at there would be a happy looking student the front. On some there would be a girl and boy this shows equality of both sexes. The happy smiling faces suggests that it is fun to be at college. The connotation of a smiling student holding books is you can still be happy and have on smile of your face wile studying.
Once I had finished my research I started doing hand drawn drafts. One my first draft I did a picture of two people stood in front of the entrance to Wyke college, it was a long shot, in the brief it said we had to do a medium close up shot so unfortunately I had to change it. In my second draft I did the same picture but as a medium shot I also moved the masthead so it was straight and looked more professional. I also did a computer draft and found images of the school buildings and put some people on it to represent my ‘models’.
I organised for my friends to come into college and be my models so I could take pictures of them in the college setting so it looked better then editing a picture into the background. We went round college and I took pictures of them in various places of the college. I told them to smile and look like happy looking students as this is what I found most college magazines represented. Unfortunately on the day the camera ran out of memory after only four photos so I had to choose the best out and delete a few that I didn’t really want to delete. However I think the pictures I produced represented the target audience of ‘students’ well because the people I was taking photos of look like the right age to be classed as a student. When I got into college the next day I learned that a medium shot and a medium close up were two very different camera shots, a medium close up is a picture were you can only see the shoulders upwards and medium shot Is half of the body.
I started on a new draft that would be a medium close up shot as it said in the brief we had to do this type of shot. My idea was a person holding a piece of paper saying pass. This represents that you can pass your results if you come to this college. I also did a computer draft for this and uploaded them onto my blog. When in came to taking my photographs for this idea I did not like them I thought they didn’t look professional at all and didn’t look like they would appeal to my target audience of people that want to go to college and learn but have some fun as well.
I had a word with Tim and he said that it didn’t matter to much if it was a medium close up or a medium shot but recommended that it was best to go with what the brief said. In the end I went with the pictures I took with the three people in it because it looked more fun and was the better picture. I constructed my magazine by using word publisher. I got a picture of the Wyke logos and put them onto my image, the logo in the top right hand corner is called an ‘ear’. I came up with some ideas for what would be inside of the college magazine and played around with were they would go on the image and what font and colour would best go, I used a lime green colour and white for my writing and Georgia for my text I chose these because the colour went with the college logo and the text type stood out and because it is bold just like the college. At the bottom of the page I put ‘succeed at Wyke college’ as a cover line, I thought this went well with my image because they look like happy students therefore people that are succeeding in their A levels.
The strength of my magazine are its bold and stands out, the masthead is easy to recognise from a distant. The sell lines are relevant to the magazine and the colours go with the college logo. It represents the target audience for students wanting to at A level. I could of time managed better and not have left everything to the last minute also I could have done some more planning to go with my work however I think the plans I have done represent the magazine and the concepts of LIIAR very well.