From these tasks, I have learnt that the client brief has various requirements that my final major project submission should fulfil alongside boundaries that my project should not exceed. These are vital pieces of information to ensure that I achieve my personal target grade of a distinction.

How did the activities help you to analyse your skills and generate ideas? Give examples; refer to your mind map and annotated mood board.
Personally, I found that the mind map I created on Popplet was an easy way for me to present my ideas; when I usually use paper I find it difficult to create a detailed mind map as I make mistakes and want to start from the beginning again. Using Popplet online means that I can make adjustments easily e.g. if I have a spelling mistake or change my idea.

By creating a mind map, I worked professionally as it is a form of planning. Industry professionals must plan and organise when generating their preliminary ideas; mind mapping is a fantastic way of thoroughly developing ideas, thoughts and plans.

As I didn't develop onto a mood board, I am unaware of how effective that activity was in generating ideas for my FMP.

What boundaries and parameters have been set with the FMP CAST brief?
The FMP CAST brief has various parameters:
> The deadline for my final major project is Monday 19th June 2017.
> Any video based work has a duration limit of 5 minutes.
> Photography work is limited to 5 photos minimum alongside a maximum of 8 images.
> The target audience for my work ages between 16-19 year olds who are students currently in further education, alongside potential students under the age of 16, "local secondary schools, local businesses and the local community." (Harlow College, client brief, 2017)

What problems do you see arising and how are you going to plan to solve them? Give examples and justify your reasoning.
One of the problems I see arising in the future is my lack of knowledge regarding the ideas I have planned for my FMP. To solve this issue, I understand that I need to extensively research into various sectors of my plans, e.g. if I were to create a podcast I would need to research into equipment requirements, copyright issues, existing podcasts, characteristics of podcasts etc.

Another problem I can see occurring will be the stress of only having a maximum of four people per production team. When creating a media product, I find it is easier if the responsibilities are spread out over a larger team; we do not have the luxury of that. As well as it being a lack of luxury, production teams of 3-4 are more realistic as industry usually have small production teams for projects. To resolve this 'issue', it will be essential to strategically plan so that despite having a smaller team the responsibilities, practical (pre-production [research e.g. vox pops], production and post-production [e.g. editing]) or pre-production based [paperwork and research etc.], are fulfilled.

What skills have you used/learnt that you plan to apply into your work next session?
By watching a video on brainstorming (Slide Genius, online video, 2015), I am now aware that it may be more effective to write all my immediate thoughts and plans down onto paper before developing them using a mind map. This skill can be applied to future lessons as I will continue to brainstorm and plan throughout production whether it be for my own individual idea or a production team idea.

Bibliography
Harlow College (2017), 'Producer's Brief for Digital Moving Image or Print Production', Level 3 Creative Media Production (Extended Diploma) Client Brief, 28 April. Available at: https://my.showbie.com/classes/209c108a16edec5ae1556b2f63caa53f954973f5/assignments/5827706/posts/143964824-93143432 (Accessed: 28/04/17)

Slide Genius (2015), '#QuickTips: Brainstorming Techniques', 7 October.[YouTube], Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bNvs_qElIw (Accessed: 28/04/17)

i. Describe the tasks you completed today and what they have taught you.
ii. Explain how the activities did or did not aid the improvement of your production skills. Provide examples and refer to specific documentation and tasks.
iii. What problems arose and how did you resolve them? Provide examples and justify them.
iv. Write about the production techniques you have gained and developed. Provide examples and link to the targets you set on Showbie.
v. From today, what skills have you gained or applied that you plan to use in future lessons?
vi. Professional practice.

Today, my team and I had a meeting; during this meeting, we discussed a variety of things that I had included on my agenda including what my photographer, Luke Brace, had planned for the day. From this team meeting, I was made aware of the ease an agenda has on a team meeting as it ensures that topics of importance are discussed. In future, I shall aim to create agendas for each team meeting so that it can be effectively conducted.

 

Additionally, our main task for the day was to complete test shoots, which we successfully did. From the test shoots, I have learnt the importance of planning which has worked in our favour because we in fact planned test shots. Planning is essential because if you are faced with issues on set, e.g. if the camera settings are incorrect resulting in grainy images, you can then plan for your actual shoot to ensure you rectify this issue.

 

By conducting test shoots, we acted professionally as professionals must have test shoots to ensure they are aware of everything that is going to happen and how it is going to work to make production work run like clockwork. Test shots can also highlight any initial issues that can hopefully easily be stamped out during their conduction.

 

Another task, I completed was reviewing the images we took and testing out what images looked good as a front cover. With my creative director, I reviewed the images we took and concluded that I would like the photo [below] (Boys, image, 2017) to potentially be the front cover of our magazine. It is important to review images, especially test shots in this case, to highlight issues that may have occurred during the shoot and how to resolve them for an actual shoot or a contingency shoot. 

 
ii. Explain how the activities did or did not aid the improvement of your practical skills. A Provide examples and refer to specific documentation and tasks.

By conducting the test shoots, both at our local town park and in the studio, my practical skills were not necessarily developed. As editor-in-chief and journalist for Adolescence Magazine, I have the responsibility of reviewing written work and images alongside writing articles for the magazine. So, in a sense, I developed my practical skill of reviewing images whilst on set and upon returning; I did not expand or develop my written skills.

 

On the other hand, although it does not necessarily fall under my job role I did refresh my memory on Adobe Photoshop with the help of our photographer. This may be necessary if I need to edit the magazine together with my creative director, Sophie Blackmore. Although I did not complete much, what I did complete can be seen in the photo (Boys, image, 2017) I have attached below.

 

An issue we faced was the fact that the equipment was not ready when we had booked it out in advance. Having said that, we only waited for roughly 25 minutes; to resolve this, we had a team meeting to ensure that we were not wasting time. This was effective as we could complete a task whilst waiting for another to be resolved.
 
Another issue that arose was the fact that our photographer had faced issues with the settings on the DSLR so the ISO had caused some of the images to be grainy. We were unable to resolve this issue however, the overall task of completing test shots has enabled us to prevent this issue from occurring again.

 

Regarding when we returned from the photoshoots, I faced the issue of believing the images were extremely low quality when put into Adobe Photoshop. This issue was resolved when my colleague and I realised that pressing the enter button on Adobe Photoshop changed the visuals of the photo. This resolution was effective as it resolved my panic regarding the quality of the photos taken.

 

As I am editor-in-chief, reviewing the photo is one of my job role requirements. So, I did this whilst on and off set. When on set I communicated with my photographer, Luke Brace, and discussed the images being taken. Upon leaving set, I reviewed the images when transferring them to my USB stick and discussed with my creative director which images I liked, as well as reviewing them when experimenting with Adobe Photoshop. This does not necessarily link to my target of being able "to successfully complete test photoshoots both at the town park and at college", however, it does prove that I have fulfilled the responsibility of my job role. 

v. From today, what skills have you gained or applied that you plan to use in future lessons?
Through today's session, I have developed my communication skills. More specifically, when reviewing the text my creative director and I had chosen, I discussed with the photographer, Luke Brace, whether he liked the font. It is important to communicate between team members, to gain an understanding of how everyone is feeling and to ensure there are no withstanding issues.

In relation to my job role, I have developed my evaluation skills; I do need to focus on written work in future lessons to ensure the magazine content is created and reviewed.

Boys, Emma (2017), Adolescence Magazine Design Experiment [Online]. Available at: https://padlet.com/emmaboys/cusqgt4qpxe1 Photo Taken By: Luke Brace (Accessed: 30/05/17)

As well as this, I also experimented with Adobe InDesign and Photoshop to construct the magazine. From this, I learnt that with the time constraints we have our team will have to construct the magazine using Photoshop before transferring it over onto InDesign.

Our tutor, Leila Capocefalo, also wanted us to meet with a journalism tutor to discuss our magazine and ask questions. During the talk, I was made aware that magazine pages are usually counted in batches of 4 so, if we were to have 15 pages we'd need to add an extra one to keep it even (e.g. adding an extra advert).

ii. Explain how the activities did or did not aid the improvement of your production skills. Provide examples and refer to specific documentation and tasks.
The meeting with the journalism tutor was informative and aided the improvement of my production skills; I am now aware of the differentiation between styles of articles. Examples of the three main types are feature articles, opinion-based articles and reviews. Now that I am aware of this, I can hopefully ensure that our magazine has a mixture of all three to keep the magazine interesting for our target audience. This will aid the improvement of my production skills because I personally alongside my team will work to a professional standard by including the article types.

iii. What problems arose and how did you resolve them? Provide examples and justify them.
An issue that arose was my lack of knowledge regarding InDesign which means we will be unable to work to professional standards; InDesign is the software that professional magazine companies use to construct their magazines. This is coupled with the time constraints we are facing which prevent us from having time to gain knowledge through experimentation with InDesign. To resolve this issue, I personally concluded that we will construct the magazine on Photoshop and transfer it into InDesign for layout and printing purposes. Overall, this decision is effective as it means we can create the magazine pages on Photoshop (which we all have decent knowledge and confidence with) before transferring them onto InDesign.

iv. Write about the production techniques you have gained and developed. Provide examples and link to the targets you set on Showbie.
In relation to the target I set on Showbie, which was to "to meet with the journalism tutor(s) to discuss the magazine, ask questions and gain information", I have developed my existing production technique knowledge. As I previously had knowledge about magazines through my GCSE media course, I was aware of the basic characteristics of a magazine; having spoken to Tom, the journalism tutor, I gained new knowledge which shall enable me to develop the existing production techniques I had.

v. From today, what skills have you gained or applied that you plan to use in future lessons?
As mentioned, I gained knowledge on the numerical side of magazines (pages in batches of 4's) which I can apply to our magazine to ensure that it fits the characteristics of a professional magazine.

Additionally, with the content I planned to create for my articles in mind alongside the discussion I had with the journalism tutor, I am now aware that I shall be creating opinion-based articles (advice articles).

Bibliography
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Moreover, we also discussed the progression of the articles and how all drafts needed to be emailed to myself so I can edit them and send them back if necessary. Upon asking of this, I received an email from Sophie Blackmore (makeup and beauty journalist) and I could edit her work.

So, as planned I edited the magazine cover and added shapes to the magazine e.g. a circle stating, "WIN a free Instagram photoshoot", which acts as a puff (where a magazine offers prizes or benefits to the target audience to draw them in) and features the buzz word "win" to catch the target audience's eye. Upon completing this, I was notified that I needed to add creating a competition to my list of things to do.

In addition to this, I edited photos on my phone as I found this was an easy way for me to do so with the time constraints we have. The only editing I did to specific photos of the team (for the credits page) was colour grading using the app VSCO cam. As shown in a photo above, I edited the photo of Ryan (a member of the team) accordingly. From this, I have learnt that my creative director and I like the use of 'polaroid' images on our credits page (shown below).

Also, I created the credits page by adding the photos I had edited (shown below); also included text crediting those within the team for their job roles and included names of those who had contributed to the development of our magazine, e.g. research respondents. This shows professional practice as having looked at the June edition of Glamour magazine (Nast, 2017, n/a), I conducted secondary research and discovered that a convention of a magazine is a crediting page. From this, I have learnt that I like the font 'Avenir' as it looks professional and sleek.

ii. Explain how the activities did or did not aid the improvement of your production skills. Provide examples and refer to specific documentation and tasks.
The activities I completed did not necessarily improve my production skills as such; it could be said that by using Adobe Photoshop to create the puff and add the photos and text (for the credits page) that I have developed and applied my production skills. Having said this, in my opinion, adding shapes, text and images to Photoshop is part of the basic skillset so, I would argue that I haven't necessarily improved my production skills.

iii. What problems arose and how did you resolve them? Provide examples and justify them.
An issue that arose was my inability to choose fonts. This is something that is vital when it comes to a magazine and especially in our case because we're catering for both a female and male target audience. Personally, I found it difficult to find fonts that are both 'masculine' and 'feminine'. Necessarily, I was unable to resolve this but I did find a font 
'Avenir' that I thought fit in well with the aesthetic of a magazine for the credits page. 

iv. Write about the production techniques you have gained and developed. Provide examples and link to the targets you set on Showbie.
In relation to production techniques I have developed, I believe I am continuously refreshing my memory when it comes to using Adobe Photoshop. An issue I am facing is that I need to be constantly using a software programme to be able to retain information and knowledge of it. So, since I am not constantly using it as different projects require different areas of technology and software, I am forgetting how to use it. For example, I had forgotten how to change the colour of a shape on Adobe Photoshop without selecting the colour in the first place but soon realised when looking at the tool bar how to correct my issue. This links to my target in the sense that I did "continue to develop the magazine" through the tasks I completed today, e.g. adding shapes and text to the front page and another page of the magazine which moves production onwards.

v. From today, what skills have you gained or applied that you plan to use in future lessons?
Today, I gained knowledge of Adobe Photoshop, e.g. you can apply a grid to the document through view to ensure things are accurately placed, as I do every time I use the software with it still being so new to me. In the future, I can apply this when working on Adobe Photoshop during my FMP to ensure all the magazine content is correctly centred and placed where necessary; I can apply it to future projects if necessary. 

Bibliography
Nast, Conde (2017) Glamour Magazine June Edition, Glamour, June 2017, Issue 195, June, Conde Nast. Pg.17

As well as this, I worked on the magazine front cover and again I received spoken peer feedback from Callum Carney. He suggested it may be a good idea to insert a shape coming from the left-hand side rather than stuck on the page to differentiate the article titles; I really liked this idea and implemented it to the magazine. This shows a level of professional practice because it is important to gain feedback, and professionals do during all stages of production, whether it be from members of your target audience (Callum fits within our audience profile as a 17 year old male in full-time education) or from peers.

My photographer, Luke Brace, conducted a photoshoot in our media department photo studio; I contributed to that by directing the models and acting as a model in some of his shots. From this, I learnt the importance of planning shots (especially my ones) as I let Luke improvise them due to the lack of time we had. 

ii. Explain how the activities did or did not aid the improvement of your production skills. Provide examples and refer to specific documentation and tasks.
By completing these tasks, I improved my production skills regarding Adobe Photoshop as Callum informed me of how to remove a background from an image which I previously had no knowledge of. This can be seen on the poetry page where I removed a background from an image of me so I look like a floating person.

iii. What problems arose and how did you resolve them? Provide examples and justify them.
Due to the influx of students as FMP deadlines are drawing closer, my team and I faced the issue of not being able to work all together in one place; not all having access to iMac computers. Personally, I would have preferred to have been able to work directly with my creative director in the same room with me; I feel as though my job role and responsibilities are merging with hers, but issues occur. So, we resolved this by communicating through the separate rooms which was frustrating as it was inconvenient having to fetch her from another room each time I wanted her opinion.

iv. Write about the production techniques you have gained and developed. Provide examples and link to the targets you set on Showbie.
As aforementioned, today I gained the production technique of removing a background from an image courtesy of peer feedback and guidance from Callum Carney. This applies to my target which was to "add a poetry page to the magazine" because the image was for the poetry page within the magazine. So, I achieved my target to an extent as I completed a task that contributed to my target.

v. From today, what skills have you gained or applied that you plan to use in future lessons?
As stated earlier, I have the knowledge on how to delete photo backgrounds which I can apply to future lessons as I may well need to remove backgrounds from other photos.

Additionally, I have learnt that professionalism is key even in frustrating situations that are out of your hands and that sometimes you must keep your opinions to yourself to avoid conflict. This can be applied to future lessons whether it be a disagreement between group members or with members of staff. 

Bibliography
N/A

Firstly, my team and I presented our magazine to the C.A.S.T judges alongside an audience of our peers. From this task, I learnt a number of things but mostly the opinions of the judges and our peers.

One example being that tutor Delta Muntean expressed how she believed we grasped the characteristics of a magazine well and have created a magazine that encompasses not only our interests but the things happening around us. This was informative and can be applied to my personal evaluation of our product.

Additionally, we received a number of pleasant comments from peers about our magazine. One being that a fellow class member Elliott Johnson thought our magazine was "amazing".

In addition to this, my team and I conducted a focus group. After completing this, I am aware that although we have tried to make our magazine diverse in genders it may not appeal directly to male readers upon seeing the front cover as it features a female model. To improve, we could do a re-shoot and feature a male and female on the front cover.

The activities aided the improvement of my research skills in the respect that I have again improved on my confidence in presenting. By using a QR to link audience members to the product, I was able to talk them through the magazine and allow them to engage with our product whilst I was presenting. This made things a little less nerve wracking because they were looking at the product as opposed to me.

An issue that arose during the presentation was the fact that the video we had compiled together displaying our magazine failed to load. In hindsight of this issue, Sophie Blackmore (Fashion Journalist) and I decided to insert the pages of the magazine into the PowerPoint and also include a QR to link audience members to the magazine and engage them. So, this acted as a solution to the issue we faced and was effective in allowing everyone to see the magazine.

Today, I gained the knowledge that it is important to involve your target audience to keep them engaged. I did this today by using a QR code to engage each member into our presentation and make sure they were looking at the product. Personally, I think this is important as it means your target audience members can gain an understanding of your product and pose questions on things they may not understand afterwards. 

This links to my Showbie target which was "to present the magazine to C.A.S.T and an audience through the audience screening"; I gained audience feedback through presenting my magazine to members of C.A.S.T and fellow class members.

Today, I applied my presentation skills as I presented my product to the audience; this skill is going to be applicable throughout the rest of my time at college. As a student, I am required to present my work, ideas and opinions whether it be in written work or in front of a class so these skills will be useful in future lessons.

As well as this, I applied my evaluation and feedback skills as I provided feedback for other pieces of work during the screening. It is important to be able to give constructive criticism to peers as you may need to do it in the future, e.g. you may not like the way your editor has edited part of your work so you have to tell them. 

By providing constructive criticism I have displayed a level of professionalism as it is important to be able to provide relevant feedback to colleagues and people in the industry would do so to ensure the outcome is fantastic.

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