Question 6 – Technology – What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

HardwareHardware, in the computer world, refers to the physical components that make up a computer system. There are many different kinds of hardware that can be installed inside, and connected to the outside, of a computer. I used a lot of hardware in the process of making my magazine and getting the finished product. I used the Apple Mac with all its accessories, a camera, SD card and reader and lighting with a backboard for imagery. The hardware itself was all a key part in the making of this magazine and without all the hardware I had access to my magazine would not of been produced at the quality it looks as a final product.

Apple Mac andaccessories

The apple mac was the building blocks to my media work as it allowed me to form everything on one piece of equipment. The Mac HD-

Processor- 2 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo

Memory- 3 GB MHz DDR2 SDRAM

It came with all the software available for me to get started from the get go and get the best final product possible. I found it very easy to use as a desktop as all the accessories especially the keyboard and mouse were so easy to get used to.

The keyboard itself made it extremely easy to speed up work with short cuts such as-

apple+shift+4= allows me to crop a image of anything selected which helped when it can to analysis of my magazine and zooming in on small things.

The mouse made it easy to cut and drag parts of images and allow me to set out all of my work in the way I want it.

The Camera, strobe flash and Horseshoe flash trigger

For my photo taking I used a Nikon D3100. The camera itself allowed me to get some very vivid and HD shots to give my magazine cover, contents and article a professional style making it as eye catching and attractive to the target audience as possible. Having this quality of camera allowed me to change the cameras shutter speed(1/300th) to the level of output to the strobe flash which allows me to get a modeling light effect on the images I took. Using a horse shoe flash trigger allowed me to link together the camera and strobe flash light using the infa red signals. Putting a flash trigger on both the camera and lighting gave the camera a flash in-sync with the lighting giving me top quality photos.

Soft Boxes and BackdropThe soft box gave my shots an edge over amateur photography to give it a sense of a professional modeling photo shoot. The soft boxes used disperse the harsh light to give it a softer, rounder light on the subject I am taking photos of. By using this it allowed me to get full quality and also allowed me to be adventurous with my shots as I could move it about to get side and back drop shadows. The backdrop is lit with two other strobes on the highest level to give a high intensity exposer and further allow shadowing.

Software The software used in this project has been vital to creating the finished product with the best visual quality possible. Obviously without the hardware like the Apple Mac I would not of been able to even run the software I included in creating the magazine however I feel both hardware and software were as important as each other as without the specific qualities of the programs the quality would not of been up to professional standards. I used a variety of software in the process of creating the magazine but also in the planning and final analysis. The main software used when creating the magazine were ‘photoshop’ and ‘indesign’. In the planning and analysis safari, a blog, powerpoint, and word were the key pieces of software for the work to be completed in the correct way amd allowed me to be creative with the work I was doing.

Photoshop

Photoshop was the main piece of software when creating the cover, contents and article of my magazine. I found it quit easy to use as a program as it is set out in a simple but effective way. The ability to have layers really helped with the layout of the pages but mostly the cover page as I wanted a multi layer look to fit the style of my magazine and the genre I focused on. The program also has extremely useful tool such as adding effects to the images and using the plaster tool to take out blemishes etc. Photoshop is also very useful when it comes to moving objects and pieces of text around, The ruler tool made it very easy in the contents and parts of the cover to get thing in line so it looks attractive to the eye and not a bit rushes and messy.

Photoshop examples

Layering was a key use

The ruler tool was very useful

Power point and wordPower point came in to use when I had finished my cover ,article and contents and had to do analysis of the finished products. Power point was a useful program as I could make the analysis visually appealing by including a lot of imagery as well as the text. I felt I could go into a lot of detail compared to a simple page of writing as I could use imagery to explain my points. Power point also is more interesting to look at for the reader of my blog and gives it a lot more appeal. Word came in useful mostly for my article and planning the questionnaire and the answers. It made the text easily transferable onto ‘in design’ so I could spend more time on the imagery and layout.

In Design I only used in design on my article due to the amount of text I had. It was extremely useful as I could set the text out exactly how I pictured it as in design allows you to set out equal text boxes and set the text that I import to flow over to the three text boxes. In design also has a set grind around the article so I know where the pages end so none of my work gets cut out and I can set it out so nothing gets squished in making it look rushed and without the visually professional look.

Safari I used safari throughout my media project for multiple reason, I feel that the prep was when it was most useful as it allowed me to look at professional magazine and get inspiration to get started on my own, for example using safari I was able to make a mood board of artists I felt linked in with the theme of my magazine. It also really helped in analysis when finding out about different publishing and distribution companies for my magazine.