Question seven -

My research and planning skills have significantly improved since my preliminary print task where I had to create a college magazine. As all I did then was briefly look at other college magazines and then go straight into making my flat plans without any detailed research into factors such as the market and the target audience, this effected my finally product in terms of quality and relevancy. In my final print task I ensured I researched greatly into professional music magazines, this was my textual analysis, this process took a lot of time and effort but was found to be really useful as it enabled me to make my product a high standard and convey the conventions of a real media product, it also came in useful when making my magazine as I could refer back to it to see what my target audience want. I then went on to do audience research where I focused greatly on my target audience, I found out what appealed to them in existing magazines which then helped me develop y flat plans in to more relevant ideas. In this section of work I also did a focus group where I asked members of my target audience questions on what they liked and disliked about an existing magazine cover, contents page and double page spread, this was to focus my work and find out what to include in my product. I then did photography research which also involved test shots, due to my prior research I found this easy as I already knew what my target audience were looking for in a magazine. Flat plans came after this process, this is where all my research and ideas came together, this was a total different process to when making my preliminary task flat plans as my research had really focused my ideas and it was less of a struggle to make a high quality product.
In terms of construction, my final product looks a lot more in line with the likes of professional music magazine, this was due to extensive research and planning. When it came to the photography for my preliminary task I kept the shots very basic and stuck to using one model in one setting, I also only took few photos which limited my selection when it came to making my product and therefore my magazine was not of a high standard. This was something I changed drastically when taking photographs for my final product. I took images in both the studio and on location, using different models of different gender and ages, who’s clothes/makeup and poses where of a more professional look ensured I had photographs of a high standard which reflected photos from existing music magazines. In my prelim task I had minimal amount of sell lines which drastically reduced the quality of my product, also the proportions and placement of all my text was something which instantly conveyed a low quality magazine, I should have took more care when it came to this. Whereas, on my final front cover I ensured the sell lines positioning and proportions where all perfect and they had left alignment which is something I noted during research that existing magazines do. I took everything into consideration from my research and prelim task which gave me the opportunity to create a high standard cover for my media product. My contents page in the prelim task had a lot of empty space and had few images and text, this made it look bare and unprofessional, I ensured this was something I changed when making my final product. My final contents page shows how much I have improved in terms of skill, I used better quality images from a variety of models and wrote a contents page which was in keeping with the genre of my music magazine. I made sure there was no empty spaces by adding a subscription box, this was a feature I found in a lot of professional magazines. A double page spread wasn’t something I created in my preliminary task so I wasn’t able to use it as a tool to help me better my final double page spread, thus I just kept the techniques in mind I had already learn't from the prior pages and all the research to create a high quality double page spread. Over all I am very happy with my final product and I have learn't so many new techniques and skill throughout the process.