6) What have you learnt about technologies from the process of

constructing this product?

In the process of researching, planning and making my magazine, I have learnt a lot about the technologies I have used. Here are some of the technologies I have used:

Hardware: -Computer-Camera-Laptop-SD card-Memory stick-Sound recorder

Software:-Internet-Photoshop-Slide-share-Survey Monkey-Word-Photoshop-Blogger.com-Dafont-York college website-Wikipedia-Windows media player

ResearchIn this research process I used the internet. I had already a lot of experience with the internet and was very familiar in how to use it. The internet helped me a lot during my research as I was able to search existing media products and then get ideas from them. This then allowed me to get a better idea of what media products were around and what they looked like. On the internet I went on helpful sites such as Dafont and Blogger.com.We also searched what publishing brands owned which magazines, this was then helpful as we knew what was it allowed us to see which magazines attracted which brands.

I used a website called survey monkey, survey monkey is a website that allows you to make a questionnaire and then get results. I had never used this website before, but I quickly learnt how to use it as it was clear and easy. The results from this questionnaire was very helpful to me, as it made me see what gender bought music magazines, their age groups and their preferences for magazines. This information I then used to decide my target audience, and the genre of the magazine.

I used a voice recorder to interview a person, to get more in depth answers about music magazines, and what music they like. This was helpful to me as it allowed me to find out what music the person liked/ and what they liked in magazines. This then helped me to make my magazine similar to what the person said they liked. I’d never used the voice recorder before, but it was simple and easy to upload the data to the computer. On the computer I then uploaded it to windows media player I had never done this before so I learnt how to make the media in to a video and adding a front cover image.

PlanningI used power points when it came to my planning. I made a style sheet in power point, where I wrote in detail about what I intend my magazine to be like. I have used power points before so I knew what I was doing which made it easier for me.I also experimented with different colours/fonts/and colour schemes for my magazine on power point. I learnt that on power point you can choose a wider variety of colours, and change the gradient and hue of them which I didn’t know you could do.

I used slide share to upload the power points on to my blogger account. Slide share was very helpful when I was researching my product. I was able to upload my power points easily and efficiently on to my blog using slide share. Slide share looks sophisticated, ,and it makes it easy to read. I had never used slide share before but I quickly learnt how to set up an account and start uploading stuff.

Post Production

I used a SLR camera- a Canon 600D. I had only used this camera once before when I was taking one picture for my preliminary task. The camera was tricky to use as it was fairly complex. I used the flash on the majority of my images as it made the photos look like a higher quality, I also used zoom for the close up images- so that I got a variation of shots on my magazine.

ProductionBefore is started this project, I had never used photo-shop. The first time I used it was for the preliminary task of York College. I used photo-shop to edit my photos for my magazine pagesThrough out making my font cover/double page spread and contents page, I learnt the basics of photo-shop.I learnt how to crop image, draw around them, how to add texts and fonts. I learnt how to change the filter and effects of the photos, and how to add grids and rulers etc (figure 1). This was then helpful to my pages as it allowed me to make my images look the way that I desired.

Figure 1

I used the website da-font this website enabled me to download any font I wanted on to my photo-shop account. The website was quite tricky to use as it was difficult to download the fonts, there was also a lot of choice of fonts so it was hard to choose. There was also difficulties with the website, as every time we downloaded the font and added it to our photo-shop page we would have to re-download it after every time we went on to the computer.The use of the font website helped me to get a font that represents the genre and target audience of my magazine which waa good.

Blogger

The main use of software technology that I have learnt how to use is blogger.com. I used blogger to store all of my work. I have never been on blogger before, but it is a clear and effective way to store work. I learnt how to upload files and html’s. I learnt how to add labels and dates to my work so that everything is in order and is neat and tidy. I experimented with uploaded different forms of media, including slide-share’s, audio’s, images and word documents. The site is very beneficial and you even have your own personal account so that you can follow your friends.