Process of Making - Double Page Spread

Process of Making - Contents Page

These were the two original images I used for the contents page. The first was from the series of pictures taken in the final photoshoot, whereas, the other is an edited photomontage of multiple architecture photographs, originally intended for my AS Photography portfolio. For the main image, I edited it in a similar way to that of the front cover image; adjusting the levels, brightness and colour balance, 'airbrushing' the photo and using the blemish and patch tools to remove minor details and shadows.

These three screenshots show how the main image was edited. As attempted with the front cover, I wanted to recreate the patterns achieved on my Google mock-ups with the Pixlr editor The 'original' photograph without the layer has a slight blueish-green tint which was altered after applying the geometric layer to make the colours stand out better. The geometric layer as it appears here is slightly more pink than in the final contents page; this was edited later in order to fit in with the overall colour scheme of the magazine better.

Process of Making - Front Cover

I started by opening this image in Photoshop and adjusting the levels, brightness and colour balance in order to even out the image. I also added a gaussian blur to give Victoria's skin an airbrushed effect and used the blemish tool to remove minor details. It wasn't really needed, however it was applied it in order to give the image the same 'flawless' effect which you might see on a magazine cover.

As shown in the below screenshot of the layers, there are two layer patterns on top of the adjustments. I attempted to recreate the geometric patterns that were temporarily available on Pixlr and which I used in my Google mock-ups by layering the patterns over the main image and changing the blend mode. These didn't work as well as I hoped however, 'Layer 2' was used as it gave the main image a faint pinkish tint and added a slight 'watercolour' effect to the masthead.

Next, I added the title. Sticking to the same title theme that I applied to my Google mock-ups, I added three title layers beneath the 'main' opaque masthead and made each layer have a lower opacity than the layer above, creating the effect shown below.

At this stage, I also began grouping the layers as shown in the screenshot below. There is a group for 'Main Image Edits' which contains all the layers in the screenshot above. This made the editing process quicker and easier on a whole.

After applying the title effect, I adjusted the colour in order to find one which went with the image the best. I couldn't decide which colour suited the cover best and so asked other students who were in the room and sent out messages on my phone asking friends who weren't there. There was an overwhelming response for purple, however, there was an awful lot of votes for the blue and pink mastheads as well. Eventually, we settled on purple as somebody pointed out, it was the colour which matched Victoria's lipstick best, and so I decided to emphasise that feature and painted the lipstick with a purple tint that matched the masthead to make it stand out more.

In order to have Victoria's head overlay the title, I made a polygon selection around her head and made a new layer from the selection cut. This went over the group 'Title Overlays' which contained all the layers for the masthead so that the head would overlay it, as well as under the 'Main Image Edits' so that it kept all the same adjustments as the background layer.

As shown in the second and third images below, at this stage I added the plug and main feature story title. After conducting research into fonts and other existing magazines earlier, I finally decided to use a handwritten font for the main feature story to draw maximum attention. For Victoria's name, the blue colour similar to the discarded masthead colour earlier suited it and white for her middle names contrasted it well (however isn't all that easy to see).

As for the plug, I wanted the words to arc so that it worked better with the spherical shape and used the 'Warp Text' tool to do this. I played about with different fonts and colours until it looked right, as well as changing the opacity of the plug at the end to make it more visible. 

Also shown in the series of screenshots below is how I made the feature stories. They originally started out as being simple rectangular shapes, however I cut an angled shape out of the side to draw more attention and make them look more visually appealing on a whole. 

Front Cover - Final Images

This video shows the set-up for the photoshoot


Contact sheet showing all the images taken

Below are the 12 best images I thought would work best as main images for a front cover

Sketches of Front Cover Layout Ideas

Below is a series of 3 sketches I did of layout ideas for my front cover, documenting ideas for poses, and feature arrangements to work around the images.

Test Shot Images

As with the previous project, we took test shots in order to gain a better understanding of the correct framing to use when taking portrait photographs for a magazine cover. Here, I have included 7 images of different framing types including examples of poor framing for a front cover. The medium close-up is most commonly used for magazine main images, and thus is the type of framing I will use for my main image.

Photography Analysis - Double Page Spread

Photography Analysis - Contents Page