evaluation of magazine cover and contents

Evaluation

For my preliminary task I created a front cover and contents page for a magazine, which I named ‘Your College.’ It is a magazine for the students and teachers of Farnham College as it is very casual and has a specific style and colour scheme which would be carried throughout the magazine. I chose a specific style so that the magazine is recognisable for when future issues come out and so it has its own style which the students and teachers will be able to identify as their ‘own’ college magazine.

I went out and around the college to take photos for the front cover of the magazine so that the images were genuine and linked directly to the college itself

My target audience is any age or gender students and teachers who attend Farnham College, it has a wide target audience as it mainly focuses on current issues which are happening in and around the college. Another main target audience is secondary school students who are thinking about attending Farnham College in the new term. The image on the front cover, I think, appeals to the wide audience because it is a quite blurred image and doesn’t focus on one student/teacher in particular which would make the target audience feel as though they are all equal when at the college. It shows 3 students from the college talking to one another showing friendship and a relaxed atmosphere. The masthead of the magazine ‘Your College’ makes the magazine very personal to the person reading it. If they are not a student of the college yet but are looking to become one it would make them already feel part of the college family. I didn’t want to just focus on one subject at the college as it has a diverse range of subjects to chose from and I didn’t want to be biased towards certain ones, this is why I chose a casual photo from the field of the college instead of one from in a science lab or mac room.

The masthead and main cover line are the same colour text as to stand out from the rest as those are the headlines in which I want the audience to be drawn to first. The other cover lines also stand out as they are matching colours (yellow and white) but alternate. A few of the cover lines also have a piece of information about the event or spread underneath the cover line. This is useful to anyone who is going to read the magazine as they can not only clearly see what the magazine contains but they also get a little bit more information on the headlines before they even open the magazine.

My contents page continues with the theme of the front cover by carrying out the grayscale colour scheme. It also has a ‘principles note’ which is like the principle is directly chatting to the person reading it, making it less formal and personal. There is also a photo of the ‘principle’ which will show potential students the friendly face of the staff who work at the college. The main event is also carried from the front cover to the contents page (battle of the bands spread) as it both stands out on the front cover and contents. This draws the reader to the certain event and hopefully interesting them into reading more about it. The note from the principle is in a different, less formal font making it even more casual and chatty towards the reader.

Before I started the task I had never used a mac computer or photo shop before. I had to quickly learn the basics of them both to produce the cover page and contents page. I have learned a lot about photo shop and how to create interesting pages by added different size texts and putting a effect on a photo, there is still a few things I need to work on for my main task such as; how to rotate images, how to edit photos in more detail and how to match colour schemes better. There is also a lot of unknown things for me to discover on photo shop.

I think the overall success of my product is quite good for a first attempt. I asked my peer group for feedback and have been told that the colour scheme is good and looks modern which links in with college as it is full of modern teens.

To improve my product I would have probably chosen a different image as it isn’t a medium – close of a student but overall I think it was quite successful.