Meeting 25/11/13

Issue's

• efefe
• fefefe
• effete

Target Audience

One issue which arose during meeting on the 25/11/13 was my audience of technology. At time of meeting I was solely going to focus on Apple only devices but having gone and looked at the publishing capabilities of the Adobe DPS I discovered that I could publish the magazine to a number of different platforms such as Apple iPad, Apple iPhone, Android and Kindle Fire devices. I discovered this a website named DPCI which lists many questions.

Which devices does the Adobe Digital Publishing Suite support?
The DPS App Builder enables customers to create custom viewer apps for iPad, iPhone, Android and Amazon Kindle Fire devices.

However, I looked on the Adobe FAQ's and discovered that I would need either the Adobe DPS Professional or Enterprise edition to allow publications to other platforms as the single edition only allows for iPad devices.

Is it possible to create publications for Android™ tablets with Digital Publishing Suite, Single Edition?
No. Single Edition is only for iPad devices. However, Professional Edition and Enterprise Edition allow publication to the Android platform as well. Those two editions include Content Viewer for iPad, Content Viewer for Android, and Content Viewer for Desktop, so you can create content for iPad and all Android based tablets.

I will continue to design for these devices and ask whether the university has got the software I need or will help obtain it in the future. From this meeting I also realised the need to do some research for my audience by looking at the student population with these devices. This will help me get a better understanding of the audience/people who can use magazine.

Name of Magazine?

narrowed down to 

Now & Beyond
Hear & Now
Direction 18

Front cover Idea

While looking at existing magazines I had an idea for mine.


For a start I think i will only design it for landscape mode as i think they work better for content.
So with this in mind the idea is to have a grid of equal size boxes but with extra column obviously because of the size.
With this filled with video of students doing something such as holding up cards of there course. this happens at different times. then when all videos are on screen they hold a different shaped card but when put together may make the logo depending on what my name of the magazine is. I came up with this idea while watching a film( friend s with benefits) and something similar happens to reveal the logo. This would look good but all depends on the magazine name. But its an idea at this moment.

design layout to come:

Front cover examples

All magazines have a front cover. They are an important part as they have to be be interesting so it attracts customers. This is no different for interactive magazines.

Here are some examples of print and interactive magazines:

Hands on research

For the last couple of days I have been using existing magazine ranging from top gear to other college maagazines. I have also looked at an html5 example. When using it seems slow and clunky and it does not always do what you want it do to.

Looking at these examples give me ideas and what is essential. For instance it should have a front cover but also a page which shows how the user interacts with the magazine. so this means the magazine will feature many icons, so these must be easy to understand.

Logo design

Not able to come up with a logo design until a name is chosen.

Image & videos resolution for screen

Colour theory for screen

Font & size for screen research

Tool options

Identifying which  tool to use when creating the magazine is proving to be a difficult task. On one hand I could use the Adobe DPS (Digital Publishing Suite) and on the other is creating it using HTML5. Both are viable options.




Adobe TV

Adobe TV - Digital Publishing

Name??

Along with the continue research and design layouts, I have been trying to think of a name for my magazine. Here are many variations. Some good, some not:

• Hack
• UniLife
• StudentLife
• Rising Giants
• Now & Beyond
• Visions
• Viewport
• Life Lens
• Lens Life
• OnLife
• Optional
• iStudent
• Certified
• Under
• Unii
• 18
• NUF
• Above 18
• Direction 18
• XV111
• Versity 18
• U-18
• 8Teen
• Social hub

At the moment I am quite struggling for a name. I am trying to incorporate the meanings as its a:

• 18 and above magazine for university students but may have younger audience for potential students such as 16 or 17 year olds.
• A fun magazine about university experience containing enjoyable things to do, but not your stereotypical drinking.

What i need to do?

• Name of magazine - differenty names, and styles
• Design a logo (Place into psd file.)
• Wireframe designs.
• Futher researtch into how i will make it (html5, mag+, dps)
• blog + prersentaion maintenance
• user testing
• gantt chart
• research into fonts, colors, size

Cover layout

 

 

 

 

Magazine design

As with any magazine the design plays a major role. I have previosly studied the art of print magazine, when i was assigned to design my own. So with that I had to look into the aspects of a magazine such as the strapline, font, sub heading and bleed. So before i go into the design I will have to refresh my memory by looking into the topic.

Overview

As previously discussed, my idea is an interactive magazine about university life but focusing on Swansea metropolitan. This may be a broad topic when you think about it but in not going to go in great detail about everything, so in thinking this mag as more of a student survival guide and how much of a fun experience uni is, sk this covers different events, sports etc.

I have looked into how the magazine will be made, i looked into the different ways i could make it
one option is a html5 app, so basically a responsive website. This is a viable option as this will enable me to design it for many screens sizes and a range of devices.
 This would also enable more features.another option is to create the magazine in indesign and then either use a plugin called mag+ or use the adobe digital publishing suite, the mag+ option is a rather simple option with basic interactivity option, while the dps enables me to add html5 files.
The other option which i currently think is a no go is the use of ibooks author. Its a good tool but lacks the complexity for a major project.
At the moment the indesign with the adobe dps is the leading contender but with more research into the better option i cant make the decision yet.

Topic idea

To start of my idea is to design and create an interactive magazine. My main focus is for it to work is on the iPad. There are many ways I can create the magazine,  such as using an application called iBooks author, this offers a simple and easy way to create the magazine by adding text and images. Another way is to use inDesign, with the use of plug ins such as mag+, joomag and issuu.

The magazine topic is based around university life. So this includes student nightlife, sporting activities and general student life. So like a student life book.The user will be able to flick through pages and watch videos. Another feature I would like is a sign in function which lets the user unlock more content. Some interactive features will be scrolling, swiping, button  press and pinch & zoom.

One dilemma is about the content in terms of the text, as I am not an english student it would be time wasting for me to write an article about something. So instead I think the best answer for this is to either use Lorem ipsum text or find a similar article and use that text. This will be solved closer to the time of putting the magazine together.

Change!

Change of idea.

After meeting with lectures and discussing how I feel about my current idea with how I may struggle further down the line with coding etc. They seemed to back me up with the change, saying it is better to say now instead of wasting several months to find out that I may not complete it.

After expressing about the change, I suggested about my second idea of doing an digital interactive magazine. This seemed to go down well as it is more suited to my course and how I could revisit my previous idea when I have improved on my coding skills as it is still something I would like to do in the future.

After suggesting about doing a magazine, they wanted to know about a topic. At that point I had none, except for suggesting something on Swansea. They advised to slim this idea down as doing Swansea is a broad subject as you got sports, fashion, music, nightlife, culture and many others. After running through some topics, it was suggested to do something for my age range and what I like doing whether it be Swansea or not. Another interesting topic suggested was my home town of Bridgend, as they were unfamiliar about Bridgend they suggested that I do this so they can see what Bridgend is like. Another idea suggested is to do something like the swansea mile, where I could take photos of my walk and then others with the magazine can retrace my steps and take there very own pictures.

I think I wanna stay away the more popular topics such as football, movies or fashion as it would be very common and maybe easy. I'd want the topic to be original.


Aims for the coming days:

• Topic Idea
• Start organising presentation
• Research into topic
• Continue blog

Stick or Twist

With the meeting in the back my head, I have started to think about other possible ideas. From the advice of my lectures they said it may be a challenge.
So whilst continuing with current idea, I have thought about making an interactive magazine. Not sure of the topc yet

Meeting 1

Throughout this project, every fortnight I will meet with my lectures regarding my major project. After todays meeting we discussed my idea. i thought the meeting went well and my idea seemed okay. Some topics off discussion were my abilities to complete this regarding the coding behind it and some thought my coding skills were not that advanced, so some advised me to slim down the idea as they knew that some of the frameworks shuck as Facebook were quite complicating. This is a fair judgement as i don't want to struggle and then forget about the whole project. So they suggested I focus solely on the twitter framework and how I could redesign it to a degree.

Some tips left by my lectures for the coming weeks were to think about the balance of coding and visual design for a new range of smart devices. By this i think they mean a device that does not already have twitter design for it. By researching the term smart device I gathered a little bit of knowledge. From my understand a smart device is a phone to a tablet or a computer. So this led me to think, have smart T.V. got twitter. the answer yes. This raise of a topic has left me curious so I shall look deeper into this.

Another issue brought up was to develop a secondary idea that validates the main one.

Existing

• Alternion
• 
  

Research

Basic Research

Before I go researching into the world of code behind twitter, Facebook and others, I plan to research the start of the companies and then research why they are designed like they are.

To start I will research into the social networks. Bearing in mind around december I will have to present the research I have done till that date, so I will have to maintain a presentation.

Some basic information about following:

Twitter

Facebook

Instagram

LinkedIn
Foursquare
Flickr
Picasa

Idea

After many days of pondering for an idea, i have finally come up with one. My idea is simple, a website/app that gathers all a users social networks into one place. So people tweets, Facebook and Instagram photos are in one place so theres no need to go from app to app.
As with any website/app a great deal of design thought will need to go into it as it has to be easy to use and read.
This tasks means I would have to create a site that brings these great social networks together and merge them, so the design will play a big part in terms of colours, layout and usability.

After searching through the internet finding a bit of information about twitter I came across this video which explains how twitter was redesigned from the first incarnation. Enjoy.

FMP

Welcome

Welcome to my blog relating to the process of my final major project. During the coming weeks I will be updating this blog with details regarding the state of my fmp. The aim of this blog is to give insight into the process of my fmp and may enable viewers to repeat the task by reading my posts.



Aims -

During this process I hope to improve some key skills, One being able to blog. During past projects when tasked to keep a detailed blog I have failed to do so. Previously I would only write a short paragraph lacking any detail but only when I remember to do so. My personal opinion on blogging is I would rather spend the 5-10 minutes it takes to create a post by continuing with the work rather than write down what i done that day. Even without any thought I may do it everyday in the sense of posting on Facebook and twitter.
A major part of this project is to present the work completed at three different stages. So a skill I need is public speaking. This is one of my pet hates for reasons unknown I become all nervous like many others. This project will help me be more confident when speaking as there are three presentations to present.
Another personal aim is to develop my organisational skills. With a long project, being organised from the start will help the end result. This includes time manegment and being able to plan ahead.