3. After constructing my flat plan it was now time to develop and create my media product into life, I started to find a font for my masthead. I wanted my font to stand out from the rest ,something different and attention grabbing. I knew what type of font I wanted ,as the results of my music magazine questionnaire, suggested a three-dimensional font which would make the masthead more eye catching , as it will be the first thing the reader will focus their attention on, Thus it is also a clever form of instant branding , meaning when people just see the masthead , everyone will know it is a “Amplify” magazine. In order to find a good three – dimensional font for my masthead , I went onto a website called - http://www.logoease.com , using this website I was able to create a masthead, which looked more like a logo , this helped to give a sort of brand identity to my magazine and make it easier to identify in the shelves. I then saved my image and opened a program called Adobe Photoshop , this program allows me to enhance and edit my photos to create more professional looking images.
4. Here , I removed the background using the “Magic Eraser tool”, and tried playing around with the colours to see which best suited the target audience , and would give my magazine a youth full look, I decided to stay with black as it was plain and simple and helps the 3-dimentional font to stand out ,also I tried to filter the masthead to make it more appealing , I could not find the look I was going for and therefore left it .I then saved my font as a PNG file, which allowed me to convert my file so I could move it across to Adobe InDesign where I would be making my magazine. After opening Adobe InDesign, I realised I had to make , separate pages for the different pages needed for my magazine e.g. front cover, contents page and the double spread, all these pages had to be copies made from the" A- Master” Page, this was the original page which I had saved and am going to construct my front cover on.
5. I then went back onto Adobe Photoshop to make my plain black background, to do this I opened and saved a A4 page and filled it in black with the paint bucket tool , I then saved it as a PNG file and imported it back over to Adobe InDesign. To bring across a file, you have to create a new layer , then make a box for where you want your images to go, then click on “file” and “place "and insert the image. It was important to create a new layer because in future if you wanted to delete an image it would be easier because everything would had been saved onto different layers.
6. I looked back at my background and thought , was this good background which would reflect the lifestyle of my target audience ? I realised I could do much better so I went back onto Adobe Photoshop and opened a picture I took of a school wall, it looked plain and boring , so I added effects such as “Dark Strokes "and altered the light and dark intensity and the balance creating a good picture which I would use for my background. After altering the light / dark intensity and the balance I had created a good urban backstreet type ambience . I then saved the changes made and convert edit into a PNG file, and then brought it over to Adobe InDesign where I placed it as my background, so now I was ready to , start to build my magazine.
7. I made a new layer and placed the masthead in the top right hand corner of the page, leaving room for the pug to go into the left hand side , to do this had to overlap the layers . I did this by dragging the little pointer sign from layer 2 onto layer 3, this allowed me to bring forward the masthead and place it onto of my background. Now that I have got my masthead on the front cover it was time to add, cover lines, strap lines and other details that will help make my magazine look as professional as possible. To do this I went back onto http://www.logoease.com , and created my Strapline “Amplify your life..” and a fake website “ for more info visit … www.amplifymagazine.co.uk ” also I added the Issue number and the season in which my magazine came out “Autumn 2010”.
8. After making and saving the Strapline , Sub – headings and Issue No, I opened the Strapline image in Adobe Photoshop and changed the colours using the “Hue Saturation” tool, and altered the colours of the Strapline to see which would best suit my target audience , I knew the colours I needed because the results of my questionnaire suggested that 70% of teenagers said they like the combination of red, black and blue as they are bright and youthful ,compared to green, orange and yellow , which people said resembled more of Pop genre. To make the pug , I had to make a equilateral triangle on Adobe Photoshop and fill it in bright red with the paint bucket tool, then I removed the background , and saved the pug as a PNG file and opened into onto a new layer on Adobe InDesign. Once I opened the pug in InDesign I had to change the size of the shape as it was too small ,by doing this I learnt that you need to click “shift” and drag when enlarging a picture, so it doesn’t look stretched or distorted which I didn’t in my preliminary task.
9. Later on after importing the pug onto my magazine , I had to rotate the triangle so it fitted in perfectly in the top left – hand corner of the page , I added coloured rectangles to separate the top and bottom strips and the masthead from the Strapline. I used to text tool in Adobe InDesign to fill in the gaps with topics ,such as what my pug was featuring (e.g. *free poster of Lil Rayne*) By now I realised that I needed a main image that would portray my target audience and their lifestyles, I did not want my magazine to look too hard core, but it still had to resemble of the tough , urban hip-hop image, therefore I used an image where the model is not smiling or looking too serious , to get a mixture of potential buyers.
10. There where many little steps, in the process of preparing my main image before I placed it on my front cover. First I had to remove background using the “Magic eraser tool” on Adobe Photoshop, however their where still bits of grey background in between the model’s spiky hair , which could not be removed with the “ magic eraser or the normal eraser tool” , and so the image just did not seem quite right , through long attempts of trial and error I found a solution, I removed as much of the background as possible, and filled in the background black with the paint bucket tool , this allowed me to pin – point accurately where the little grey bits where so I could remove them . After doing this I zoomed in to make sure that every pixel was perfect and used the “ Magic Wand Tool” , to select the part which I wanted to cut , I selected the models hair and carefully removed the grey bits around his head with the “Magic Eraser tool” .Then I replaced the part which I selected, and at the end of my operation, I had successfully removed the grey marks , thus making my main image look as professional as possible. * No grey marks * After removing the grey bits, I played around with the filter effects, to see which would best suit my image and represent the messenge I wanted to portray. At the end I had chosen to use “Dark Strokes” again as it would match my urban wall street background. I altered the black intensity from “0 – 2”, I did this because it gave a shadowy look to my image , I left the white intensity at “0”, otherwise my model would look to ghostly and distorted , and finally I changed the balance to “8”, I did this so the colours did not blend completely together , but you could still define the image, and what the model was wearing. Later on , I saved my main image as a PNG file and imported it across to Adobe InDesign , where created a new layer and placed the image in the centre of the front cover, however there where still gaps in my magazine that needed to be filled. Therefore I looked back at the codes and conventions needed for a magazine , and realised that I did not have a left – third , after looking at some magazines, I learnt that the most interesting and exclusive interviews, and tips/advice are on the left third to attract consumers. Therefore I researched ,some major hip-hop artists and some of the latest news in the music industry, and included them on my left third, with the heading "exclusive interviews” and “features” to grab the consumers attention, as by buying my magazine they will be the first to know the latest stories. I also added the artist’s name , “Lil Rayne” which in this months issue its all about him and his story of growing up in the big world and how he has become a success . I did this to emphasis the well known artist’s name and therefore is will help encourage consumers to buy my magazine. I used the “text tool”, on Adobe InDesign. I chosen to leave the text white, to make it stand out with the contrast of a dark background and then I added the “outer glow” effect on Adobe InDesign and made the “spread” to 100 to get the maximum glow , to help it stand out in the shelves.
11. Now looking back at my magazine , I included most of the codes and conventions needed, but it still didn’t look professional , so I remembered to put a barcode on, which I altered on Adobe Photoshop and placed it on my magazine on Adobe InDesign. Then I added the price, this was a difficult decision if I did not have the research I had done beforehand .This helped me chose a suitable price which would be affordable for my target audience. However by looking at the typical 16-24 year olds , most teenagers are unemployed and are still in full-time education , therefore they are not going to pay £5-£6 on a magazine, therefore the price can become a major issue when it comes to buying, and the results of my questionnaire suggested that ,many teenagers would spend around £2.50 on a magazine as it is the middle of the range and a suitable price to market my magazine at, also due to the fact that it is a monthly magazine I feel that there I more information to write articles on and the quality would be better and should hopefully be worth every penny.
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16. TRIED AND FAILED ATTEMPTS FOR THE OF MAIN IMAGE ON THE FRONT COVER These are a few of my many failed attempts ,through the progress of which I gradually progressed to make my *NEW* front cover. Here I used the spot healing tool to fade out the blemishes, however it looked very unprofessional since everything on his upper lip was smudged and gave it a matt effect when the rest of the image was all of a natural skin tone. On this image I used the smudge tool to try and blur in the unibrow so it would even out the skin tone, however smudge transformed into black messy blur , and I tried to remove parts of his forehead
17. *ACTUAL MAIN IMAGE USED FOR MY CONTENTS PAGE* I imported a new mid shot image of the main artist, and used the magic eraser tool to remove the unwanted grey background I then rotated the image, so it was straight and in the centre of the page I then used the Clone Stamp tool, to replicate the skin on the models nose and overlapped it onto his unibrow and then slightly smudged the edge so the new skin blends in with the old I then flipped the image so that it faced towards the camera, and on my front cover it would be looking directly towards the audience and his body language is pointing towards the left-third In order for the Image to stand out from the urban background, I changed the colour of the shirt to Dark blue , as it also coincides with my colour scheme of red, black and blue. I then placed the new main image onto my Front Cover
18. Whilst in the making of the front cover, I realised that many Hip-Hop artist have a tattoo on their hand or neck to resemble the hip-hop genre such as Chipmuck by doing this it adds to the Mise-en-scene of the star persona , therefore when on Adobe InDesign ,I decided that since my double page spread was about dreams, achieving goals and aspirations I added a tattoos on the neck of the main artist “believe” THE RESULT I then created a new layer on Adobe InDesign and then placed the image as a PNG
19. FINAL CHANGES I changed the outer glow colours from orange to white with the red font since white illustrates purity and being unique individual and the red implies courage , and I think through my imagery and my article people can develop as individuals and that the article will help 16-24yrs old who have low self esteem. I also changed the font from “Gill Sans Ultra Bold” to “Park Avenue and Pristina” for the tattoo” to give a graffiti type signature effect which I believe demonstrates that the hip-hop genre is another form of art and by reading my magazine the creativity flows through you. I also removed the added background underneath the sub heading “exclusive interviews “, and since the main artist on my contents page was called “Salina” I added her name into the interviews bar in the left third to create a sense of continuity and that everything I have mentioned in my magazine was related to a topic.
