Flat Plans

One of the things I have been doing to help plan out my coursework is to draw up a few plans for my Front Page and Contents, in the hope of giving myself a better idea of what I want them to look like. I used the 4th picture I edited as a base for the picture and began working around that for the Front Page. Here is what I have come up with:

Front Cover

This is the first drawing I did to plan out my work. I have used a number of ideas from other places, for example the column along the left hand side was used by the front cover of Kerrang! Magazine that I analysed earlier. The Masthead is large, clear and centered to the top of the page. The coverlines are meant to bend around the models face, neck and shoulders the way I feel it should have been done for RockSound magazine. The face underneath the M has been inspired by Disturbed Mascot "The Guy" and has been adapted to fit. A circular button is placed under the second M of the Masthead as space for a special offer or an upcoming event of some kind that will interest my audience. The column on the left hand side is made to look like Torn or Burnt paper, a design element I included alongside the fire at the bottom of the page, just for another aesthetic element. I have gained some feedback from my peers and my teacher regarding this mock-up, and I have been told that the column does not fit into a Front Page. I can understand this as it could distract the audience from the main story, the element itself is much more appropriate for a Contents page.

This is the Second Mock-Up I have done for my Front Page, and there are quite a few changes from the first. As you can see the column on the left hand side has been removed, but the flames at the bottom of the page remain behind the Main Coverline. The Price has been moved from above the Masthead to resting on top of the Barcode, a place I feel that is much more appropriate. The Torn or Burnt paper effect still remains just behind the Masthead as a graphic element, and the sphere button has been made to look more like a Bullet Hole (sorry about the terrible drawing...). Coverlines are still bending around the models head, neck and shoulders but they are above the wings that I had thought about adding in Photoshop, although I have been going against that idea now that I have seen it rough on paper. Finally, using a Sharpe pen I have added in tattoos and red eyes to my model similar to the way I had done before in my first edited image. I still think that the whole tattoo and glowing eyes edit is a good idea but just isn't appropriate for a Front Page picture, and I might try to include it in either the Contents or the DPS of my Magazine. 

Picture used for Front Page Mock-Ups

Contents Page

Here you can see the Mock-up that I have done for my Contents page. As you can see I've decided to go with a 3 column layout which is what I have found in my research, and have positioned my features in the center of the page, with my main image positioned to the right hand side. The Masthead has been constructed in a similar way to that of my Front Cover, and the shard design is shown throughout my Contents Page as one of the main design elements, but also as a way in which to define the spaces for the features of my magazine and to separate the different features accordingly. Now that I have drawn up this particular layout for my Contents Page however, I feel that many of the ideas I tried on this plan aren't appropriate for use in my Contents Page. For example, there is space remaining between the features of the magazine that could be filled if the layout was more thought out and systematic. There also aren't enough pages in my magazine according to my Contents Page, and with the space left I feel I could fit more features in to show that this is a Monthly magazine over being a Weekly edition. Also, I don't like what I have done with the main image in this plan, by cutting half of my models face off at the edge of the page obviously isn't appropriate for a Contents Page image, and I feel that I ought to include the other member of 'Hell Raiser' as well in my Contents Page. On a more minor note, I feel that the way I have set out the Competition feature, at the bottom of the page, could be improved and constructed to take up less space which would again give me more space for features in my magazine and also give 'Project Mayhem' the professional look and feel evident in existing media products.

Double Page Spread

To the right you can see the hand drawn design of my Double Page Spread, where I have tried out a few ideas of how I want my Double Page Spread to turn out. As you can see I intend to combine two images that I have previously taken of my models individually, and this is to show a divide between the two which is strengthened through their different costumes, each of them representing the light side and the dark side respectively. The introductory paragraph takes up the majority of the left hand page, and is Text Wrapped around the image. I have also included a Drops Cap with a depth of atleast 5 Lines in my introductory paragraph, since this is a common element that has been seen in my research, which can be found here. The questions are then arranged around the image with a final note at the bottom to conclude the article, with the title in the bottom-centre of the article, with the word 'Hell' on one side of the fold and 'Raiser' on the other, to make allowance for the fold. Now that these ideas have been put down on paper I can see there are a few issues with my Double Page Spread plan, and the main issue I can see is there are only 7 questions in the article. This is obviously way too little, and needs to be expanded upon since there are roughly 20 questions in the Green Day article that I analysed from Q magazine. I also think that the narrative beginning also takes up too much space, so the layout of my Double Page Spread needs to be revised. However, I feel the image works well to create the desired effect and the page numbers have been included are appropriate to the article and the genre of music.