BY R I TA P R O TA S I E W I C Z

MY SIXTHFORM MAGAZINE

FRONT COVER

• This is the front cover for my sixthform magazine

• A problem that I struggled with since the beginning was that the photograph was taken landscape instead of portrait. I overcame this problem by resizing the image so that it fit into an A4 page and stayed in proportion.

• I believe the front cover is attractive to sixthform students because it is lively and school appropriate.

MASTHEAD• I started off with a simple, white typography over my

background. What I noticed was that the masthead was quite difficult to read over the background.

• The first step that I took to improve the masthead was changing the typography to one that was bolder and was easier to read. I enlarged the title and positioned it so that ‘Beyond’ was above ‘the Blazer’. I did this as it looked more attractive and we read from left to right. Also, I changed the colour to blue as it stood out against the background. Finally, I changed the typography of ‘the’ as I wanted the emphasis on the main words in the masthead.

• In the end, I once again changed the colour from blue to orange because orange is a connotation of the season Autumn and that is when I would like this issue to be published. Complex sixthform magazines are usually published every season and I wanted it to be the same for my magazine. Also, Autumn is the new start to a school year and it would be the most appropriate to represent my magazine in this way. The final step was to give my masthead a drop shadow so that it stood out against the background even more.

THE MAIN IMAGE • For my main image I used a school student

that I believed illustrated a school role model. I believe this is suitable for a sixthform magazine front cover as it is who students look up to. I took the photograph using a Cannon camera and the aperture priority setting. I made sure my model was looking straight at the lens to connect with the audience. Also, I took a mid-shot from the waist up. The props I used was a bench, for the subject to sit on, and a folder for them to hold. This represented the subject in its natural environment and what is expected of a student.

ANCHORAGE TEXT• I included an anchorage text

just below the masthead to attract the audience to one of the main articles in the magazine.

• I used a tag ‘Exclusive’ to engage the reader more and make the interview sound better than it actually is.

• To make the anchorage text stand out more than the other text on the front cover I used a drop shadow.

COVERLINES• I placed my coverlines on either side of the main image. This goes

against the right-hand side rule however, I decided to do this because one side of the cover would have looked empty otherwise. I decided to only include the essential articles from the magazine that sounded most interesting. I noticed that with a black font it was very difficult to read, therefore I changed the font to white as this worked better. However, to improve and make the coverlines easier to read, I could have created a drop shadow.

PUG

• The freebie that I decided to include with the magazine was an apple MacBook. This is suitable because students can use laptops in school to complete their school work and use it for research. The explanation mark gives more emphasis and makes the prize more exciting. To make it stand out more and make it more attractive I used a spiky, orange shape and an image of the prize. Once again I decided to use the colour orange to link back to the Autumn theme.

CONTENTS PAGE• This is the contents page of my

sixthform magazine.• I made sure the contents page

linked to the cover page as it is part of the same magazine. I did this by keeping the same typography – to allow in-house – and the same colour scheme – house colours.

• The background of the contents page blends in with the white background. I though this effect made the contents page more interesting and once again linked back to the green colour scheme.

TITLE

• The typography that I used was Bauhaus 93 and this was the same font for the masthead for the front cover page.

• The colour I used was orange to reflect back to the Autumn theme and the new start to the school year.

• I started off with only having the title and no effects on it. I realised later that with the drop shadow the word ‘Contents’ stood out more against the background.

SUBTITLE + COVERLINES

• I used the subtitle ‘What to expect in this months issue’ above the coverlines. This is effective because it introduces a whole block of text.

• For my coverlines, I made sure the page numbers were in red so that it did not blend in with all the text, therefore articles are then easier to find. Also, I separated the page numbers with the ‘|’ so that it was not part of the text.

• I used the same typography as the front cover page so that in-house was illustrated all the way through the magazine.

IMAGES• I took all the photographs myself using a Cannon

camera. The school environment was the most appropriate because, after all, it is a sixthform magazine.

• I took a before and an after picture that linked to one of my articles. This was the chair scandal article where there was not enough chairs in the common room. However, once more chairs where brought in, there was not enough tables. I illustrated this by having a photograph of neatly placed chairs and then an after picture of chairs being left all over the place.

• The 3rd image links to the article about county champions in planking and I got the subjects to plank.

• The final image is of the ‘Quiet Study Room’ and this once again links back to one of my articles.

• To make the images stand out against the background I used a drop shadow.