Evaluation

Before I started working on my front cover and contents page, I looked at the common conventions of magazines. By doing this, I had a better understanding of how the layout should look and what colour scheme, pictures, and fonts to use. I began researching by firstly looking at the Bodmin College Magazine. Because this magazine doesn’t appeal to its target audience, as it looks too busy and unprofessional, I decided that it wasn’t a very good design. I then made my own Bodmin College Magazine using the results from my survey monkey to produce a magazine that the target audience would find appealing. From my survey monkey, I found that the majority chose quality for what they dislike about the magazine the most, and they chose both better quality and better font for what they would like to see on the front cover. On my front cover, I have followed some of the common conventions; such as having the masthead take up 1/8 of the page so that it is clear and will stand out – unlike on the original Bodmin College magazine. I also used the layout convention with one medium shot as the main image, which is the focus of the front cover, with text overlaid around the image. This meant that my front cover looked professional without looking too busy. The target audience will find this appealing, as it will be more pleasing to the eye; catch their attention and make them want to read it.

My target audience is for students age 11-19 as this is the age of the student attending Bodmin College. It needs to appeal to them because it has information they are interested in inside. From the results of my survey monkey, I found that the most recent age that read the magazine is 14-16 so I need it to appeal to the this age range more as they are the ones that are more likely to read it. My magazine is mainly targeted for students in higher education; this goes against what Stanley Hall wrote in 1904 where he came up with the ‘Storm and Stress Model’. He stated ‘Adolescence is inherently a time of storm and stress when all young people go through some degree of emotional and behavioural upheaval before establishing a more stable equilibrium at adulthood’, also, he thought that the ‘common mood in teenagers was depressed’ and ‘criminal activity would increase at the ages of 12 and 24’. My magazine goes against this theory as the students of this age have continued with their education and it also shows that they haven’t become depressed or got into any criminal activity because they are still attending college. I want my magazine to show a positive view about teenagers instead of the negativity that is usually put on them. I think my cover and contents page have done this through the stories that I have included.

The primary target audience for my magazine is students that attend Bodmin College as the content will be about topics that involve them. To make them want to read the magazine, the stories will need to be about things that interest them. Although from the survey I found out that the majority of people that read the magazine are between ages 14 and 16, so there will be content targeted for this age range in particular. The parents/guardians of the students attending Bodmin College will be the secondary target audience as they will want to know about the stories and event happening at the college, especially if their son/daughter is involved. This means that there needs to be informative content about the curriculum and students work as well as being appealing to the students. I have attracted my target audience by using an attractive colour scheme and made sure that my layout wasn't too busy and have used a fairly simple layout making it easy to read and find the information that the reader wants to know. It has the common conventions of how a magazine cover should be laid out, so it was effective. I also featured stories that will appeal to my target audience, such as news about school uniform and 'how to have your say' so they know how they can make a change to their school life. I added a story about managing studies which will appeal to the older students and will give parents an idea of their child's education and how they should be managing their time,

I have used new media technologies to construct my magazine. I think the following quote by David Gauntlett in 2007 represents the process I went through to make my cover page and contents page: "The view that the internet and new digital media as an optional extra is replaced with the recognition that they have fundamentally changed the ways we engage media." This process has made me more confident about magazine layout and how a simple layout can be effective. I think what I have learnt from this supports Gauntlett's because it shows the way we engage with new media.

Overall, I think the outcome of my cover and contents page was good because they used common conventions which would be appealing to the target audience. I also feel that I have made an improvement on the original Bodmin College magazine as it appeals to the target audience, has relevant stories and topics, and is overall better quality with a more attractive colour scheme, a simple but professional layout and better fonts and images. Although, I still think there could be improvements on my work; such as a clearer, bolder font for the text around the image. I also feel that my front cover appeals to a mainly female audience because of the colour scheme and main image, however, I think that my contents page appeals to both genders.