Feedback changes with audience feedback

From the comments on my front cover design blog post, I have made a few changes to the magazine front covers and swapped some of the features around so they mix together to make one front cover. The changes made are below:

As we can see from this draft, I have taken the main image from my first magazine front cover draft and put it on my third draft because the masthead and typography on this draft was the most eye catching and effective. This design meets the conventions of a magazine front cover well, and the use of direct mode of address stands out a lot. However, in the text, I have included the colour purple to highlight the key aspects of the point, but this colour gets hidden away by the colour of the models dress slightly. I didn't really want to change the colour of the writing that is meant to stand out because it follows the house style and colour theme to the magazine, which is what tied it all together.

I have also made some changes to my final front cover design by changing the background colours to light pink, light blue and light purple because I thought that if I was to chose any of these colours that they would be the most suitable as they are colours that wouldn't clash with any of the colours on the front page.

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Here is the analysed feedback I received about the colours I have added to the background, I produced this through PowToon:

Feedback from double page spread

I received feedback from my peers and family based on my final design of my contents page, I got the feedback via Whatsapp and Imessage by sending the image of the final design along with these questions for them to answer:

1. What do you like about the double page spread?
2. Could I change anything to improve the double page spread?
3. Do you think the double page spread is suitable for the audience of teenage girls of 12-14 years old?
4. If not, how could I make it more appropriate for this target audience?
5. Would you say there is too much text on the page to read?

Below is the feedback that I have analysed:

Feedback from contents page

I received feedback from my peers based on my final design of my contents page, I got the feedback via Whatsapp and Imessage by sending the image of the final design along with the questions for them to answer. The questions are below:

1. What do you like about the contents page?
2. Could I change anything to improve the contents page?
3. Do you think the contents page is suitable for the audience of teenage girls of 12-14 years old?
4. If not, how could I make it more appropriate for this target audience?

Below is the feedback that I have analysed:

Double page spread article with feedback

Miss left some feedback on my double page spread article, which I found really useful when going back to read over and making changes to make the interview as good as it can be. I am going to make these changes and put them onto my final version ready to be put together in the magazine.

Double page spread process and final design

My attempt at designing first double page spread ended up like this. I designed the main heading of the article in the same font 'Cheri Liney' so stick to the same house style of the front cover. The colours pink and purple are still in use and will be throughout the magazine, so that everything can piece together nicely, as well as this, I still used purple for the hearts because I see this as a unique style for the design throughout the magazine.  I decided on the image of my model Derrie because I think it looks quite fun, as she is holding a hairbrush as a microphone. As well as this, the hairbrush is an essential accessory for everybody, mainly girls, therefore it is an object that reflects on a girls everyday life.

When continuing to design my double page spread, I typed up the interview and put the text into positions so that it didn't look too squashed and there was enough room for the relevant questions. I did type up some more answered questions onto a word document, however there wasn't enough room to fit this all onto one double page spread; this lead me to picking the most important interview questions. I kept the image and the title in the same place, because they both stand out here and the image breaks up the writing a bit. I also added a little introduction to the interview, because to me this bit is important as it tells you about what is going to be spoke about and a little bit about the artist.

By looking at this design I produced, I have changed the introduction about Derrie because it says that I interviews her about embarrassing moments, which I did, but some of the answers took up too much space so there wasn't enough room left to include that bit of the interview. I thought about including it still and getting rid of some of the other question and answers, but the questions I have included now are more relevant and important I would say. As well as this, I made another change of adding a thumbnail image which was a selfie of Derrie because it reveals a bit more of her personality and what she gets up to in her free time, so that the audience can see a bit more about her and it draws them in, also to me, it breaks up the massive chunks of text which is a lot to read, but will be interesting for anyone who likes/ wants to know more about the upcoming star Derrie.

This is my final design of my double page spread, I have made a few changes from the last design that I had produced. I adjusted the location of the writing a bit to spread it out more so that everything didn't look as squashed together and unattractive to read, however the interview still covers the space of the double page spread. I was able to do this because I moved the main heading over to the left which enabled me to move the introduction to the right of it, which is really effective because you naturally read from left to right, so the title comes first and them the introduction should be read straight after, then followed by the interview. Finally, I moved the thumbnail image and the cover line for it to a bigger space after I had moved all of the text around, now the image fits nicely between the text. The use of the colours blue, pink and purple helps me to stick to my house style of the magazine Pop it, the colours all work well together and don't clash. Also, having the writing as black makes it stand out from the light blue background which is good. When designing the double page spread I decided to use the colour light blue for the background, as this was considered an option for the main colour scheme of the magazine as well as pink, purple and black all recieving 60% of the votes in the survey I produced, meaning I had to try and incorporate all of these chosen colours some how, which I have managed. Overall, I am happy with all of the changes that I have made to end up with this final design of my double page spread.

Following the description of my previous final design above this, I have made a few changes after receiving the feedback my teacher gave me on my double page spread article. I made these changes on my actual design so that everything was written properly and made sense. I added a brief introduction into the life of the star Derrie at the start of the interview and I also centralised the heading of the article because this will then be the first thing that the audience sees when reading the magazine. Overall, I have moved around the layout of the article slightly to make everything fit better so that I can include everything that I need to on it. Therefore, this is my final design of my double page spread.

Contents page process and final design

This is the first step of producing my contents page, I downloaded all of the fonts to my computer and inserted most of the text, except the headlines to go with the page numbers, but at this stage I haven't yet thought of all of the headlines. I still need to add a background, images and headlines for it to be completed. 

In this second draft, I have changed the layout and added a few images because it should be a 50:50 ratio of images to text. However, I'm not too sure if I actually like this layout compared to the first one. My only problem is, I don't think I have enough pictures of different people to full up the space on both designs. I'm going to play around with the design's to produce my final contents page.

For my 3rd draft, I wanted to make it completely different to the 2nd one because I didn't like how boring it looked, so by putting loads of little images at at the bottom of the contents page which also ties in with the incentives from the magazine, I thought it would look a bit more attractive. I also wanted to stick to the 50:50 ratio of photos to text, which I think this design follows quite well. My target audience is attracted by colours and images, which I think my contents page has done very well. As the images at the bottom all have different costumes, I think it makes the contents page look more intriguing and makes the reader want to know more about what is inside the magazine as a whole. 

This is my final design for my contents page. I am happy with the progress made and how the final design has turned out! I think the house style of the magazine has been stuck to, by looking at the front cover and contents page, and the bright colours make it look very attractive. Overall, there is a mixture of images and text which is a key point for the ages that will be reading this magazine, because younger people don't just read, they look for different images. All of the text is music related and the listed contents is very much music and celebrity orientated, which is the aim for this music magazine Pop it. All of the images at the bottom of the page are of the upcoming star Derrie Oliver, because this magazine is focused on her, and so is the double page spread.

Feedback

After producing different designs for the front cover of my magazine 'pop it' I have gathered my final 3 designs. I am prepared to use any of the final 3, however, in order to choose the final product to take forward I didn't think I should go by just my own opinion because it could potentially be biased because its my own work, so from this I decided to ask a few peers/friends and family about what they think.

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I gathered feedback for this question via whatsapp/imessage and direct conversation. As evidence of the feedback, I have screenshotted a few responses from whatsapp/imessage and quoted the direct conversation I have had with people. I did this so I could incorporate a variety of different technologies and ways to receive feedback other than just conducting surveys all the time. I also believe that feedback from surveys can sometimes be rushed so these answers this time will possibly be more thought through and reliable.

I proposed the question of:
From the 3 front covers I have sent/shown you, which one is the best and why?

The feedback I received:

 

• "I cant decide between the first front cover or the last one, I think they're both suitable for the audience you're targeting. I don't particularly think that the main image on number 2 is the best, the layout on number 3 is my favourite however." - Stacie
• "I would definitely say the last design, I think it includes a bit of everything that is on your example sheet. I especially like the little images that show what the magazines will be like, and I love the main image, it goes perfectly with the music theme." - Martina
• "I don't really know what a typical music magazine should look like but looking at the 3 designs you have made, I would say that number 3 is the best because all aspects of it stand out and it looks the most attractive for girls." - Warren
• "If I was to go to the shop and buy a magazine I would pick up the magazine with design 3 as the front cover, this is what kind of front cover I look for when I buy music magazines, and I buy them every week. This front cover is full of colours and interesting headlines and free presents for the audience." - Megan (13 years old, part of my target audience)

After receiving all of the feedback off the 10 people I asked (9 being female, 1 being male) I got the following results...

• Design 1 = 0 votes
• Design 2 = 4 votes
• Design 3 = 6 votes
  

Because the majority of the votes go with design number 3, this is the design I will be taking forward with me to receive feedback off my teacher. Then going onto using it to produce my final magazine front cover. I am pleased with the research I have conducted and with the results I have received!

Photography

In this slideshow, I have taken some photos of my nephew to practice and play around with my camera a bit more to gain confidence with it. I tried out a few different angles and shots. We both had fun taking the handful of photos!

Created with flickr slideshow.

Final 3 magazine front cover designs

 

My final three magazine designs are in this blog post. To make my decision on which front cover I am going to take forward, I will gather some feedback by either a survey, blog comments or another way. I will go with the majority of the votes from peers, teachers/adults and family. I would be happy to use any of the following designs as my front cover. My favourite is number 3, as it has a variety of different things/aspects included on it, and it shows a wide range of knowledge I have taken from my lessons such as: Masthead, cover lines, anchorage text, incentives, thumbnail images, main image with a medium long shot, eye level with direct mode of address, also included a bar code and price.

Magazine front cover 3

This is my third and final layout for my magazine front cover. On this front cover there is a variety of different pieces of text spread around the front cover, but not fully covering the main image. The thumbnail images on this front cover are my own photography as well as the main image and I think they stand out because none of my other magazine front covers have thumbnail images on them especially to show off and give the audience an insight to the incentives. This magazine also looks effective because the headlines are still big and stand out because they're also in another colour which stands out. The use of the black and purple writing in the anchorage texts are effective because it incorporates one of the house style colours of purple along side the professional, straight forward black writing. I have kept the masthead at the top of the design because this starts to create a feel for the house style of my magazine.

In the second draft of this layout I have changed the main image to an image with mise-en-scene that is really girly, for example the coat is pink and fluffy which really links to the target audience of teenage girls because pink is a 'girly' colour and fluffy things are likeable by all girls. I also moved the incentive to the centre of the page because this way it can catch the readers eye and when younger girls look to buy magazines, a lot of them look straight for what they get for free.

Here is my third version of this last layout, I think this one looks good however the top right side of the front cover is bare which looks a bit strange, but I don't have anything else to put there without making it too full of writing and look too busy. All aspects of the text stand out because none of the colours clash with the main image and they are all bright so you can read every single word on the front cover. I moved the masthead over to the left so we could see more of the top of the model because a lot of her body is covered up by cover lines, incentives and the anchorage text.

This is my final design of my third layout choice, I have centralised the masthead because I feel like this is a key point so it stands out and is easily visable because its right in the middle at the top of the page. Another change I have made is moving the incentives/thumbnail images of the posters to the top right of the front cover because this fills a gap and spreads the writing out so not just one part of the magazine is full of text. As well as this, I have also centralised the cover lines of 'UPCOMING STAR//DERRIE OLIVER' because I think that this is an important part of the magazine because the celebrity on the main image is usually the first thing that the audience spot when searching for a magazine, or even just browsing the isle in the shop. I enlarged the writing because this is also what the double page spread is going to be about when I start planning to write that. I kept the anchorage text in the same place because this looks effective to have them scattered along the bottom of the magazine not just all in one block. This is because I don't have the images and text 50:50 so I need to spread out the text so the audience don't just look at the magazine and think 'I cant be bothered to read all of this writing'. I do believe that this is one of the most effective and one of the best looking magazine front covers I have produced over all.

Magazine front cover 2

From my previous blog post, we can see how I am producing all of my magazine front covers using Adobe Fireworks. As I am starting to use the programme more and more, I am getting more used to it and feeling more confident in trying new things on it. Because of this reason, I wanted to make more than one magazine front cover to see if I can produce a variety of different professional looking magazine front covers to chose from when it comes to picking the final one.

Below is a few different versions of my second magazine front cover designs, where I have changed a few of the key components round, such as the masthead, the main image, the cover line, etc...

What I like about this design is how all of the colours start to blend together nicely, the use of the mise-en-scene(the coat) and the bubble with the incentive/anchorage text also the masthead, they all blend together nicely. The cover line stands out a lot which is the main aim to catch the readers attention of a new singer coming about. The only downside to this design is how much the black anchorage text blends in with my models hair because the text starts to disappear, therefore I would need to change the colour of this if I was to keep the same main image. One final thing I think that I should do is edit out the red eye on the model, this makes the magazine look very unprofessional and it ruins the image of the front cover as a whole.

On this design, I have made the improvements from the previous design above, I have edited the red eye out of the photo which had made a massive difference to such a small area of the main image. As well as this, I have changed the colour of the anchorage text to purple which is also part of the masthead on the heart on top of the 'i', therefore this all ties in together. However I do prefer to have the black writing, which was also my peers choice also, according to my survey, so from this I have gathered that I think I should choose a different main image which is suitable.

I have decided to completely swap the main image in this design and put in a medium long shot still from eye level. This main image has a bit more of a music look to it as my model is holding a hair brush as a microphone, which I believe really relates to the audience as some girls listen to music when they're getting ready, which getting ready involves using a hairbrush. I also changed the positions of the anchorage text, however to me, they look a bit lonely and out of place; so when designing the next version of my magazine, I think I will place the anchorage text back up the left side of the front cover. I really think this main image is effective and related to the music theme very much Following this, I moved the masthead around, placing it on the right hand side because when it was in the middle of the page, it covered up a bit of the models head.

On this design I have made my final changes. I changed the main image because I like this medium close up of Derrie because it gives the idea out that she is shocked so the audience must read it to find out the gossip inside of the magazine, however, I cant get the placing of the anchorage text in the right place so that it doesn't cover the models face, making it look odd but then trying to get it so the top of the front cover doesn't look bare; so I still need to find a way to get about this. Apart from that, the layout is the same because I think the bottom end of the magazine cover looks good and eye catching.


After making all of these changes to the same layout, my favourite and final design would be the first draft at the top of this blog post, despite the fact that the text blends into the image a bit, with a couple more changes to the text, perhaps making it bolder it would look just as good and stand out more. As well as this, I would go on to using the main image from the second draft I made, even though they are the same, this image has no red eye, because I edited that out, like this:

Evaluation of my first draft

In these screenshots, I have evaluated my first magazine draft of pop it. With the results of this evaluation I will make the improvements in my other front covers that I am yet to produce. Hopefully, by adding all of these suggestions and improvements into one magazine front cover it will help me to achieve a higher mark and a more professional looking magazine front cover.

Magazine front cover 1

This is my first draft of my music magazine, in this image it shows the first few steps I took when starting to design my first front cover. At this point, I was unsure on the main image and the cover lines that I was going to put on there, and I didn't want to rush this so I carried on with the masthead and the main cover line to see how they looked and to know which colours I want to use for them. During this process, the masthead and the cover lines were difficult to colour, which I did on Paint, so that I could continue to change the colours and play around to see which looked best for each piece of text.

This is my second draft of my music magazine front cover which as you can see isn't completely finished as the bottom half is empty however I have made progress with it as I have done some photography and managed to get hold of my main image which I think looks effective and suitable for my target audience. I still need to add the anchorage text to the bottom of the front cover and once I have done that then the magazine will be complete.

This is my third draft where I had started to add the anchorage text to the bottom, I had thought about what I wanted to include and which bits of the magazine I was going to highlight on the front cover. It still felt bare and I had a think of what else I could add to the magazine to give it more of a fun look and less boring as at the minute it is just words. I realised that in order to make it look more professional I should add thumbnail images which link to the anchorage text, this way it gives the audience a real insight into the magazine and the target audience for this magazine would usually look straight for the images not the text to see what catches their eyes.

Above is a picture of one of my final 

magazine front cover designs that I created on fireworks.

Whilst in the process of making this front cover I had to consider all of the feedback I received about the hand drawn designs I produced.

• The colours of the masthead and cover lines are very soft, girly colours which I feel relate to my target audience of young girls very well, along with the fonts of them. The bouncy writing reflects the bubbly personalities of the readers and suggests the fun effect which attracts readers. 
• In the planning of this magazine, I suggested that I would use thumbnail images around the main image to give the readers a quick insight to the magazine, which I stuck to and included. The ones that I did include were used because they are a common interest within most girls lives such as the Disney aspect, this is widely adored by many children and adults; for those who haven't visited Disney or even if they have, they get taken on a journey with the celebrity featuring in this article. The gloves thumbnail image is an essential feature for winter and if children see a pair of clothing they like advertised they will be more inclined to by the magazine so that they can browse at what else is on offer within the magazine.
• The main image of the star called Derrie shows off quite a 'dressed up' look because a common interest with girls is being glamorous and looking up to their idols, which Derrie is giving off a mature, sensible look for many children to follow.