Production - Preliminary Magazine Task

The first thing I had to do to get my magazine started, was take an array of photos. As I had a vague idea of how I wanted the person on my front cover to look, I decided it would be easier if I modelled myself. I took a selection of photos, around 15, and then chose 3 of my favourites. I then uploaded the photos onto my laptop, once I had decided which photo I was going to use for my front cover I quickly started to edit it in Photoshop.
Using photoshop, and the tool, magnetic lasso, I cut around the picture of me, making sure the edges were fairly neat.
Choosing a possible font for the mast head was possibly the hardest part for me. I wanted something that gave the magazine a clean edgy look, but also looked quite artistic. I played around with a few possibilites until I decided to use the same font that COMPLEX use for their mast head.

Once I had chosen my mast head font, I needed to choose 2/3 other fonts that I could use for my front cover. I still wanted quite edgy fonts to give the magazine a style completely different to others. But they also had to be eligible and in keeping with the style of the magazine.

I then continued to put all of these features together. After adding dates, titles and a barcode, I decided that the cover was still quite bland. After looking at previous COMPLEX issues I decided to include paint splats to fill any empty space.

Using Photoshop was not much of a task as I have used it, and the many features before. But one of the main tasks that I had to overcome was the use of layers, as most of my previous Photoshop experience was just editing photos this was still quite a new feature. This was something that I felt I overcame quite quickly.
The main skill I acquired during production is my Photoshop skills, I know feel that I am a comfortable with most Photoshop features. This will help when I come to do my final magazine.

These our my initial drafts of both my front cover and contents page.