Construction of contents page

Stage 1: I didn't want the word contents to take up a lot of space and I also wanted it to be unique so I placed it vertically down the page. I got the font from dafont.com and I cut out each letter seperately so I could rotate them individually. I then added a thin red rectangle to section it off. I tilted the main image and then added a border that didn't exactly fit to make it look edgey and modern.

Stage 2: I then added the text and followed the pattern of having the title of the story in bold capitals in the font Impact and then a little summary of the story in lower case in the font Rockwell. I wanted to incorporate more red as it is vivid and draws you in so for the page numbers I used white numbers in a red box. I wanted to maintain professional by making each box the same shape so instead of making a new shape everytime, I duplicated the layer several times. I also added the pager number on the main image to make it clear to the readers where it is and it is also a covention used by existing magazines.

Stage 3: This is where the contents page starts to take place as I added all the photos. Throughout my magazine I have tilted the photos because I think it gives a quirky appearance and makes the change between a simple image and a more interesting image. Using the burning tool, i slightly burned the edges of the bottom middle picture (Alexandria story). This gave the image a darker and dramatic look. I also added little things to make the page look realistic such as placing the website in the top right corner and the ERA logo in the top left corner.

Stage 4: I added a little red rectangle underneath ERA so it relates to the front cover masthead. Then there were little end touches which included putting the page numbers on the bottom pictures. For all 3 of them I used black numbers on a grey background to clearly seperate it from the page numbers next to the text. This is because I wanted the red ones to stand out. I added a shadow around the grey page numbers by duplicating the layers, then filling the underneath layer in black. I then clicked on filter and then blur and then increased gaussian blur to 7.0 pixels which created a slight shadow round the edges. The white background looked to simple and mature. This is significant because I am targeting a young audience, a white classy background would suit Q's more mature audience. To make the page more modern and quirky I used a paint brush with a dappled effect in a very large size, about 500px which created a splattered effect and I randomly splattered it in places I decreased the opacity to make it grey rather than black because black would be too overpowering. Lastly, I included a little image on the front cover in the bottom left corner to make the page look more interesting and it combines all the pages.