Developmement of the magazine

Development of the Front Cover

The background is a light grey gradient which fades into white at the bottom, the gradient isn't a big contrast as I didn't want to take too much attention off the image or text. I felt this gradient background made images, shapes and text flow together better than just a plain white background. On the master head 'UNPLUGGED' I gave it a drop shawdow as well as an inner shawdow of orange to make the font lift off the page therefore the reader would look at it first. Once the masterhead was editted I inserted the image of Mel and resized it to fit the page, I made this overlap the master have as from reasearch I I found most magazines do this as they are conifdent readers can recongnise their magazine name from a glance. I added faded orange circles into the background for places to locate my text.

This part of my front cover needed to be well-thought out. I used rectangles to highlight this text as I thought it was most important; also the rectangles allow to make the text be seen over the image therefore it makes it more catching for the reader. I use all 4 colours in this section of the magazine: orange, blue, black and white. These contrasts makes certain bits of information to stand out such as 'Exclusive', these types of words make the reader want to find out more about this particular artist because they feel as though their missing out otherwise. A catchy 'The New Quenn of POP?' has the same affect. Not only does it inform the reader what her article may be about but it gives more depht to the cover so it doesn't look as plain. At the bottom of the page I added a orange rectangle, this is another way of applying more information to the reader about what the magazine includes. The barcode in the right corner gives the magazine a professional and realistic feel to the cover.

To match the bottom, I included a strap line with the text '150 songs you must download now for summer 2015'. The matching orange strap lines both top and bottom gives the front cover structure and balance. The language used is very persuasive, command words such as 'must' and 'now' make the reader feel as though they will miss out if the don't but this issue.

I used a blue circle, outlined by a orange circle to draw attention to the competition. 'WIN!' in a white font automatically contrasts against the blue making it one of the first things the reader sees. Through

research I found almost all have an issue number and date of realse. I added this just below my masterhead so it didn't attract too much attention.

In the faded orange circles I added text which allowed readers to find out what else is included inside the magazine. The circles framed the text so it wouldn't get lost in the background. Sticking to the colour scheme, I decided to use blue to make the key words stand out to the reader whilst the orange was more specific. I added black rectangles to undeline the words. I felt this seprerated the page well.

Development of the Content Page

What the Focus Group want on a Contents Page

I asked my focus group what information and layout they would want for a contents page. They said the following:

A list of page titles with the page number split into sub sections therefore it is easier to find the pages you want to read.
Images of the artists that are featured on some pages or relatable images to a page.
Advertisment of social media sites so we are able to follow
Editors note
The same style and colours used for the rest of the magazine is used on the contents page

I soucred all the fonts through the website: www.dafont.com. Once I had picked each font style and decided what which font style would say, I used the snipping tool on the computer software and pressed saved as. When I inserted the fonts into photoshop I used the magic wand tool to remove the white background. I used the same fonts as the font cover however chnaged what each of them said. I made the background gradient again so grey would fade to white,because the content page was filled with text and images it didn't look odd (like the front cover) as there was no black spaces.To start off with, I drew 2 rectangles; 1 blue smaller rectangle placed upon the larger orange rectangle with included the heading font 'contents', The heading was aligned to the right side of the page. The rectangles carry on the housestyle of the front cover and links the two pages together. Above the blue rectangle I added social media icons I sourced from the internet to the right and the same issue number and date as the front cover to the left. Down the left side of the page I section of a bit which is for the page titles. Using the same font throughout however making sub heading bolder and larger therefore they stood out to the reader. I used black rectangles to underline each sub heading, this worked better on the contents page than the front cover because it was consistently done therefore it didn't look odd. I kept to the colour scheme and added a touch of blue using it make the page numbers stand out next to the page titlles.

I have added 3 images, one of Ed turner, a clean bandit gig and a festival picture which was all edited before appiled. They were all placed in the top half of the page spaced equally apart from each other, this created a box affect with the three images therefore it looked clean cut and in line with everything else on the page. I made Ed Turner slighty bigger than the other two as he is listed as a feature in the magazine therefore it was a reminder to the reader that he is included. Including pictures broke up my page and make it more visual and interesting for the reader. I drew out a thin blue rectangle which ran across the bottom of the page, just like the front cover I did this to balance the magazine out and make the magazine look consistent with it's house style. The blue box connected to this blue rectangle in the bottom left corner. Inside this box had a image of the front cover which was advertising the fact the reader could subscribe to UNPLUGGED and if the did they would get certain benefits. I got this idea from my research, I didn't make it too big as I just want it to take up vaulable space however I didn't want it to blend into the background and not get attention off reader therefore I filled the background in blue and contrasted with the orange text. Next, I added a editors note box at the bottom, next to the subscribe box. Inside this, I included a picture of myself (the editor) to make it more personal and so the reader could see what the editor looked like. In the text I gave my own opinion on this issue and reminded them of the competition and to follow us on social media sites. A editors note is a nice touch to a contents page, I picked up on this whilst researching. The handwriting font 'Megan' adds to the personalised expereince for the reader as well using synthectic personalisation in the language, using words such as 'you' to build a relationship with the reader.

I wanted to do something different on the contents page which I haven't seen before, i used a tweet templete sourced fromthe internet and wrote a tweet from a reader to UNPLUGGED's twitter page telling them what they loved about UNPLUGGED issues. By using a readers tweet on the contents page it raises awareness about their social media accounts and encourage other readers to do the same. When I collected target audiences responses from my questionaire 1 thing I found out was people mostly find out about gigs via the internet. My aim was to spread awareness of gigs in magazines so that people had another way of finding out about gigs. By reminding readers of gig tickets release dates it will inform them about gigs they might of not known about.

Development of the Double Page Spread

I soucred all the fonts through the website: www.dafont.com. Once I had picked each font style and decided what which font style would say, I used the snipping tool on the computer software and pressed saved as. When I inserted the fonts into photoshop I used the magic wand tool to remove the white background (just like I had done to the cover page and contents page as well as the grey gradient background colour). I based my double page spread on the double page spread featuring Nicki Minaj which I found through research. I started in the top left of the page, with 'exclusive interview' with a orange rectangle behind it. This made the writing stand out so it would draw the readers eyes to the text. I decided to include an 'exclusive interview' because it makes the reader feel as though they have to read it in order to have the gossip about the music artist. 'Mel Williams' is the largest font on the double page spread because as soon as the reader opens the page it catches their attention. Under neath I wrote a breif introduction, this tells the reader what to expect to find in the intereview and article. On the right side of the page is a big picture of mel. This instantly shows the reader who this interview is about. I fitted the text around the image to make the page flow from right to left. I did the same for the other two picture, down at the bottom.