Evaluation

I believe that my school magazine front cover and contents page follow most of the conventions found in a real magazine. My front cover has a masthead placed at the top of the cover and a barcode in the bottom right which follows the ‘Z rule’ which is used when designing professional magazines.  I also used bylines on the cover to show articles that would be in the magazine which would encourage people to buy the magazine. I used smaller font on text that was less important like the date, issue number and price so that the audiences main focus was on the main image and bylines. My contents page follows a 50:50 text to image ratio, which is a common feature with professional contents pages. Whilst I followed conventions, I did also challenge them. For my front cover I didn't use a headline, which implies that there is no main article within the magazine. On professional magazine cover you would be able to find a headline, cover-line and bylines. My contents page also doesn't feature any text describing what the picture shows, it only has the page number that you will find it on with the related article.

When designing my magazine I wanted to make sure that it was appropriate and appealing for all social groups. At Chislehurst School for Girls, there are a variety of social groups and I want my magazine to appeal to all of them. I used a photograph of 2 sixth form students of different races on my front cover as well as in my contents page. I used sixth form students because they are the oldest year pupils within the school and don't have to wear the school uniform. I also included different articles within my magazine which would appeal to all students at the school as well as teachers and even parents.

School magazines aren't usually distributed because they are designed and sold by students in school. However if I wanted to sell my magazine to parents/guardians I could use a small distributer.

My school magazine is primarily aimed at students within the school, because most of the articles have been chosen with students in mind. The image on the front cover of the magazine is also of two students, which implies that the magazine is aimed at students such as how to deal with exam stress, revision tips and sixth form dress code. However some of the articles might be useful for both teachers and parents, for example the message from Mrs Raven, school updates and upcoming trips. 

In order to attract my audience, I followed most of the conventions of a magazine to make the cover and contents page look aesthetically pleasing. I used large and clear text so that the bylines were easy to read. I also didn't use too much text on the front cover; this was to make sure that the text didn’t cover the students on the front cover. I used 4 examples of articles within the magazine on the cover so that people would want to buy the magazine to find out more information on those articles. 

I used Adobe Photoshop to construct my magazine front cover and contents page. I used various tools on Photoshop such as the magic wand tool, colour overlaying and transformation. I also changed the exposure on all of the images that I used to make them appear slightly darker and less over exposed. From constructing my front cover and contents page on Photoshop I have learned how to use blending options on text to make it stand out more on the page. I think that when designing my music magazine I will be more confident when making it look professional because of the different tools that now learned to use. 

Overall I am happy with the final outcome of my magazine front cover and contents page. I think that because it follows the majority of the conventions it helps to make it look realistic and vaguely professional.