What I have learnt and how I have progressed.

Bill Topping.

What have you learnt about the technologies from the process of constructing this product?

I have come on leaps and bounds since the start of the year in terms of using technology. Before this year I had never used photoshop or publisher to create anything so it was a completely different experience for me. In terms of text, colours etc I never had a problem with how to do them I just lacked the creative spark needed for it to look good. My main problem was with editing pictures. At the beginning of the year my knowledge restricted me to using boring, block, unmanipulated photos which looked cheap and nasty. Now as the year has progressed I have become more confident with this problem and I am more at ease with editing pictures, whether it’s to do with cropping or changing colour etc. I also spent many long hours panicking about why I couldn’t get certain pictures on the blog. It took me a long time to find out I had to make the picture a jpeg. Once I had found this out my blogging became more consistent.

Publisher and PhotshopAt the start of the course I was expecting the use of computers to be the easiest thing in terms of what I had to seriously focus on. This turned out not to be the case and I sent most of the opening months of the year practicing and trying to get used to the programs we would be using. That practice definitely helped me otherwise the layout could have been simply awful.

I preferred using publisher as I found it much easier to move everything around. I used this program for my contents page and double page spread both of which I am proud of. The fact that I was more at ease with using publisher meant that I was more confident in experimenting with what different types of fonts sizes and colour I needed for different things. I made the pictures black and white to cover up my less than convincing photography and my progression with media practical has meant I could do this without any problem. For my front page I used photoshop and that is the one I am most proud of, however it did take me the longest. I soon realised the main point of photoshop is to help with the manipulation of photographs. Publisher is the one to help with design and layout.

The Blog I have also become more at ease with the blog. I have been consistently updating my blog with constant reference to how my designs have been getting along. I used to blog to log my different stages in planning and design. I made sure that I had the different stages of my design posted so the progression was much easier to see. I have also put on the blog feedback from friends and the interacting I had with potential customers. This was all helpful and having it on the blog meant I could always go back for referencing. We were encouraged to post every little detail to do with design and research on the blog to prove we are doing work. While I had a slow start I am happy with the way I began more consistently posting my progress so it was easier for everyone to see how I was doing. I am pleased with the way my blog looks and I feel that I have followed the instructions given to us well.

I also learnt how to embed videos and powerpoints onto my blog. This meant that I could vary the ways I answer questions in my evaluation. I am glad with the way it has all turned out.

The use of the blog has also allowed me to post feedback I have gained from peers and I have been able to show how I have acted on that feedback. It also means its possible for fellow media students to constantly give me more advice by adding comments which I can then act on.

One of the things I found most useful about the blog is that my work is always up there for reference. I can click on it if I need to see what specific font I used where and it is just so much easier than going through all the palaver of getting the actual product up for a quick check.Overall I found the blog very useful and I believe I put it to its best use.

Looking back at the preliminary task what do you feel you have learnt from it in the progression from it to the full

product?

Since the preliminary task I have gained more of an idea as to what looks good and what looks bad. My very first attempt consisted of very many different colours and texts. After help from others I now realise how bad that looked and hopefully have not made that mistake to that extent again. As I touched on before I have learnt how to manipulate pictures and move things around so they are in the best place they could be. I am happy with the progression I have made and if you compare my final front page design it looks so much better than my first attempt. As Lewis touched upon in my feedback he “didn’t think much” of my first school magazine. I agree with him and I am glad he likes my final design better.

Photoshop Progression The area I definitely made most progress with in Photoshop was the manipulation of photographs. After much constructive criticism and teasing it was made clear to me that photography was not my strong point and with my preliminary task I was restricted to block photos which did not look good in the whole context of the magazine. Although my photography is still poor I have on the whole managed to make up for that my learning how to manipulate the pictures. Mostly I changed the colours of them to black and white but I also learnt how to crop properly. On the front covers my pictures look good as they are cropped well and manipulated. I have progressed well since my first task and I believe that shows.

One of the main problems which I soon found out was the transferring of pictures or word from photoshop to publisher. This was not simple as it significantly interfered with the size or colour wanted. Once I found out how to fix this with help from teachers and friends I could do it more easily. As it happened there was not that much transferring needed after the front cover as most of everything else was done on publisher.