College Magazine EvaluationZac Walker

I feel that my magazine pages meet the typical conventions a reader expects from a magazine, regardless of genre. The masthead is probably the most typical of all the conventions, it creates an identity for the magazine which makes it easily recognizable when it’s amongst others in stores. For mine I used the title “ProspectUS” playing on the connotations gained from this. Prospectus is a term used in education, linking to the genre, but the separation of “Prospect” and “Us” adds to this, attending college broadens your prospects and “Us” implies an “all-in-this-together” attitude. The use of only the two colours strengthens the brand identity. My cover image meets the brief we were given, a medium-close-up of a single student, which are often the specifications many magazine covers use. None of the stories cover the face, as this is what the reader is most drawn to.The coverline is larger than the others so signifythat this is the one linked to the image.

Evaluation: Conventions

Evaluation: RepresentationI attempted to represent teenagers in a positive way as this is how I feel a magazine of this genre should. The best example of this would be in the cover image and the story linked to it. Emma is pictured with positive facial expression, implying that she enjoys being in the learning environment and is willing to help others through their time at college (reflecting the “all-in-this-together” of the masthead) another example is that the other stories featured display the achievements of youth with exam results, but also the stress and pressure that comes from them, signifying that youths aren’t lazyand care about their education and future, unlike howyouth is represented in other forms of media.

Evaluation: TechnologiesHaving knowledge of photoshop, I found using this piece of software easy, and was able to use most of the basic and a few more complicated tools to create my cover page without much help if any. Quark on the other hand I had no prior knowledge of and found quite difficult to use as it wasn’t as user-friendly as photoshop with a great deal of constraints that photoshop doesn’t have. However the ability to use a column layout made it the right choice for the contents page, as this is a convention that sets it apart from the other pages in a magazine.