Filming Essay

On Thursday the 11th June we had to split into groups and make a video of a tour around our school and sixth form. The class got split into three groups of about 4 or 5 people. We chose to basically do a day in the life video with someone from our sixth form and we filmed in various every day school situations doing the sort of stuff he would do in a normal school day. This was our first proper attempt at filming and so we, as well as all the other groups encountered a few problems.

The first major problem that all the groups faced was the steadiness of the camera. A lot of our filming we had to walk with the camera in our hands so it was difficult to keep it steady. There isn’t a lot that we could do with this problem other than trying to get the person with the steadiest hand or for shorts where we didn’t have to move with the camera we could have used a tripod. This was a major problem because it meant that it ruined what otherwise good shots we would have had that had been planned out.

Another problem that we had was the gaps between clips. In our video especially, there was a couple of times where there was a couple of gaps in the video where the screen would just go blue. This happened because we accidentally turned the camera off a couple of times and so were careful not to record over what we had already done. The only way we can make sure that this problem doesn’t happen again is by just getting in practice and getting used to the camera so that we can get to use it easily without making mistakes.

The other major problem that we had was with sound and noise. The narrative was often lost in our videos and there wasn’t much we could actually do about this. The real problem was the other sound that we would have in the background such as traffic and wind. To sort this problem we would obviously need to film in locations that were away from roads, or on a windy day try to film as much as possible inside. This was a problem as the sound quality isn’t brilliant on the camera to start with, so other sounds that aren’t needed make it almost impossible in some shots to hear the narrative.

The last thing we struggled with was the cuts. A couple of shots were cut too quick and so if it came to editing we wouldn’t of had a lot of film to work with. In one particular group the shots being too short also lead to some of the speech being lost. The only way to solve this problem is to allow the camera to run for a few seconds before and a few seconds after.

evaluation

evaluation

Before even starting on my main task, I had to do a preliminary task that would help boost all my skills I needed to do well with my music magazine. For my preliminary task we had to make a school magazine. This was useful to get an idea of how to structure both a front cover and contents page, it was also useful in practising the skills I needed to use photoshop well and get the best out of it.

evaluation

My genre of music that I wanted to focuse my magazine on was indie. So before I started my magazine I needed to research into a magazine that also focused on the same genre of music. The biggest magazine in the country for this kind of music is New Musical Express (NME). Researching this wasnt that hard as I usually read the magazine anyway, but I took a deeper look at how they structure things within the magazine and the sort of language they use.

evaluation

Before I could start the production of my magazine I needed to look at the history and present of a music magazine that I hadnt previously done much research into. For this I looked at Q magazine. This would help because you need to have an idea of the history of a magazine to understand why it does the things it does in the modern day and how they came to publish things on that genre/genres of music.

The front cover is essential to get the audiences interest, this is has to be eye catching and sum up that issue of the magazine otherwise the audience will never even think about buying the magazine. You need a clear title and listed features so that people get an instant feel of what the magazine is and what is inside that weeks issue. The picture is key to representing what kind of magazine it is and showing what is the main feature without having to even read the contents, title or any of the feature inside.

evaluation

For me, the sole purpose of the contents is to help the reader find what they want quickly and easily. So for this reason it needs to be as easy to read and understand as possible to help the reader find what they want. The plain background make it easy for people to read and the bold heading helps split up the contents into sections which makes it even easier to find what you want, this is very similar to what they do in NME.

evaluation

I felt that the most important thing on my double page spread was the black on white contrast. I feel it needs to be this way because it needs to be easy for the audience to read otherwise they just wont read it. If the colours dont stand out well against each other it will make it difficult to read and you will lose the interest of the audience. A clear headline and an obvious quote from the text also help to get the attention of the reader and give you a good idea of the text. This is like what NME do with their double page spreads.

evaluation

Before you can attempt to attract your audience, you need to know who your audience are. The slide above lists the typical person that I believe the audience type is based on. I got these ideas from looking at a magazine I think is most similar and looking at its audience.

evaluation

It was key while making my magazine, especially the front cover, that I knew how to attract the audience. The ways I used to attract my audience are shown on my presentation. To attract my audience I first need to get their attention, this is done by using things like bold colours, clear title and clear text. Once the persons attention has been gained it is important to sell the magazine to them and things such as free offers and a well related picture help to interest the audience into buying the magazine.

evaluation

While making my magazine I used various different technologies. The main one I used to construct my actual magazine was Photoshop. I found Photoshop quite difficult to use because of all the icons and different things available to do on it, also before this project I had never previously used Photoshop. After my preliminary and practise tasks I was better at using photoshop which allowed me to use it fairly well while constructing my music magazine. I also used various music websites to make research into how to make my magazine and I used powerpoint for things like this presentation.

evaluation

Looking at the publishers, I think that the best oppourtunity for my music magazine would be with the publisher emap. As far as I could find, emap dont currently publish a major music magazine. Both Bauer and IPC both publish major magazines already and so this would be difficult for them to start to publish my magazine in the first place and then starting to compete with these magazines in terms of sales would be even harder.

Music Magazine - front page

This is the front cover for my music magazine 'The Scene'. I wanted the front covers main focus to be on the picture of Billy Lunn and I think that I have done that. The black and white fonts stand out clearly and are easy to read while they dont take away the focus from the picture. The title and information circle being in green help to blend in with the shirt Billy is wearing in the picture so they blend in rather than stand out. My only problem with the front page is the free offer square in the top right corner. The colours of it dont really go with the rest of the front page and if I had the chance to do it again I would do it with another colour apart from red.

Music Magazine - contents page

This is the contents page for my music magazine 'The Scene'. This also is a very basic layout placed on a white background to help make the pictures and text stand out. The layout of the contents page is very simple which makes it quick for the reader to find the page or pages that they want to look at. The green and white section headers make each section easy to find and then once youre on that section, the red font makes it easy for you to find the text that you want. My only problem with the contents page is that bits of it, particularly the right hand side is a bit bare. I could have done with adding a bit more information to fill it out a bit more.

Music Magazine - Double page spread

This is my double page spread for my music magazine 'The Scene'. The double page spread is set out with the title in bold black font. This setting is what makes up the whole two pages, black on white is a simple setup that makes it easy for the font to be read while also making the black stand out which helps to make it more eye catching for the reader. The font is also a bold and plain which makes it easier to read. These are both traits that a magazine aimed at an older audience would normally have.

Photos

Before I made my music magazine I went to some gigs where I took pictures of two different singers. The first two are of a singer called Billy Lunn who played at the square in Harlow. The second is a woman called Laura Mary Carter who I saw play at astoria in London. Both sets of pictures work well as they are from live gigs which help represent the raw nature of this genre music and the magazine.

nature magazines

Before we did either task, we made nature magazines which were purposely for the purpose of getting used to things like photoshop.

Preliminary Task

My preliminary task, like previously mentioned in my blog, was a school magazine. These are the photos from that magazine:

Q Magazine presentation

Following on from my research into music magazines we had to make a powerpoint presentation based on a magazine that we hadn't previously looked at. As I had already done NME, I chose to do Q magazine. In my powerpoint I looked at the basic history of the magazine and things like their selling figures today. Above are some of the slides from this presentation

Friday 6th March

During this lesson we were told about the criteria that we had to follow for taking the pictures for our music magazines. The pictures had to be our own original material. We got the basic ideas of what our pictures needed to look like and then we got some time at the end of the lesson to start planning out the front cover and the picture layout.

Thursday 5th March

We had to go down to the computer room (E3) for this lesson to make a PowerPoint presentation on a music magazine. The presentation had to be on a magazine that we hadn't previously looked at which meant i couldnt do NME so i did Q magazine instead. The presentation had to show the basic structure of Q magazine, so i mentioned things like their circulation and readership figures and explained things like who set it up and why and how they got the name Q.

Tuesday 3rd March

During the lesson we had to do an essay on the ways a music magazine attracts its audience in both the print and online versions. Looking at the differences and similarities in both versions.

In my answer I wrote about how the print version attracts people with things like free gifts and I used the example of how that weeks NME was giving away a free poster, cd and money off voucher for a shop. I then talked about how the online version has its advantages in how you can listen to songs on it or watch videos. Then there are also ways in which the two version work together, like when in the print version there is a story on a video or a song and then it says at the end of the story to go to the NME website to see/hear it.

Friday 27th February

In this lesson we were given more time to look at the print versions of music magazines. I looked at NME as we were going to get set homework on it later on and it was the one i knew the best. During the lesson i looked through the magazine making notes on everything like content, pictures, colours, free offers etc.

At the end of the lesson we were then set the task of comparing the print version to the online version.

Thursday 26th February

In this lesson we went down to E3 again so that anyone who hadnt finished their school magazine work could do. After this had been done we had to look at different types of music magazines that had been brought in by Mrs Rogers. When we had finished looking at the print version we had to go look at the online version and compare how it was similar and different to the print version.

Tuesday 23rd February

In this lesson we had to start looking at our main task. We split up into groups of between 2 and 4 and had to look at all different genres of music and put them into mind maps and split them up into their characteristics and examples of the sort of bands/artists and magzines. The four genres we had to write on were Rock, R'n'B, Pop and Dance. In my group I did the Rock mind map and I split it up into its own sections like Indie, Metal etc. I also looked at typical sort of characteristics of each type.

Thursday 12th February

We went to E3 this lesson to make our school magazine front covers and we used photoshop again using the tips we had got from marks tutorial a couple of weeks before. I stuck to my design that i had come up with earlier that week. My contents had the same colour scheme as the front page and also had the same st marks badge in the top corner.

Tuesday 10th February

In this lesson we had to take the pictures for our magazine front covers. I first tried taking a picture of two people but it didn't turn out the way i wanted to. I then got two pictures of two individual people in the library and then got one more of one more person in the sixth form common room. After me and Beckie had taken our pictures we went back to class and uploaded them onto our own folder and gave the camera back to Mrs Rogers.

Friday 6th February

In this lesson we had to plan and draw our school magazine front page. For the front page I decided to have a red background and yellow font to represent the schools badge. I called the magazine Marksman and had three pictures of students laid out across the middle. I also put in the school badge in the top right hand corner of the front page.

School Magazine Analysis

school magazine url: http://www.gshs.org.uk/school-newsletters/evolve

This magazine is made for the school George Stephenson High School.

The magazine has a very simple and basic layout to it. The title is 'The Rocket'. It is bold white text on a blue background. This isn't a very imaginative title but it at least shows you what the school is and you know that it is going to be based on only stories that are related to the school.

It is has a fairly simple layout to it, with all the navigational items at the top so it is easy for you to find what you want to look at, although this is also very simple and bland. The more detailed navigational bar down the left hand side is more confusing as it has different icons for certain things and it doesnt really show you what theyre about. This one is also bland and confusing.

The actual magazine itself has a simple layout of columns like that of a newspaper. Like a newspaper it also uses white on black which makes it easy to read and it stands out better than it would with any other colours.

Its purpose seems to be mainly to act as a newsletter for updating parents rather than information for the students. Although it does seem to basically just seem to be an outline of what is currently happening and what has happened within in the school so I guess readership would be both parents and students.

Thursday 5th February

In todays lesson we used the skills that we learnt from our photoshop tutorial with Mark last week to edit the pictures that we took of nature last week and made it into the mock up of our nature magazine front cover. After editing the image I used the actual image as my background of the front cover and then put my title and other text on top. I found photoshop fairly difficult to use today, alot of things to remember from last week and my notes weren't the best. I realised from this lesson that i am going to need some more practise on photoshop before we do our mock up of our school magazine front cover.

Friday 30th January

In this lesson we had to take pictures of nature for a magazine titled 'nature'. We worked in groups of two or three and we had to go out of the school to get pictures. Me and Beckie decided to go to netteswell pond across the road from school as it has alot of wildlife such as ducks. We took 4 pictures (two each), which after became three as one of the ones I took wasn't very good. Then we went back to the classroom and uploaded them onto the schools shared area folder into our own new folder to be used at a later date to edit. In this lesson I learnt the importance of using time properly as we had get to get a fair amount done in a short space of time.

Thursday 29th January

For the first half of the lesson we had a tutorial on how to use photoshop from mark. He showed us all the useful techniquies to use on editing a picture. This part of the lesson made me realise how a good picture edit takes alot of work and that it is key to constantly save your work. For the second half of the lesson we had to annatate two different university magazines. This part of the lesson showed how the front page is very important in terms of setting up an idea of what the magazine is about.

27th January

Todays lesson we look through media text books and made notes of what we will have to do to make a good music magazine when we start that task.

Media - 22nd January

In todays lesson we constructed a sales pitch for our school magazine. We did everything like working out the cost, the content of the magazine and how often it will come out. This helped me to learn just how crucial advertising is to the success of a magazine.