1. Unit 51 Page Layout and Design
Production Commentary

2. Design Programmes
The main programme I used throughout my magazine project was Adobe Photoshop. It
is one of the best and most professional programmes you can get to edit and
manipulate photos. Photoshop was essential in my project as I completed both my
front cover and my double page spread using it. I also edited my images on it to try to
create a more professional look. I used tools like the clone tool, the selection tool and
changed all image settings like exposure, colour balance and levels. By using the
selection tool it allowed me to select a certain area of the image and edit it rather than
changing the whole image. I did this with a few pictures for example wit the sky in quite
a few images. To make to sky look a little more special and better. And the clone tool
comes in handy quite a lot when there is something in an image you don’t want, you
can then clone a certain area and cover up something. Most of the time it is good just
to slightly clean up an image. There is also the re-sizing of images and cropping. When
actually creating the front page and double page I used a lot of things like numerous
cool fonts, images that I had taken and found images. And also a couple of shapes to try
and keep it to contribute to it being relevant to the target audience. On the double
page spread I added coloured squares and rectangles behind the specific font so that it
didn’t get too confusing realising what paragraph was to what image.
I also used Microsoft word to get my initial article types up on. Microsoft software's as
a whole are incredibly popular and used so much world wide every single day. I used
this programme to type up my whole article how I would have liked it then my friend
Emily went through it and corrected things she thought didn’t work or were wrong. I
typed around a 1000 words for my article and there were a few minor changes I had to
make to it. Once I had made these corrections I then copy and pasted it into my
Photoshop project and separated it into the correct sections and to the right pictures.
Adobe Photoshop
Microsoft Word

3. Formats
When we were originally planning the magazine project I looked at an umber of different styled magazines. Originally I thought I
was going to do a music magazine but then I thought as I do a lot of sports photography in my spare time it would work out better
to do a sports based magazine. To help me understand the layout and styles of extreme sports magazines I looked at a few different
ones. The one bellow influenced me with the use of the Model Credits, I liked the fact they weren't all straight. I thought by
incorporating this onto my work it would be so boring and would add more anchorage.
I also considered that the masthead on this front cover goes right across
the top of the page. I thought in order for me to do this I had to merge
my image into it so that you could see my image fully over the font but
still be able to read the font correctly. It looks better and shows the use of
more complex editing. This how I incorporated this into my own front
cover.
I also briefly discussed music magazine. This is taken from
Kerrang!. It didn’t necessarily influence me in my project but
analysing this kind of text definitely helped me understand the
layout and style better.

4. Conventions & Visual Language
I would say that my front cover keeps to the target audience and there is a lot of use of colour and big
fonts. This could anchor the younger ones quite a lot better. As my magazine is targeted at teenagers and
people interested in the sport I felt that to keep it as relevant as possible and not too serious this was the
best way. Also using a big exciting picture as the main source of anchoring the audience definitely helped
it hooks you straight away. Then there is the masthead. By having it as a lace made it so relevant to the
name of the magazine. Again it is in some senses quite childish as it is like cartoony. I liked this though as it
almost sets the seen a bit better. And obviously with it being called laced it is relevant to having your
shoes tied tight when riding so your shows don’t fall off.
Then there is the double page spread. Again the use
of colour and images is really essential so people will
look at the pages and feel like they want to read on.
The use of the relevant coloured subheading font I
feel works well as it relates to the most relevant
colour in the image. Again it keeps it more quirky
and not as boring it adds a little more colour to it as
well so it isn't all just black and white and drab.
I did strongly consider the Guttenberg principle as well in the creation of the
front cover. Using quite a strong and bold Masthead so that it looks like a
masthead and not just a random word. As your eyes lie here first I thought it
most relevant to try and get a good masthead. I also have the use of strong
model credits to big up the main article featuring in my double page spread. And
in the Axis of Orientation I knew I needed to feature an action shot. So by using
the picture of my friends riding allowed there to be a lot of anchorage. I used a
barcode in the lower left corner in the weak fallow area as it isn't an important
part so I thought by putting that there is made it look professional.

5. Audience
The target audience for my magazine is Teenagers ranging from 12-19. but then it is relevant to adults as well as not
all people interested in extreme sports are teenagers. It is more targeted towards male as it is a male dominant sport
but then I do want there to be some relevance to girls. But it will only be relevant to those who are interested in
scootering as a sport. I would say the social class is hard to call due to the people being younger. However if I did it
would be working class or lower working class due to some of the people that would be of the target audience may
have apprenticeships and or skilled work. Or bar work. But the majority would be un-employed as they’re too young
to possible be employed.
I would say it meets the needs of the target audience due to there being a lot of
relevance to the sport even just through the front cover with the mentioning of a lot
of popular iconic things in the sport like competitions and Skatepark’s even
professional riders from around the world. People would be aware of these
conventions if they were into the sport. And then there is the main picture feature on
the front cover I have previously mentioned but this adds anchorage and pulls you in
as it is an exciting picture and people interested in the sport would want to see some
action and excitement.
Again I would say that the use of
fonts and colours is the same on
the double page spread as I used
the same headline font as I did on
the front cover. And I tried to use
interesting looking pictures but it
was hard because there was a lot
more font so there wasn’t as much
room for pictures. Which is a bit of
a downfall as a younger audience
would want to see more images.