Preliminary Task

Brief
Using DTP and an image manipulation program, produce the front page of a new school/college magazine, featuring a photograph of a student in medium close-up plus some appropriately laid-out text and a masthead. Additionally you must produce a mock-up of the layout of the contents page to demonstrate your grasp of DTP.

Photographs
I began this task by producing several photographs, in which I choose one to go on the front cover. I didn’t realise how much of a challenge this was going to be. When taking a photo there are many elements that you have to take on board such as the background, the lighting or the product. I knew that I wanted the shot to be of the 'Head girl' sixth former. So, I got my friend to dress up smart and stand outside school! I took various photos and resulted in a medium close of the model, my friend, standing in the school grounds. The model is standing in front of a tree and in the far background is the school building. This adds depth to the photo, instead of just having a plain background.
Once I found my photo, I began editting it in Photoshop.

Front cover
Once I had completely edited my photo I began with the front cover. I created this using the program InDesign. Firstly i had to come up with a title for the magazine. I wanted it to be fairly simple and relate to the school. So, I choose the title to be the schools initials, WGSG. This is a recognisable abbreviation, and in order to make it clear what the publication was about I decided that I would add a small caption, underneath the title, that would state 'Sixth Form Magazine'.

I then added the school badge onto the front cover of the magazine to again make it clear that is a school magazine. The colours of the badge are light blue ad maroon. This therefore made the decision of font colour easy as I decided to use the light blue colour. This colour font applies to the Title and to the sub title. The content description is in Black as the colour is more prominent on the background of that particular part.

Content Page

The content was also created in InDesign and uses the same colours and font type as the front cover in order to maintain house style. The photograph used is of the same person on the front and implies that there is a section to read about this person in the magazine. There is a column that explains ‘What’s Inside’ and all the content is listed in black font with the page numbers in the light blue colour. The layout is easy to read and provides a simple understanding of what the magazine has to offer inside.