7) Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Before starting this task, I did a preliminary task, of which was to create a new student magazine. This helped me to get used to a lot of the technologies which I have further used in this task. Once the preliminary was marked and I received them, I wrote myself some targets and uploaded them to my blog in a blog post titled 'Targets':

• "-Use more illustrations to illustrate research which will help develop a better understanding of what you can try to achieve.
• - Design a more sophisticated cover design which is suitable for my chosen audience
• - Use less intrusive text
• - Detailed account of the technologies used in the creation of the product and research.
• - take screen shots of the product in progress and keeping notes of anything difficult I have managed to achieve- i.e- text wrapping round an image."

when researching and planning I took these targets into consideration and this was able to guide me out of the things I did wrong in the preliminary task to create a more successful main task.

The video below shows me talking about how I have developed in technologies and knowledge since the preliminary.

Here is the script which I used in the video with the text in Blue any information I have added:

In my preliminary task, I only created two blog posts for my research. I only researched what I needed too and not more into the topic in which I was going to be creating a magazine for. I chose a few images and picked out the main focus points such as the masthead, colours and boost image, I did not really explain the conventions or look into it deeply as I was really quite unsure of what I had to do as it was all very new to me, therefore I struggled for the first couple of weeks as I was still getting to grips with how much work we had to do in so little time- however in the main task, I spent more time researching into the magazines of the genre of music I had decided to create my magazine on. I analysed them in more detail and also researched into the types of stories and articles which they write about, I was able to look at the websites for other copies of the magazine covers and compare them to see the key conventions of the different designs. I also researched into the different sub-genres of Jazz as it is a very broad genre and I felt that I had to focus on one specific sub-genre to make it to the point, I also did much more research in the Main Task because as I am not a Magazine reader I wanted to make sure I was really clear of the types of this which I needed to include and the end product would potentially could look like.  I did not plan my preliminary magazine to the best of my ability. I drew a few designs on paper and photographed them to put on my blog, but as I had never designed or created a magazine cover before, I did not really know what to do, so I went along with my instinct and using the research to complete the task and drawing my designs firstly seemed good because then I could see briefly what  could create. For the main task, because I had done so much research into existing magazines I was able to design my cover in a detailed way and with the help of Timetoast I was able to create a personal timeline in which I could set deadlines for each section of work and when then had to be completed with the final deadline set by my teacher at the end.  The fact that I drew several detailed designs on paper and photographed them to upload to my blog, and created computer mock-ups of the cover, I knew exactly what I was going to do and how to do it.

To organise my time wisely and effectively I used an internet programme called Time Toast which was really beneficial as I was able to create a timeline of dates in which I had created to ensure that I knew when I had to complete each sub-task by.  I did not do any time time management in the preliminary task which was not very good because it meant that I did not do much work for a few weeks and then at the time of the final deadline, I had to do a lot of work in such a short space of time, which was very stressful. Time management is important because I will then know when I need to complete certain things and these deadlines and dates can be fitted around other things in advanced so I can ensure I have time at the end to touch up on anything which is incomplete.

In the preliminary task I was very careless about how I used the camera and did not really take the time to think about the angles, lighting and the way the model looked. The thing I did like was that it looked very natural which shows that the magazine was independent. I took some time whilst taking the photographs to think about the angle and trying to see which would be the best angle to take them, however I think I could of done more preparation of this before I had started to take the photographs. For my main task I took more time looking into the different angles which I could take. When taking them I took several photographs at the different angles I had thought and planned of, to which I then chose the best images to use for each section of my magazine. Furthermore I took much more time and consideration into the lighting of the images, and especially the boost image and making sure there back no shadow behind the model.

The conventions of the magazines for both my preliminary and Main task have very similar conventions which alot of magazines, despite the subject which they are made for they all use the same conventions to attract their target audience such as a larger masthead, splash,  bar-code, date, price, reversed out cover-lines one boost image as the center of attraction and many cover-stories to inform and give an idea of what to expect inside the magazine. I followed the majority of these conventions, however when it came to cover-stories, I only included a few to connote the higher-class audience of my target audience whereas on the preliminary I used much more Cover-stories and used reversed-out cover-lines as I was trying to target an audience which was completely different.

I created both the preliminary and main task magazines on Adobe Indesign with using Photoshop to either edit and transform all my photographs which I had taken. The first time I had used Indesign (a desktop publisher) was on the preliminary task and it did not take me long to work out the basics of how to use it with a little help from my teacher. Once I knew the basics of how to insert text and images I was able to carry on with creating my magazine. I had used photoshop before, so that was no trouble to use. The only thing I could do was top up my skills over what I already knew, one of these of which was learning how to view and create a double page spread and also how to text wrap writing round boxes and images which was really beneficial. I also learned during the preliminary of the programme Prezi which creates interesting Powerpoints, and I have further used this programme in the main task. One programme I used in the main task, and was new to me in this one was the programme Time Toast which was very simple to use. Overall I have used so much technology and different programmes in both the Preliminary and Main task to create the two magazines. Many of the programmes such as Powerpoint and Photoshop I had used before and also being introduced with new programmes like Indesgn and Prezi which will now come in useful with everything I do. The improved use of photoshop to edit and manipulate images has grown as I have learnt so much more techniques I could use to make my images to look better, an example of this is the saturation levels which is taking out some of the colour. I used this on my boost image and contents image to connote a more formal look which would appeal to upper-class person. The manipulation of images took time and there were times where things did not work. I did not do any image manipulation in the preliminary because I felt that I did not need to edit anything with the images I had taken. The bright images would attract the audience type I targeted and the background was very important with the subject it was based around so editing the images did not seem necessary. 

The process of both tasks really heavily rests on the feedback from your target audience. The target audience was the core of all the ideas I came up with, and importantly they had to fit and connote the audience profile I had created. Throughout the main task I  referred to my Audience focus group of people from my target audience for their feedback of each step that I took to ensure it agreed with them and that it suited them and if not then I had the feedback to change the components which did not work. I found that the more I turned to my focus group for positive and negative feedback, the more successful and real looking my magazine became. Also the feedback from my boost image model was very helpful as they were able to identify the flaws of the cover and whether things worked or not round his face and whether I needed to add anything else onto the cover to make it more appealing or to keep it simple to connote a more sophisticated audience and if it appealed to them. The feedback and advice given really affected the decisions about what I did throughout the process of the production. An example of this is with the boost image. I took a total of 32 images and them selected 13 to show to my target audience. I then asked for their view on the photos and which one they thought would best suit the boost image. Their thoughts really counted as it was the image they chose which they would most like to see on the cover which would most appeal to them. The help of the decision was really beneficial because the straight answers of their feedback suggested that this image stood out against the others and it really appealed to them as my target audience. Another example was with the contrast of the boost image after I had changed the contrast of the colour in photoshop. One of the images was lighter and the other darker to which I asked my audience to say which one they preferred and which would connote them as an audience altogether. They chose the darker image as it looked more sophisticated and formal, but also suggested that I changed the saturation of the image to take out some of the colour which I took their advise and it really highlighted the image as traditional which connoted my audience as sophisticated and upper-class.

The biggest thing I have learnt whilst on the journey to completing these tasks was how important you should plan your time is. I have realised that setting personal deadlines helps you to get through the sub-tasks at a good rate with leaving yourself plenty of time at the end to go back if anything did not get finished or did not go the way you wanted to make it more successful. Deadlines also help to complete everything to the best of you ability as you have realised that you have to complete this task for this date and you do not leave everything to the last minute before the final deadline and you have to  rush through things in order to get them done to meet this.

I think I have improved from the targets I set. The first one states that I should use more images to illustrate research. I took plenty of images of Wire magazine for my research to analyse the conventions which it had. I was also able to refer back to all these images to calculate and review exactly what I needed to include and whether I wanted to challenge anything and how I was going to do this. In the preliminary I got feedback that my cover was not very practical for the audience I had chosen, to ensure the cover for my main task suited my target audience, I took a long time to research and analyse existing magazines and my target audience, so I knew exactly what I was going to do. Also the use of feedback from my focus group allowed me to create a successful magazine which appealed to them. The third target was to use less intrusive text. To overcome this, I stuck to traditional old-style, serif text to connote a sophisticated audience which is clear to read and does not take over the whole magazine. As shown in question number 6, I have described what technologies I used and how I used them in much more detail which was target number 4. The last target I created was that I needed to take pictures of the process of my magazine. With everything new that I did to my magazine I screen shot it and imported that into photoshop and saved as a JPEG to use in my evaluation. I did this with every step which I took and it has helped me greatly when writing up my evaluation. So overall I think I have improved quite a lot from the preliminary as I have made sure I have understood and researched really well before designing and then creating my magazine which has made the process easier as through the research I came up with so many ideas.