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Digital
Technology
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Creativity
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Research
and Planning
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Post-Production
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Using
conventions from real media texts
Last year, for our Foundation Portfolio we started with a
Preliminary exercise using DTP and an image manipulation programme, we had to
produce the front page of a new school/college magazine, featuring a photograph
of a student in medium close-up plus some appropriately laid-out text and a
masthead. Additionally we also had to produce a mock-up layout of the contents
page to demonstrate our grasp of DTP.
Our main task was to create a front page, contents and
double page spread of a new music magazine. We had to think about the language,
the institution, the ideology, the audience and the representation in detail
and had to do market research for 3 magazines that had a similar genre to what
we had chosen ourselves. We had to think about our target audience and price
and publishing. We had to do a digital mock-up and produce lots of drafts to
improve on our final products.
Through-out the year we did lots of work on the conventions
of TV drama by looking at the Mise en Scene, the editing, the sound and the
cinematography. This helped prepare us for the exam at the end of the year. We
did numerous of essays which helped as revision and a guideline to what sort of
things we needed to write about and know in the exam.
Before I started AS Media Studies I had some skills of how
to use photo shop. These where very basic however and I developed my skills in
using photo shop further and increased my knowledge of specific things I could
do to improve my front cover as my first front cover draft was very basic
compared to my final draft. Before AS
Media I worked for a non-paying student based company called ‘Up the Volume’
which included filming bands live and taking photos. We also got to interview
them. This gave me some skills in using digital technology and how to get a
good photo whilst a band played live. This helped with my Foundation Portfolio
as it gave me a rough idea of what type of music magazine I was going to create
and how I wanted it to look. This meant my creativity was improving as I had
lots of ideas running through my head. This was very fortunate as I already had
some great photos that could be included in my music magazine which was an
advantage, alongside new ones that I took of individuals that I made up were in
a band. I enjoy reading magazines so I
knew quite a lot of conventions from real media texts and magazines. This was a
good skill to have how to analyse a magazine because it meant I knew the
conventions I needed to include to make my magazine look professional.
My skills developed in the Foundation Portfolio when using
photo shop as I made lots of drafts. I learned the more I used digital
technology the more things I learned and discovered. I had very basic knowledge
of how photo shop worked and how to edit photos to look more professional. My
skills developed with text on photo shop as I learned how to make the text more
bold and professional. I also learned that using fonts from photo shop was
better than finding a jazzy font on a website as you could make the text look
the way you wanted and look by making the outer layer thicker and putting the
letters closer together and not so far apart. My creative skills developed as I
learned having a house theme worked better and looked more appropriate.
Research and planning helped with my Foundation Portfolio as
I developed skills on how to research specific aspects and make sure my
information was correct. Planning helped with my organisation skills as It made
sure that I was up to date with dead line dates and also knew what I was doing
and what stage I was at.
In my post-production I created lots of drafts. The first
draft looked completely different from my final draft which shows I improved on
my digital technology skills and developed them further. I had a vague idea of
what the music magazine would like for my final draft which made me improve
every time and reach my goal of how I wanted my music magazine to look.
In conclusion, my skills developed in creativity, digital
technology, research and planning and using conventions of real media texts
which can be seen in my post-production outcome. They developed because I spent
a lot of time researching and planning on how I wanted my media products to
look and how I could get them to look professional. My skills developed hugely
in digital technology as I now know lots more about photo shop and how to use
it then what I did at the start as I didn’t know to edit photos of texts on photo
shop. My creativity skills developed as I made lots of drafts and wanted to
improve them every time as I had lots of inspiration and idea’s in my head from
analysing three different media texts. Looking at magazines and noticing the
conventions. From looking at magazines and realising my product didn’t include
a certain convention which I liked I would include it into my media product.
