Jay Franks

Evaluation 6 –

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

Camera and Tripod:

I used the Nikon D3300 camera for taking the photos. I have learnt that this camera is of a high quality and takes great photos . Over the course of making my magazine I have developed my photography skills of capturing a good photo. There are alt of buttons on the camera that can be quite confusing at first, but as I used it more the process of taking the photos came a lot easier. I found that through manipulating the scenery of the set for taking the photos it can have great effect on the end product. Manipulating the amount of lights and how close you take the photo from or how far away changes the dimension of the image which I learnt through making my magazine. I used a tripod in the process of constructing my product as it was required in order to rest the camera onto to it to get a steady shot. I learnt from the tripod that manipulating it’s height has a big impact on the angle at which the photo is taken and then how the photo appears when it is taken.

Jay Franks

Photoshop:

From the process of making my magazine through Photoshop, the software has become second nature to me. As I did GCSE media, as well as now A level I have been using the software for a long time now. But I discovered new tools and elements within the software that were required in order to make my magazine to the best quality possible. I used a lot of photo effects within the software in order to capture the right colour so it fits the style of the magazine and I learnt how to use this efficiently through advancing my skills with photo filter within photoshop and the editing software on my laptop. An example of what I have developed a good skill for is the brush tool as well as the colour picker tool. It was very important in my magazine that all the colours were perfect, and the brush and colour picker tool allowed me to do this with great effect. Not only that, it was useful for editing elements of the images. As for using the shades as a prop it showed the reflection of myself taking the photo in the reflection of the lens. Therefore I used this tool to edit this out but also keeping the shine of the reflection so it looked real. I learnt this skill, as previously before making the product I didn’t know how useful this tool was and I didn’t know it could be used for that purpose.

Jay Franks

Online sites and programs:

Blogger, Scribd, Slideshare, Soundcloud, Google and Prezi are programmes I used in order to complete the research and planning for my magazine as well as the evaluation. I use blogger to be able to post my work online so that it can be marked by the examiners as well as teachers. It is a good secure website where if my data gets lost I can still retrieve it of this website. I used Scribd to convert word documents to an embedded code so that I could then post it on my blog. This was the same for Slideshare, but for Powerpoint presentations. I used Soundcloud in order to complete the research and planning task of constructing a 20 song playlist that is suited to my genre. I was then able to post this on my blog so that the audience gets a better feel of what the music genre is like. Another site that I used extensively was Google, this was my main source of information in terms of the research and planning task to get an idea of magazines within my genre. Prezi is another site I used to construct an evaluation task. It presents the information in a different way to other programs making it more interesting for the reader. I learned a lot within this programme as I have only used it once before, I feel confident that I can go and use it confidently again to create a good piece of work. From using these different sites and programmes, I have learnt that there are multiple ways in which you can present information. Instead of using the same website or programme, you can make the information produced to be presented in a different way. This allows it not to become repetitive and interesting to read.

Jay Franks

Lighting:

In the process of making my magazine, for taking my photos in a studio or at home, I learnt that the amount of lighting has an effect on the effect on an image. Too much lighting can create a shadow giving the photo a mysterious effect and too little lighting can cause the image quality not to be very good. I tried different ways to manipulate the image which I found that in the media studio, having all the front lights turned on as well as the lamp shades it made the quality of the photo to be the best it can be.