What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

The process of creating my magazine involved the use of technology, this made the whole process easier and quicker.

For the research part of my coursework I used the internet in order to find out information and search for magazines to analyse. This was a quick and convenient way to do so. Otherwise I would have had to buy ten magazines which would be inconvenient and expensive. Using the internet for my general research meant that I could get very accurate and reliable information.

For the planning stage I used a professional digital camera, this is because it produces high quality images, something you would expect in a magazine. The camera allowed me to do a variety of things such as zoom, using flash and choosing profiles such as ‘portrait’. This meant I could get the best photo possible. I learnt a lot of things buy using this digital camera such as how to actually use it to its best ability.

To edit these images I used the program ‘Photoshop’. This programme is very good to use for images because it lets you do almost everything. I did a variety of things while editing photos including tools which let me change the look of an image: I adjusted the contrast in my images to make them look more dramatic. I adjusted the brightness to make the image look brighter. I used this on some images because it was getting dark when I was doing the photo shoot so this let me restore it to normal. I adjusted the exposure to again make the image have a dramatic look. I used tools that actually change the shape of the image: crop allowed me to cut an image down to a required size. Magic wand allowed me to roughly cut around an object in the photo. Magnetic lasso allowed me to precisely cut around an object in the photo to make it look professional. I also used the tool ‘smudge’ this was a useful tool which allowed me to smudge colours. E.g. in one of my images a bit of grass was on my models leg, I was able to smudge the blue of her jeans to erase the grass. Overall I have learnt that this kind of technology is very useful because it allows me to create a very professional look to images. This will hopefully make my magazine look professional.

For creating my magazine I used a mixture of InDesign

and Photoshop. In Photoshop I was able to edit images so they look professional so then I could import them into InDesign. In InDesign I was able to use a variety of techniques to create a professional looking magazine. For example I was able to design my text boxes so they look like a proper article style. I was able to insert images and move them around and position them in the correct places. I was able to import text from ‘DaFont’, these fonts look professional ideal for my magazine. I was able to adjust the size and colour to make it suit my audience. I was also able to insert text from a word document. This was very convenient because I was able to write it up in ‘Word’ and simply press ‘insert’ so it is imported. I found these programs very useful because they allowed me to create a professional looking magazine. I learnt the best way to create magazines is on professional programs not ones like publisher as I would not be able to get a good result.

DaFont is the website in which I found and designed my font for my magazine. I wanted to find the right style which would suit my target audience and found ‘Coolvetica’. I imported the text into Photoshop where I was able to adjust the colour, I changed it from black to purple with the ‘fill’ tool. This was very useful as it was a fast way to do so.

For creating my college magazine I used the programme ‘Publisher’, this allows you to create basic designs for magazines. I found that I was limited in what the programme allowed me to do. However this technology did allow me to have an insight into how to create a magazine. It also let me do useful things such as ‘wrap’ text and ‘bring objects forward’ so the title is at the front. Overall I have learnt how to set out magazine designs and order objects in priority.

I used ‘Microsoft Word’ to produce all of my work. This was because it is an easy way to write up my findings and insert images. I then uploaded this

work to my blog via ‘slide share’. Slide Share transformed my documents into a slide show so it can be uploaded to blogger. It was a fast was of doing so and was easy to upload.

Blogger is the place I uploaded all of my work. It is a webpage in which you can post ‘posts’ on. This was a good programme because it clearly shows each post allowing people to comment on it.

Overall I have learnt that technology is a very important aspect in creating a professional looking magazine. I have learnt that without these technologies no professional designs can be made. Photoshop is a very good technology as it lets you do almost anything to an image to suit your needs. The use of the professional camera is a huge advantage to constructing the product as it provides high quality images.