STUDENT ANALYSISLook at an existing project – summarise its

strengths and weaknesses and what you

would like to take forward from it

This students work received 59 out of the possible

60 marks available for this part of the task. I think

this is because the student has clearly looked into

many different magazines and found a style that

she wanted to work with that would look effective

and would cover everything that she needed to

include. The student has used an image of the

model looking directly at the camera and this is a

technique I have seen frequently when I have been

researching my own magazines. There is a bold

title, and this is eye-catching and draws you into

the magazine. The student has clearly looked into

what a typical magazine includes for example a

short but interesting story heading which here is

“inside her mad, bad world” which interests the

reader and makes them want to read on into the

magazine. Similar to the magazines I have looked

at in my research, this student has used a list of

other things that will be in the magazine in the

baseline, for example names of bands. This helps

to encourage the reader to pick up the magazine

as they may not be interested in the main article

and instead want to read about the other artists

included inside. The front cover includes a little

section which says “win” and this will automatically

engage the reader into opening the magazine so

they can look into how to win what is stated. At the

top of the magazine under the logo, it says 10

exclusive interviews and this makes the reader

aware that what they will read in the magazine is

not seen before, and also is accurate as small

snippets of the conversation are inserted on the

front cover.

From studying different contents pages in my

research I feel like this is the area which let the

student down. I think strengths of this contents

page are that they have included the title which

says “Contents” which not all magazines have

anymore. I like the continuous use of the logo

throughout, and also the addition of “monthly

treats” at the bottom of the page. One of my

issues with the contents page is that it does not

feel as organised as the front cover and I think

that the pictures used make it seem slightly

messy. I think it would have been better if the

student had split up the contents and placed

pictures between as this way it would have

broken up all of the pages. I feel like some of

the descriptions of the pages are too long and

that the student should have looked into maybe

shortening some of the page names so that

they were short and precise which would save

time. I like the fact that on the photos it states

which page you will find the particular part

which is mentioned.

I feel like the contents page is lacking a stand

out feature as it all seems quite basic and I am

going to try and avoid this when creating my

own magazine as I want the contents page to

be more thought about.

From looking at double page spreads I can see that this student has followed the typical style of the double page

spread. There is a larger title, which draws you in. In this case the title is “my big break” and this is a good title

because it is short and precise, and also includes alliteration. I can also identify that the student has used a larger

O in the first paragraph, and this is typical of a magazine. I like the fact that throughout there are quotes which are

slightly larger than the rest of the text and these are in black font as opposed to the grey used in the other text. I

think this highlights the importance of these parts and the reader may read over these small bits to see whether

the full article will interest them. I like the fact that the colour scheme has been used throughout the magazine as

this makes it easier to read and understand without being distracted by the change of colours. There are three

photos, one larger than the other two and the only thing I would add in there is a caption as to who the images

are, who took them and what they signify. I like the fact that the student has used a white background for this

section as I feel it makes the headline stand out more and draws the readers attention to the article.

The only thing I would

think about doing

differently for this page is

making the logo slightly

larger as I feel like the

consistency of this is

almost dropped by

making it so small. Also, I

would make sure that the

page number is at the

bottom of the page

instead of next to the title

as I feel like people could

miss this when they are

reading the magazine and

especially if they are

trying to find an article

they want to read.