Q6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Internet as a research tool

Using the internet has helped me throughout the project. I was able to look up the layout of professional magazines and then use this information to help me create my own magazine front cover. The main magazine that I was using to help me was mixmag and there was a lot of things on the internet that I found out that helped me with my magazine, for example I also looked at the contents pages that mixmag have already produced. This was essential because I could get ideas from these magazines for my own product. I also used the internet to find out information for my article about David Guetta.

Blogging as a method of organising and arranging research and planning materials

Using blogger makes it easier to arrange your work so that it is clear and looks more professional. It is a good way to organise your work so that you know where you’re up to. On blogger is allows you to go back and edit the work that you have already done to change it and make it better. I have learnt that using blogger is a good way for me to put all of my work onto, there is also many different ways to do your work, e.g. slide share for documents and you can also upload videos.

Digital Cameras

Digital cameras are good to use so that you can get good clear pictures. On digital cameras you can also have different settings so that you can get the exact picture you want, this makes it better because it will be clearer and more suitable for what type of image you want.

I was unfamiliar with using Photo Shop and at first it was complicated but it got easier the more you went on it. It is a good way to create a front cover because you can manipulate the image to look how you want it. There are lots of different tools to use to create different effects. I used the text tool to create different fonts that looked good for my front cover, I used a bigger and bolder font for the main headline. You can also change the background effects, I changed the gradient so that it was darker at the bottom of the page. I have learnt a lot of different techniques by using Photo Shop and I think it is a good way to create a front cover.

I was also unfamiliar with how to edit photos on Photo Shop. At the stat I had a coloured background so I learnt how to cut around the image so then I could put the picture onto the background that I have chosen. Also to manipulate pictures there are tools for airbrushing, and cropping. I have cropped the image so that is fits onto my front cover and so that it is good for the layout of what I had chosen to do.

I found Quark a lot harder to use then Photo Shop, this is because it was a lot more complicated and harder to create all of the text and the coloured boxes. One thing that I did like about using Quark was that unlike Photo Shop it doesn’t have lots of different layers so therefore it is easier to move things around. However I did like the way that you could put columns in and then the writing moves to the next column when you add more text, this is better than using text boxes. I think that on Quark on the computer it makes it look better than when it is printed off. I like the way that you could crop the picture and move them around. Also on quark there is an option for you to have a drop cap, this is important for every article that goes into magazines.