Construction of Front Page

In order to gain the final product, the front cover of the magazine needs to go through a series of processes to reach the finished cover. Manipulation of images being a major aspect of this process, to reach that 'perfect look' on the model as they are the main focus therefore, have to be striking and appeal to the audience. Additionally there are other process that need to be undertaken, codes and conventions that you would expect to see on a front cover of a magazine such as a feature bubble and so forth, all to create that realistic cover.

To begin with I started editing the background of my chosen image in Photoshop. The backdrop in the distance is a line of houses and trees, and where my model has been placed they all appear to be going through his neck, creating a defined line between the floor and the sky, when in fact I want the image to have a gradual blend from the sky into the grass on the floor. All because I do not want any distractions, I want all the focus to be on the model; nothing else. With this I started editing the background with the 'cloning tool' blending the white of the sky into the grass giving it a clean cut blend without the distraction.

With the same 'cloning tool' I began editing minor faults on the face i.e dark circles under the eyes, I have edited the left eye and not the right to show the definite difference on the left, and how minor fixing of these details can make a huge improvement on the right. The final part of the face that was edited using the cloning tool was simply removing the mole above my models lip. Although it is not a downfall of the appearance, my research suggests that the models face has to be completely clear with no imperfections and so forth.  

                                           

I then moved onto other aspects of the magazine that would be featured; in particular this 'feature circle' created in order to make whatever is written inside it stand out, and draw the readers eye to it. I firstly, drew out a circle and filled it with a deep red to match with my black, white and red colour scheme. Then to make it stand out and look slightly raised I put a 'Bevel and Emboss' effect to give it that specific look and then added a 'Satin' effect to create the very smooth and lightened texture. Lastly, I simply added the required text and chose different fonts that appealed to me all in black to stand out against the red.

I then began to pay a lot of attention to minor details that almost complete the magazine, finishing off its overall appearance. I created a banner by drawing out a box along the bottom of the page and filling it with grey. Then layering the text over the top

I then started to concentrate on the top left hand corner of the magazine another aspect of the cover that completes the overall 'look' I wanted to create a sectioned of part that will contain a small amount of information. I initially began with drawing out a rectangular box, placing it where necessary and simply filled the box with the same red of the circle mentioned previously, to show a continuous theme

I followed this with cropping the rectangular box in half diagonally to create this upside down isosceles, almost like a banner has covering the corner

To make the corner banner appear more life like, I used an effect on this, the same effect I used on the circle; 'Bevel and Emboss' and 'Satin' again following the continuity of keeping to a theme, and because of the chosen red colour against the black and white, these aspects of the magazine particularly stand out, therefore, draw the readers eyes to this features.

In the previous picture the title of the magazine was initially placed behind the corner banner, undermining how much it should effectively stand out, therefore, resolving this I made sure the title was in front of the banner and had a fairly thick white outline increasing the number of the stroke highlighting the title and making it stand out against the red and across the models forehead as the title did blend into the hair due to the same colouring.

Lastly, I completed this banner by adding the text inside it; 'Special Black+White Addition' I wanted this specific information to be shown to the reader as even though it is apparent everything is black and white, it is still very unusual for a magazine to be this colour scheme, as usually they are in colour, my research supports my colour scheme decision, however, it was very difficult to find this research, and as it may seem out of the ordinary I'm hoping that it will attract the reader due to how unique it is and inform them on this special edition.

I continued the development into my magazine with adding particular sub headings that would suit the Indie/Alternative genre and my target audience. This simple phrase 'Hot up + coming festivals this summer' I didn't make the font fancy or unreadable, simply to stand out against the dark background, as a result of this I used white to make it even bolder. I also increased the height of the word 'This' of course emphasising the actual word and adding a sense of variation in height 

I continued this similar style throughout all my headings, with varying the height on certain words/sentences. I kept the simplicity of the black and white, however, making it bold and underlining 'The Vaccines' and with 'The future indie success' I filled the background of the box white accentuating the black against the white making it stand out.

With this particular heading I followed the same steps of all the other headings with the same font, colour, and so forth however, the only difference is that I purposely increased the size of the '50' placing it behind the text but also making it look as if its part of the subheading despite its height difference. I did this to purely for design purpose and to emphasis the the extent of the feature within the magazine, that will hopefully appeal to the reader. To make the differentiation between the 'Top Albums' and '50' I filled the '50' in white and increased the outline width in grey so that it didn't merge in with the other text 

This straight forward text is different in colouring opposed to the other headings, filling part of it red however, highlighting the music band in another colour; another technique in making a particular word stand out.

Lastly, the final heading I edited was one of the main focus titles. I initially used the same font, colour however, changed the height of the'Reading Festival' to pinpoint the important part of the heading. Alongside this was tag line that goes with the title of the magazine, this font is slightly different; its the same font as the title, showing continuity and similarity

between the two also using italics. This didn't need any further development however the 'Reading Festival Line Up' does, as I want it to jump off the page.To do this I added a drop shadow, creating a sense of light, dimension and overall BOLDNESS to it. In the effects box I can choose and vary the effects, for example, making the drop shadow more prominent or a slight shadow, nevertheless, this feature gives you the ability to experiment with the appearance of fonts. As seen below.