Evaluation Question 6

Q6.

During the making of my music magazine I learnt that how to add special attributes to my product, through the software (Adobe Photoshop) and technical equipment such as the Canon E05 400D Camera. In using this camera, I learnt how to operate the camera for flashes and focusing the lens. I took a lot of medium close up shots for my front cover. I learnt that the camera would give me the best results when the red dots were located on the eyes of the people I was taking pictures of, otherwise the images would come out blurry. I also learnt the importance of the flash and the soft box and how they can create even lighting while taking pictures; these are good ways to enhance the quality of the image being taken.

The software I used on the computer was called Adobe Photoshop, the software allowed me to edit my photos whether they needed increasing in brightness or decreasing in contrast. This technology can help change an original photo to something that is more ideal to its given purpose and it experimenting with different tools that Photoshop had to offer, I later on found out how. There were some challenges in changing a photograph from its original being as I noticed that it doesn’t keep its natural look and looses its quality. However, if it is used carefully then the right adjustment can be made. Consequently, I learnt how to keep an original copy of a photograph on the computer as a backup, so that I still have the opportunity to start again if the edited photograph doesn’t meet my needs.

On my contents page I used a tool in Photoshop called a “lasso tool” which allowed me to create my own type of design. Using this tool was quite tricky as I did not understand its use at first, but after I had familiarized myself with it, I found it very useful because it enabled me to create a variety of different ways I could choose to structure my contents page without it looking disorganised. The lasso tool could be used by “free-hand” or by connecting lines for the desired shape. I choose used both tools to see what was more useful and efficient for what I wanted to create, and in doing this I found out that connecting lines was more efficient for me. This tool could also be edited once the desired shape was made; this could be done by right-clicking the starting point of the shape, then options will occur.

The options I focused on were the “Fills” and “Strokes”, I got to know that the fill is the colour that will go inside the shape that is made. The stroke is the colours that will act as the outline of that shape. Using the fills and strokes in Photoshop helped me to create prominence in the masthead. I learnt that using bright coloured strokes for a masthead can really help to make it stand out. Also, copying images from the internet i.e. Google could be done by saving the image from the site and then opening it up on Photoshop. Photoshop allowed me to resize and reposition the image to how I wanted. The copying technique came in handy for barcodes because it would have been a lot harder and time consuming trying to create a barcode.  I used a similar technique for my masthead; I created my masthead on a separate Photoshop file and during this I learnt that Photoshop can save the files in other types of files for example JPEG. This gave me the opportunity to drag my masthead image onto different part of my magazine as well as my masthead.