What I’ve learnt about technologies from the process of constructing my media magazine

TECHNOLOGIES USED IN MY MEDIA PRODUCT

TECHNOLOGIES I USED: • iPhone

• Computer- Apple Mac and PC

• Photoshop

• Microsoft Powerpoint

• Microsoft Word

• Microsoft Publisher

• Internet explorer

• Google

• Blogger

• Google drive

• Slideshare

• Gmail

WHAT HAVE I LEARNT?

Internet explorer: This programme was mostly used in the first stages of creating my media product, for my initial ideas, audience research and artist profile. The internet allowed me to get an idea of music artist’s behaviour, what Hip Hop artists typically look like, font ideas and layout in general. I would’ve benefitted a lot from constantly looking at existing music magazines whilst creating my own, so I’ve learnt that it’s extremely good to compare how realistic my media product is.

WHAT HAVE I LEARNT?

Photos from iPhone:During my media project I didn’t have access to a professional camera, so I had to use my iPhone to take my photos. Although the images looked like they were of a high quality on the phone and when they were inserted into Photoshop, the edited images would’ve looked a lot clearer and high quality if they were taken with a professional, digital camera instead of a phone.

WHAT HAVE I LEARNT?

Computers:While producing my music magazine I used the PC at school and an Apple Mac at home and I’ve learnt that it’s easier to access documents and save aspects of my work on a PC. I’ve learnt the importance of saving and sending the work that I’ve completed at home to my e-mail so I can access it at school. Throughout this process I’ve also learnt how to save different forms of text/ images, for example, if I wanted to post a rough draft of my front cover onto my blog as an image rather than a Photoshop document I would save it as a JPEG.

WHAT HAVE I LEARNT?

Software: The main software I’ve used to complete my music magazine are: Photoshop, Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft Publisher, Microsoft Word and Slideshare. I wasn’t always comfortable using all of these programmes so during the process of making my music magazine I’ve learnt how to use them a lot better.

WHAT HAVE I LEARNT?

Photoshop:Throughout this process I also learnt how to use different tools on Photoshop to edit my photos effectively. I learnt that the exposure and contrast of a photo had to be equally balanced (unless I wanted a unique effect). I learnt how to use the blur tools on Photoshop to make areas of my photos less prominent than others, for example, I blurred the pigmented areas on the face so that it was all one colour.

WHAT HAVE I LEARNT?

Microsoft publisher:

Originally I attempted to create the double page spread of my magazine using Microsoft publisher because it had the correct options for me to create the page simply. However, I thought it would be a lot easier just to adjust the width of the page in Photoshop and create my double page spread on there because my front cover and contents page are Photoshop documents, so it would be convenient to be able to be able to open them all on the same programme.

WHAT HAVE I LEARNT?

Blogger: Blogger is another programme that I wasn’t familiar with before starting my media coursework, but it was quite a fun way of submitting pieces of work. When posting work on my blog, I learnt the importance of titling each post so that I could identify it easily when I had a large amount of work on there. We were able to edit the design of how blog and change the font and colour of any text that was posted, however, the font I chose was too hard for others to read. Because I had to submit my work through a blog, it was important that it looked interesting with a mix of pictures, slideshows and typed work. I made sure that I print-screened and posted parts of my magazine that I was making progress on or had changed.

WHAT HAVE I LEARNT?

Microsoft Word: I used Microsoft a lot through out the process of creating my media magazine and actually posting it onto my blog. I decided to type all of the text on Microsoft Word before inserting it into Photoshop because I would be able to proof read it more clearly and edit it easily. I also realised that instead of print-screening my work on Photoshop and posting it straight onto my blog without cropping it looked messy, so I used Microsoft Word to crop the print-screen then copy and pasted it onto my blog. When deciding which fonts I wanted to use for the text in my magazine, I learnt that Photoshop didn’t have a very wide selection. I played around with fonts in Microsoft Word then was able to type the font name into the font selection box in Photoshop to change the font type.

WHAT HAVE I LEARNT?

Microsoft PowerPoint & Slideshare: During the preparation for my magazine, I had to create a number of documents to record my initial ideas, audience research, artist research etc. so I thought it would be easier to keep them all together in a PowerPoint, instead of individual Word documents. Before this piece of coursework I wasn’t familiar with Slideshare, it was a really useful piece of software that allowed me to post my PowerPoint documents effectively onto my blog, so that they could be viewed as a slideshow.