Front Cover Draft using DTP

Since I got all my pictures and plans ready, I went on to constructing the front cover on the computer using DTP. Here is the first draft of the front cover:

First Rough Draft - Experimenting with Colour Schemes

At first, I had wanted a red and black colour scheme to match the more rock/indie genre of the magazine and so I started constructing a rough draft with this colour scheme to see how it looked.

 

 However, I came to realise as I was constructing the draft that the colours looked too harsh and aggressive, which was not I wanted to convey to the audience. The magazine was meant to be represent all music genres but with more indie/rock focus and influences, however, the red and black colour scheme was enforcing the rock theme too heavily due to its aggressive and angry connotations. Also, the red would not go well with the green backdrop of the pictures. Therefore, I decided to substitute the red for green. I felt that green was a better choice as it represented the 'darker' genres of indie and rock, yet not so heavy as to completely exclude the pop and hip-hip genres. Also, according to psychological colour properties, green represents 'balance', which I felt fit the magazine nicely as I did not want the magazine to be too discriminative in regards with genre - I wanted the magazine to focus on good music and talented artists rather than just genre. 

Here is the draft I made with the new colour scheme:

 

Editing the Pictures: Before & After

Image source: http://saitraining.co.uk/trainingLightroom.html

For the magazine, I edited several of the photographs taken due to problems with lighting, colouring, etc. I edited the pictures using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 - a program often used by professional photographers. Here, you can see the photographs as they were normally and the photographing after the manipulation - the before and after.

Before:                                                                                                         After:
                                         

 

  

Taking the Photographs

Preparing for the shoot! :)

After having planned the photoshoot and doing the pencil drafts, I decided to go ahead and take the pictures. I wanted the images to be in a studio so I asked to borrow the studio in the Art Department at my school. I also, borrowed some of the props required from the Music Department such as mics, guitars, and headphones.

I found my models through asking my friends ... I chose them based on who suited the look I was going for the most. After choosing my models, I briefed them on the type of clothes, colour of the clothes and the make-up I wanted for the photoshoot and then we carried out the photoshoot a couple days later. Here are the results:

    

 

To make my models achieve their specific looks, we used the help of make-up to convey their concepts. Here is the make-up we used!

I had originally wanted to borrow one of the professional DSLR cameras from Art Department, however, the camera I had borrowed was not working, therefore, I had to use my own camera - the Canon IXUS 750:

Thumbnails of Planned Photographs

After finishing the new pencil drafts, I started on the planning of the photographs too. Here are my ideas for the photoshoot:

I decided that I would like my models to be two Asian females to represent a duo band. I decided that I would like Asian females because I want my magazine to be solely about good music without any boundaries - whether it be genre-wise, popularity-wise or culturally. I want one of them to be dressed 'softly' and femininely while the other model to be dressed more chic and cool with more of a fierce vibe. I decided on this to show that they, as artists, have many sides to them - they try out a range of genres. However, the model who will be dressed more femininely will be dressed (if possible)  in a lace or translucent clothing to slightly show the bra. This will show that the artist still have more of an 'edgy' concept and although they like to try out variety of genres, they're main style is still indie/rock and they put their own twist to all their songs which are of another genre.

In terms of props, I have chosen to place both an electric guitar as well as an acoustic guitar into the photographs as this again represents the different genres and also makes it clear to the audience that it is a music magazine. I also decided on placing items such as headphones and microphones to emphasise to the audience, again, that this is a music magazine and that it is avid music fans. It also suggest that the band on the cover are one who are really interested in music and are not in the music industry just for the fame.

For the 2nd picture in the 2nd row, I decided to place headphones and its wires all around the picture and have the models entangled in them. This has connotations of the artists being constantly 'wrapped' in music and, again, emphasises the importance of music to them. Also, in this particular shot, I want the model who will represent the softer side to have a fierce expression while the other model will have a softer expression. This, again, plays on the fact that they have many sides to them and their music.

New Pencil Drafts

I had previously devised some rough pencil drafts of my pages. However, looking back on them as I started on the planning for the photographs, I realised that, due to time constraints, it might be hard to take all the photographs that I required for both the contents page and double page spread. Therefore, I have sketched out some new pencil drafts:

Contents Page:

Double page spread:

Planned Pencil Drafts

I have drawn out some simple rough sketches of the layout of the magazine pages: