Final Evaluation

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From March, the date our final major project was assigned, I knew that I wanted to explore a magazine concept as this is the brief that I have done the most prior research on and feel most comfortable with. Previously, I have created two double page spreads about fashion, and the Star Wars franchise. I believe these projects were a great success and the techniques I used over the duration of producing these are perfect to creating something in the magazine style. From these earlier units, I have learnt about the general conventions, what makes an effective and engaging magazine cover, and also how to grab relevant information from a source to write an interesting article. Given the chance, I would have liked to improve my previous tasks by putting less text on the page as I feel like this made my Star Wars spread look overcrowded. One noticeable improvement that I should have taken into consideration with my fashion spread was the alignment of the text. I am not pleased with how the sides of the text box were not perfect lines. These are aspects that I consciously made sure to improve during this final project. Nonetheless, I invested extra time in ensuring this was the best pathway for my FMP. I done this by breaking down my strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats into tables for each project brief. I also created a small mind map with three ideas for each brief so that I could conceptualize the project in my mind before committing to one of them.  After analyzing the content inside these tables, demonstrated in my personal skills audit, I was able to come to an effective conclusion that producing a marketing campaign for a magazine concept would give the best opportunity for a high grade and creative piece of work.

Although I had already completed similar exercises in the print media field, it was very important that I was aware and extremely clear on the history of magazines, general conventions and also the specific techniques used in my chosen genre of print media. To do this, I created a mood board of magazine covers both inside and outside of my chosen genre, so that I could grasp a higher knowledge of how these should be put together effectively. After this, I delved deeper into analyzing two magazine cover that were specific to my chosen genre, rock music. From, this I was able to further understand the usage and importance of certain fonts, images, layouts, taglines, and brand names.  After this stage, I took the time to look into the different types of magazines, as I was unaware of this information. I learnt that there are three prominent types of magazine media. Specialist, consumer, and trade. Investing time into learning this information was very worth-while as this not only is helpful for my final major project, but also for future life and my career in the media print industry. I decided that my magazine would highlight conventions of both specialist and consumer magazines as I intended for my product to feature stylizations similar to ‘Vogue’ and ‘People Magazine’.

I decided that my target demographic for this product would be extremely vague. As there are many different generations of people that enjoy rock music. In my audience profile, I noted that my age range for this project is fourteen to sixty. This decision came from knowledge that bands like AC/DC and Metallica are still popular today by original fans from the seventies, and also by the younger generation who are starting to appreciate rock music once again. I was very aware that this was a large gap and that I would have to adapt my magazine to appeal to a more specific range. Which I found a solution to later down the production line. After researching this demographic, I found that seventy-seven percent of this audience was male, leaving only twenty-two as female. This would influence what I create as different conventions, colours, fonts and tag lines appeal to the genders differently. After researching my demographic in the form of age and gender, I invested time into looking at their key psychographics. These features of my audience’s personality are shared by my entire age range. This is helpful as it shows that these conventions are of mass importance and are needed to be featured in my product to be able to create something really effective. A general feature in magazines is tutorials or ‘how to’s’. This is why I researched some challenges that my audience face. In the hopes of advertising a solution on the front cover of my magazine, I anticipated using this as a main selling point and way of attracting readers.  Another interesting category of my audience profile is the preferred content types. Identifying these early in my planning would really benefit my project later down the line as this will hasten my decision on what platforms I should release my audio advertisement and social media page on. The final feature of my audience profile that I put emphasis on and invested a lot of time into was religion. I am aware that conforming to religion is a good selling point and can be used as an effective marketing strategy. For example, if the region of my magazine was mainly Christian, I would not feature words, stylizations or faces of influencers that are known for satanic, grungy, rebellious, or similar aesthetics as this would be a detriment to my selling point. After establishing this for my demographic, I had a clear idea of the type of magazine that I wanted to create. Additionally, I now had enough relevant information to create and finalize my rationale, which featured my product concept also. After this point, I intended to document ongoing reflection so that I ensured that I was on task, on time, and I also used this as an opportunity to keep track of my order of operations and exactly how I worked for a future employer to see.   

The next stage of my final major project is creating and presenting a pitch of my intentions to my audience. However, because of restrictions due to COVID and lockdown, I was unfortunately unable to actually present my pitch to a real audience. Alternatively, I created a PowerPoint presentation which featured what I would have said if I was given the chance without these restrictions. I would have liked to record and edit a video of myself presenting my pitch so I could experience this process, however with limited resources from working from home and time restraints, I decided that simply continuing my planning and starting my visual planning was a greater usage of my limited time.

My visual planning stage was a rather confusing path as I ended up scrapping my original first ideas. As seen on my WIX, I roughly drew the plans for two magazine covers and two magazine spreads. As I was working from home and wasn’t able to go take photographs outside, I saw no use in things like location recces or risk assessments. However, I now see how that could have been of benefit towards the end of the project. After starting production on my magazine covers, I realized that I was using too many images taken straight from Google, and I needed more original shots to push my work to the higher standard. This is why I scrapped my second magazine design, re-drew the visual planning, and started again. At this stage I had not started production on my magazine cover, so all I had to do is re-draw my intended plan. These drawings are nothing of artistic genius, however I believe that they are enough for a designer to understand my vision. Getting better at drawings like these is something that I am interested in improving as the better I can draw my vision, the better it will be understood in a production line in the real industry. Artistic drawings have never been a strong suit of mine and alternatively, I would have like to have taken more time in getting these plans to a better standard if it was for a real production company in the industry.

The production process of this project was quite a success. With minimal issues or problems, I was given more time to play with Adobe Photoshop and get more comfortable with the program. And doing so with my own original images made the whole experience more enjoyable. In future projects, I would like to continue using my own original content in all aspects so that I avoid complications with copyright and because this method allows for the most creative freedom. Furthermore, I would like to go outside and gather images of nature or use backdrops more effectively using a professional camera, instead of my iPhone. This is something that I am excited to explore after college and is the next step in improving my creative media skills.

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The post-production process was also a great success. Although I had problems at the start choosing appropriate fonts and colour schemes, after much consideration, I believe that I overcame this and chose these as very effective aspects of my entire project. As I am quite experienced with Photoshop and I would consider this program a strength of mine, I did not encounter many technical problems which helped considerably in saving time during this process. This is exactly what I had hoped for when choosing this brief as this gave myself a lot more time to concentrate on creating, rather than troubleshooting. Although this was the most time-consuming stage of operations, I am very glad that I took extra time and pride in making sure that my magazine conventions reached my desired demographic. The brand I created for this project, New Age Rock Magazine, was inspired by the idea of a magazine that focused on the new artists of the genre. I am very aware of a rise in popularity within the rock genre and found it appropriate that teenagers would want a source for their new, modern, favorite artists without being burdened with old talent that they might be less interested in. In addition, this is the reason I chose sharp but simple fonts, bright but not distracting colours, enforcing my manta for print products – “less is more”.

A visual effect that I found intriguing and took advantage of during my final major project is the gradient overlay feature. I found this very effective in making my titles and sub-headers more interesting and eye catching. To conform with the punk or grungy aesthetic that I was aiming for with my magazine, I made the decision the gradient will feature black and dark red. I kept this colour scheme consistent to enforce recognizability within my audience. Another useful feature that this effect resolved was allowing dark text to be seen on a dark background. Originally in my front cover, the title “who is this new artist phenomenon?!’ was hidden by the black background of the protagonist’s sweatshirt. I solved this issue by making the side that was hidden, red. This was extremely easy in Photoshop and is a feature that I will remember and exploit in the future.

In previous projects, I reflected that I would like to look closer into blending modes. This was something I messed around with during this project and used in my final front cover for the paper texture overlay.  This was a spontaneous decision because I had an issue with the method I used previously. On my other print products, I simply lowered the opacity of the texture layer. This worked every well in dark contrasting colours and shades, however, would be a lot less effective on lighter colours. As my final front cover consists of a primarily white background, this arose as an issue. This was fixed by using the ‘darken’ blending mode. I found that this was the most effective substitute for usage on lighter shades.

One aspect of my FMP that I had no previous knowledge on is my audio advertisement. Because of this eventuality, I started by doing important research into similar adverts on the platform that I was aiming my own for. Doing so helped enforce conventions when writing a script for my audio advertisement. I learnt that the first five seconds are the most important when gripping your listener as after this time, the advert may become skippable. I also learnt that it imperative that the voiceover is enthusiastic, calm, and gentle – to give off a friendly cadence. The sound effects cannot be too harsh to the ear, and as there is no visual go along with the audio, the product must be described tremendously. With the brand name mentioned clearly. The voiceover experience served uncomforting to deliver as this did not come naturally. I found it very awkward trying to sound excited about a brand that doesn’t actually exist. After a couple takes, I think I was able to illude the audience with my advert. To complete the editing process of this advert, I used FL Studio 12. This program is primarily used for music creation of all genres. In my free time, I have experimented with this and therefore had prior experience how to use effects like compressors and equalizers. One very interesting effect I added to my vocal layer is the Fruity Parametric EQ 2. In this effect, I was able to use a technique called ‘selective eq’. This is where you increase the volume of a specific HZ range to hear the imperfections more clearly. After these imperfections have been identified, I lowered the overall volume in this HZ range so that they are not heard in my microphone recording. This helped in removing background noise, muddiness in my microphone, and made my cheap, at-home setup sound like it was recorded in a professional studio. Alternatively, in this aspect of my project, I would have loved to learn about creating my own instrumental for usage in the background of my advert. However, with very limited time restraints and zero prior experience, this was not a possibility for this project. Nevertheless, I will definitely look into this to assist in improving future ventures.

In conclusion, at the start of my final major project, I intended to create an effective magazine campaign consisting of two front covers, a magazine spread, audio advertisement, web page, and social media presence in a very restricted time. I believe that over this given time, my project intentions stayed the same, and I was able to complete this intention. Although it was difficult and I challenged myself with the amount of foreign aspects that came with my project, with help from my action plan and timeline, I was able to stay on task and on time to ensure I was able to finish every aspect of this large project. Moreover, I am very proud of the magazine campaign that I have created and will take the knowledge that I gained during the past few months onto future endeavors.

Concluding my course as a whole, I was very happy with my progress from GCSE level. I went from creating music videos with little to no edits, posters that were drawn in MS Paint, and a lacking knowledge of the media industry, to being able to confidently take original images, take extra time and pride in my usage of camera angles during video recording, broaden my range of techniques and skillset in Adobe programs such as Photoshop, and absorbed a mass amount of knowledge about how the media industry works and how to market to a specific audience that I will take on to my next step after college. I am very grateful that I was given this opportunity to be surrounded like-minded people that shared the same interest, improving their understanding of the media industry. And with this positive environment came great progress. The ranging and plethora of units that have been assigned over my two years really gave myself the full experience and idea of that I wanted to do in the future. Even though COVID restrictions potentially ruined parts of out course and was a detriment to further progress, I still feel extremely humbled with the knowledge that I have taken from the past two years.