Some Images I Took To Use On My Contents Page - Editor's image

I took a number of images, that i could use on my contents page originally... as the Editor's picture, however as i furthered into the production my ideas changed and i did not use any of these images.

Girls Aloud Research

This is the research i gathered from the internet, to find out as much about the band as i could.


Girls Aloud are a UK girl group that were created on the ITV1 talent show Popstars: The Rivals in 2002. The group, consisting of Nadine Coyle, Sarah Harding, Cheryl Cole, Nicola Roberts and Kimberley Walsh have been successful in achieving a string of 20 consecutive UK Top 10 singles (including four number ones and four number twos, also 15 top 5 singles), two UK number one albums,all albums are certified platinum and having been nominated for four BRIT Awards, winning Best Single in 2009 for "The Promise".
Girls Aloud have become one of the few UK reality television acts to achieve continued success, amassing a fortune of £25 million by May 2009.[1] Guinness World Records lists them as "Most Successful Reality TV Group" in the 2007 edition. They also hold the record for "Most Consecutive Top Ten Entries in the UK by a Female Group" in the 2008 edition. The band have been working with Xenomania since the the start of their careers. They produce all of their material...
The link below is where i gathered my information from

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Girls_Aloud

Contents page - Feature Articles

9 -EXCLUSIVE interview with the latest Pop sensation, Pixie Lott, The ‘Mama’ Do’ singer talks to us exclusively on her new album and her rise to fame in under a year!

34 -Which bands make, and which bands Brake this week? - find out in our page all about the latest pop band splits and the freshest pop talent

39 -UK Top 40! - This weeks Top 40 revealed here, incase you missed it on Sunday we have it for you! - Letting you know who has made it to the No1 spot and what funky new songs have entered the UK Pop charts!

44 -Interviews with Pop Stars? What about interviews with their Managers! The people behind the scenes of the stardom, the people who make it happen! Read about it inside...

51 -LEGEND ALERT - Read our new page about Pop Legends, The musicians who have proved to be great successful pop artists!

63-POP STAR OF THE MONTH

Contents Page - Regular Content

4 -Letter from the Editor, letting you in on all the gossip and news from the month

5 -Letters sent in by you, the reader readers - Tell us your thoughts on this months top celebrity stories

7 -Send in Your Stories free and we will put them in our magazine

11 -WHOOPS Page - The images the stars didn’t want us to see!

12 - 15 -Concerts around the UK - Tour dates for all UK arenas throughout the next month - Get your tickets before anyone else!

19 -Agony aunt page! - Got something on your mind, want to talk to someone about it? Abby our agony aunt is here to help!

23 -FREE POSTER!

Contents Page - Editors Letter

EDITOR’S LETTER Hello and welcome to this week’s edition of Pop stardom! This week i have been out looking for the latest news and gossip from the celebs, there are some interesting finds as you read on! This week you lucky girls are in for a treat as we have a New and EXCLUSIVE interview with Pop sensation Pixie Lott! But wait... there more, yes we have more! We have exclusively for Pop stardom magazine, a brand new page dedicated to you girls out there! This new page allows you to write in with any problems or if you just want to rant about something, write into us and we’ll publish it in our next edition of our magazine! Anyway girls for the latest news and gossip read on!

Change Of Ideas

Double Page Spread

For my double page spread, my ideas have changed. I was planning on writing a biography about the girlband Girls Aloud and then add an interview with a real Girls Aloud fan... However after planning this and writing up in a word document,my questions and other original ideas started to change. Therefore when i started to use Quark Xpress i found this. And my final idea came to be that i would just write a biography about the band, letting the audience know more about them. I choose to use Girls Aloud because i went to see them in concert and i had good quality images of the group, also the genre of music i have choosen is the 'Pop' genre, and the girlband appeals to my target audience of Girls ages 10+.

Title Of Magazine

I have edited the title of my music magazine because my original idea of “PopRocks” had connotations of the Rock genre, however this may confuse the audience, therefore I have edited it and made some changed and after a long plan I came up with a new title, called ‘Pop Stardom’… this works because it only connotes the Pop genre and does not confuse the audience.

My Final Plans

Front Cover

• Take images of pitures that connote the "Pop" Genre
• Use a female model because my target audience are females

Contents Page

• Write a list of Feature articles
• Regular content
• Editor's

A list of the images I am going to use for my contents page is…

• Image of the editor
• An iPod
• Another image of the Girls Aloud concert
  

Decision making & Ideas

• I don’t want to use a lot of images, I would prefer to use a limited amount
• I do not want the page to look very much text based
• For my double page spread I have decided to write a biography on the Girl group Girls Aloud
• Research the band and the collect and write up my double page spread using the information I obtain
• Write about how the group got together
• How the band went straight to No.1 with their first single
• The bands success over the past six years
• What the plans are for the band within the next year.
• Use one large image for my double page spread, of the group at their Out Of Control concert.

Final Double Page Spread Article

Girls Aloud are one of the most successful Girl bands in Britain, the group originated from ITV reality TV show Pop stars: The Rivals in which the group collaborated together to become BRIT Award winning pop artists!, and here we have an exclusive biography about the Pop band everybody loves...
Girls Aloud are a very successful trendy UK Pop group, the band were originally unsigned solo acts, however they after appearing individually to audition for ITV Talent show Pop Stars: The Rivals in 2002, the band were created and won over the viewers and went on to become “The most successful reality TV group” in 2007. The concept of the programme was to create a successful Girl band and Boy band, and they would then compete for the UK No.1 for Christmas 2002. The girls won and their first single released went straight in at No1 at Christmas and stayed on top for four weeks. The final five girls who made it into the group were Cheryl Cole, Nadine Coyle, Sarah Harding, Nicola Roberts and Kimberly Walsh. Girls Aloud went on to be managed by judge Louis Walsh until 2005, Girls Aloud went on to record their debut album; ‘Sound of the Underground’, which was released on 23 May 2003, and entered number two in the album charts. The group went on in 2008 to release their fifth album, ‘Out of control’; the first single released from their album was ‘The Promise’ which entered the UK charts yet again, for the fourth time at No.1! Successful UK tours, first in 2005 with ‘What will the neighbours say’, 2006 Chemistry tour, 2007The Sound Of Girls Aloud, with their
Greatest Hits, 2008 Tangled Up tour then the groups latest tour Out of Control in 2009! The girls started their 2009 UK tour in April, crossing the country and letting us hear the amazing music they make. The girls were performing throughout April and May and they kicked off their tour in Belfast then Dublin, the girls then followed on to travel up and down. The popular British band is due another three albums, the first was ‘Out Of Control’, and the second is expected in autumn 2010 for release. However for now the girls decided that after travelling and promoting their ‘Out Of Control’ tour in 2009 that they were going to ‘Take a break’ from their music careers and focus on their solo projects for a while. ‘TAKE A BREAK FROM THEIR MUSIC CAREERS’ Cheryl Cole is going to focus on her music career as a new solo artist, recording and releasing her debut album ‘3 words’, which went straight to No.1, also her first solo single ‘Fight for this love’ went in at No.1 becoming the fastest selling single of 2009. Nadine Coyle is working on her new solo album also, and is planning its release in March 2010. However Sarah Harding is taking a different route from music and is focusing on her acting, she has landed a spot in the UK film St Trinians and what a fabulous job she did, Nicola Roberts plans on extending her current Make-Up range, Danity Doll, mean whilst Kimberly Walsh is modelling for the popular high street store, New Look. Girls Aloud have not only toured globally, but have appeared in numerous television shows, in 2005 the girls filmed a one off documentary entitled Girls Aloud: Home Truths, the show basically shown viewers the scenes behind the music being made, the show saw the release of single ‘Long Hot Summer’ and their first tour, the show was that successful that the girls then went on to make a documentary, this time it was a six part series on E4, showing the band promoting their latest singles. The band was later lucky enough to have their series made into a DVD, which included unaired scenes from the show. This enabled the popular group to show fans more of what the group’s everyday life is like. They are permanently on the move, promoting their new albums and singles, however their hectic schedule trying to make their careers a success has paid of for them on a big scale. In the groups 6 year career as a successful pop group they have won 31awards, they won a Brit award in 2009 ‘Best Single of the Year’’ with ‘The Promise’, however the band have been nominated for an amazing 64 awards! Overall the girls have proven to be the No1 UK Girl Pop band of all time!

Regular Codes And Conventions Of A Front Cover

Regular Codes And Conventions Of A Front Cover

• Bold masthead in unique font ordering from Left to Right
• Central image presenting a direct mode of address
• No text accross central image
• Freebie offers enticing audience
• Barcode
• Positioning statement next to the title
• Certain number of colour use throughout production
• Various font styles and sizes
• Puff - E.g "FREE CD"
• Around the central image displays other smaller images of the magazine features
• Strapline - At the top or bottom of the page, normally in capital letters
• Coverlines and smaller coverlines to attract the reader
• 
  

Regular Codes And Conventions Of A Contents Page

Regular Codes And Conventions Of A Contents Page

• Regular Content
• Feature Articles
• Numerous small images
• Issue date
• Page numbers anchoring images
• Editor's letter - image of the Editor next to it
• Website Address
• Page numbers displayed in columns wth a breif description written next to it
• Font size 11pt
• Colour scheme kept simple - links with the front cover
• Headings

The image below shows an example of an old popular 'pop' genre magazine 'Smash Hits' front cover.

Regular Codes and Conventions of Double Page Spreads

Regular Codes And Conventions

• Drop Quotes - in order to capture readers attention
• Short Summary of the plot feature, A Standfirst
• The first letter is a Capital letter
• One large image within the page, displaying some relevance to the article
• A strapline accross the top of the page
• Limited use of colour; so the reader is not overpowered with bold colours
• Eye catching headlines
• With music magazines the artist/bands name is usually highlighted and made bigger
• Sometimes have an image of the journalist at the end of the feature with a By-Line
• Text arranged into columns
• Page number written in the bottom right of the page
• The title of the magazine will be displayed within the page

Practice Camera Shots

Before we started to plan and design our magazine and contents page, we were asked to take practice camera shots, from a range of different camera angles, and in various settings.

PRELIMINARY -Planning and creating my front cover

We were told to use Photoshop to create our front cover for the school magazine. Before i started to create it on the computer i sketched an A4 size plan of what i wanted my front cover to contain and look like. However when i went on to create my front cover on Photoshop i found that my original ideas that i had put into my plan had changed, for example i had planned for the main theme of the magazine to be Halloween based, therefore i was planning on capturing an image of two students in halloween costumes in the school settings. However i found this awkward to do as i was not able to take students out of their classrooms and ask them do dress up. As it was not yet halloween either, there were no decorations or anything to connote that it was Halloween. Moreover i then decided to ask a friend to dress up as a witch, which i found to be more accessible therefore i could take the image and then use that as my central front cover image.
In addition i also had features on my plan, for example there was a Year 12 trip to paris coming up, therefore because all the images had to be original i took a picture of the French flag to connote france. As with my contents page i also decided that i would not have too many images on my front cover, as my central image was very eyecatching, so i didnt want other images surrounding it, because it would look very over the top and confusing.

PRELIMINARY - Planning my contents page and changes i made

When i got on to task eight of the work we were asked to produce, i had to create a contents page for my school magazine on Quark Xpress, however before hand i was asked to roughly sketch a contents page, so i has ideas. I made a list of features and regular content in school magazines, therefore i had more ideas of what content i could upload onto my contents page. I also made a sketch which displayed where i would place my images and that my contents page would be set out into columns. I decided that i would have only 4 images, and then i would have Sub-headings such as 'Halloween' then underneath the subheading i would list any content the magazine was to contain about Halloween. Therefore if the reader only wanted to read about the halloween disco, which was one of my features, then it would enable them to find the page quicker as it was set out into sections.
Furthermore as i have never used Quark Xpress before, we were given a class demonstration in which i took down notes to help me to remember how to use the program in the following lessons. At first i found Quark Xpress confusing, in that it was different to Photoshop, which was what i was used to and i had to do things in a different way, however the more i used the program i come to find that it was easier than i had originally percieved it to be.

PRELIMINARY - Images i took for my front cover Central image

I took these images of a friend i choose to use as my central image, i took numerous images, and then afterwards decided which two images i would use. I chose one for my central image of my front cover and then one for my contents page.

PRELIMINARY - Final front cover

This is my final front cover design.

PRELIMINARY -Final contents page

This is my final contents page creation.

PRELIMINARY evaluation

Evaluation


For this task we were asked to design and create a front cover and contents page using Photoshop and Quark Xpress for a school magazine. All our images had to be original and taken ourselves, however i found this a challenge as my idea was to have a Halloween themed magazine. Therefore i had planned to capture images to connote Halloween. However because at the time we were taking the images for our magazine it was not yet Halloween i could not find much to help, so i decided to ask a friend to dress up as a Witch so i could use the picture as my central image on my front cover. I also made sure that my picture followed the central mode of address. Also as with all magazines, mine followed alot of the regular codes and conventions, for example the Masthead was in a unique font and was bold and very easily noticed by the reader, i also used coverlines. And numerous smaller images throughout the page.
Moreover i used Photoshop to create my Front cover, i found this rather easy as we have used Photoshop to create a magazine before. So i already had the hang of it. However i did not find this when we were asked to use Quark Xpress to create our contents page. This was because i struggled abit at the beginning of creating the contents page, because i was not used to using the computer program, however after finding my barings with it, i found it just as easy as Photoshop.
Additionally before we started the task and throughout the task we looked at other real media products, such as magazines of different genres and looked at and noted down the codes and conventions of a magazine. This became very useful when i was creating my own magazine. And it helped me to make it as much like a real school magaizne as possible.