evaluation

Evaluation

Elizabeth Herries

Introduction

• What I chose to do for my A2 media project was to construct a local newspaper, an internet page and a poster. When making these media products it was important to know what to focus on, I focused on the layout, style and audience. For a good newspaper to work you need to be aware of these things.

• My newspaper is a local paper for the area I live in (Bognor/Pagham/Aldwick) through some research I discovered that members of the community under an average age of 18 do not read the newspaper so therefore become naive to what is happening in the world. Therefore I decided that there was a gap in the market for a local newspaper accessible for the younger members of the community to read and gain information from. This is why my writing style will be varied to that of other local papers. I think that it is good to have advertisement and news within a paper, however my local paper has more new and less adverts, which means my readers are getting more of what they want. The price of my paper is 60p, I feel that this is a reasonable price and will be at the same standard of other local newspapers of this price. I would like my newspaper to be published 5 times a week, from Monday to Friday, as it is just a local paper, there is only so much news that will be of interest to the local community.

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge

forms and conventions of real media products?

My media product uses the media conventions in the following ways:

Layout: the layout of my own newspaper is very similar to any other newspaper. It has the same conventions, for instance, the mast head, columns and main headline. Everything is set out professionally, however my front page is more spaced and clearer, this is because of my reasons for targeting a younger audience, as said previously.

Website

Masthead

Date

Price

Main headline

Main photo

Columns

Advertisements

My media product uses the media conventions in the following ways:Colour: when creating a media product it is important to think about the colour, this is because a lot can be portrayed about your product by just the colours or colour schemes chosen. Also it means that when people see those colours your brand will be recognisable to them. It is important not to add too many colours as this can distract from the main content of the product and look unprofessional. For my own local newspaper I have chosen the colour scheme of purple. My reasons for this are; it is a colour that no newspapers our using so therefore will make my newspaper unique and recognisable without being confused with other media products.

These four images of my created media products, these show where I have used colour and how I have stuck to the theme of purple. I did not use a gradient for my colour I chose to use block colours and I thought this looked tidy and clear and more professional.

My media product uses the media conventions in the following ways:Writing style: the most commonly used journalistic style for writing a newspaper article is who? What? Where? And why? This creates an easy structure for easy reading with all the facts. I decided that for my own articles I would also stick to this convention as if is the best way to give someone all the information they need within the first few paragraphs, and therefore at any point they walk away from the article they will still have all the facts required to know about the story, and other readers can read on to find out the facts in more detail.

News story 3: Peaceful Estate's Shock Break In

BREAK in at a house on the Aldwick Bay Estate, 4,000 pounds made in damages during the break in. Aldwick Bay Estate is a quiet and peaceful area hosting home to many retired,therefore this incident came as a shock to everyone within the local community. The Butler family was abroad in Cyprus for two weeks, during which time the burglary took place. It is believed that 3 televisions, a laptop and microwave were taken from the family’s home, but police are still investigating. Investigations are underway to track down the culprits. Police arrived on the scene after being called by a worried neighbor who noticed a broken window at the front of the house, which appeared to be just an act of vandalism. There were two rocks found underneath the front windows believed to be the vandals’ weapons.

Who? What? Where? And why?

What might happen next.


Adverts: all newspapers use advertising within there media products, this provides them with a lot of money and provides there readers with information. Adverts are important to newspapers and media products, some papers will relate there adverts to the time of year. Below are some examples of advertisement that our placed throughout my media products.

Most of my advertisements are placed throughout the website I have created, this is because I feel from a newspaper my readers would prefer to have more stories and news and less adverts so therefore they are getting what they paid for. The reason most are on the web page is therefore it will get a boarder and wider audience and can create more interest in adverts and therefore more advertisers will want to use my media platform to display there products hence giving the paper more money.

Email to a friend


Expanded media products: many of the local newspapers around will not just have the information they print in the paper but also will provide and further media platform to display more news by the use of a website. The use of websites enables people to access the news stories your providing, and with all the smart phones people can access the internet on the go, this relates to how I want to target a younger generation as well, they will be more likely to read the news on a web page, which helps to educate them to what is happening in the world right now.

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

The combination of my product and ancillary texts I used were effective for the following reasons:

My media product, both use’s, develops and challenges the conventions of other media products and there ancillary texts. Throughout this project I have been trying to produce a local newspaper that looks professional and shows realism, portraying to my audience that it could be a real local paper. It is all the details that make up the final product I created, such as adverts, the way the text was structured and how the images were used throughout the ancillary text. I feel that I have created a product that fits the forms and conventions of a existing newspaper.

Layout, fonts and colour schemes: I used a simple layout uncluttered with tones of advertisements, like some existing newspapers. My fonts are clear and easy to read, the size is not too small but I can still fit all the information my readers are paying for.

Website highlighted in the main product: at the top of the front page above the mast head is clearly given my newspapers website address, for my readers to be able to easily access the site I have created.

Poster highlights website and the main product: I created a poster, which other existing newspapers do not do at this time, featuring the environmental importance of my newspaper. And this also gives details of the website as well as when my newspaper is available for readers.

Images and stories: all the stories within my newspaper have followed the journalistic structure of who? What? Where? Why?. My images have been edited on photoshop before being placed onto any of my products to make sure that look the best they can. All images were also taken by myself specifically for my media products.

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

When getting audience feedback for my media products I asked some people about the articles in my media products, the professionalism, and style/layout. This is the feedback I received:

Newspaper:Layout: from my audience the majority stated that the layout was clear and easy to read, making them want to read as it looked simple and not cluttered. Some people thought that on the front page that there was not a big enough gap between two of the stories which was slightly confusing.Articles- my audience said that my articles were clearly structured and could get all the facts and know what they were about from reading them. Advertisements: there was only one advertisement placed on the front page and none on page two. From the audience feedback they liked that fact that there wasn’t a lot of adverts as it provided more news and articles that they paid for.Professionalism: from my audience feedback the majority said that they would believe that if they had not know it was a media product created by me they would think it was an existing newspaper, a few people however thought that it may be too simple.

I learnt from the audience feedback for the website that:Layout: I wanted a clear structure to my website and easy to read pages and links. I learnt from the audience feedback that this worked well, people who tried the website said that they could navigate through the site at ease with no hassle. Articles: I learnt from my audience feedback that the articles were short but informative, they gave you all the facts that you needed.Advertisements: the audience feedback I got said that they liked the adverts as they weren’t just for the local area but advertising thing slightly outside the area, making the website more accessible for those who are not from the local area.

I learnt from the audience feedback for the poster that:

Appearance: I learned from my audience feedback that appearance wise my poster looks good and the image compromises the words written.Eye-catching- at first from my audience feedback they said that the image was too dark, I used photoshop to brighten the image to create a more eye-catching poster. I then asked again and was told that the image was eye-catching and the meaning of the poster worked well with the image. Layout- from my audience feedback I learnt that my layout made the poster easy to read from a distance as the layout was clear and the colours did not blend with the image, they stood out from the background.

How did you use the media technologies in the construction

and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Photoshop: throughout my whole project I used photoshop to manipulate and edit images into how I wanted them to look and be perceived by my audience.

1.I took this image of a mobile phone as I wanted to create an image for cyber bullying, however the text was not visible on the screen

2. I then put the image onto photo shop and used the colour fill to cover up the text that was not visible.

3. Finally I rotated the image then wrote out the text in a text box and placed it onto the image to look like it had been typed.

Microsoft PowerPoint: I used this to represent my the evaluation stage of my project. Doing my evaluation in this way meant that it was easy for people to see what I had done by using images and diagrams. Also this allowed me to use slideshare.net to present my evaluation online.

PowerPoint

Slideshare.net

Digital camera: all the images I took were taken of a digital camera, to get the best quality images for my media products.

These are some examples

Blogger.com: I also have used blogger.com, this is the blog site where all of my product is presented, and all the media products can be viewed on that site. It is an easy platform and can be found with no hassle, it is easy to present my work in a tidy way that is easy to follow.

What have I learnt, and conclusion!

Through doing this project I have learnt a lot about local newspapers and the way in which they work, and I tried to portray what knowledge that I had through my own media products. I had the use of good quality programs and software that was available to me, this meant that when creating my media products I was using the technology that existing papers would be. However the software that was used to create a large majority of the media products, was not available to me at home, this meant that all practical work would have to be completed at college. This left me with limited time using the Mac’s as they are not always accessible to students on a regular basis. Although saying this I feel that I managed my time well and produced the best work I could. In conclusion I am please with my final product and think that it conveys my knowledge of media forms and conventions ass well as the understanding of all the different software. All the small details show the efforts of my work, and I have portrayed my work in a simple yet effective way.