Week 27: Project Update and Research into Colour Schemes and Graphic Design Trends

I have completed part of my  production schedule up to this date and the tasks which I have completed on my Production Schedule are the Skills Profile, Contingency Plan, Mood board, Market Research of a Questionnaire for my Target Audience, Research into Existing Student Magazines and I have started to complete my write up of research into the trends within Graphic Design, I have also started to sketch my initial idea for my Student Magazine.

Initial Ideas Mood Board showing existing magazines, features and colour schemes

I have researched into the 'trends' within graphic design for 2011 and this includes the colour schemes, typography and layout for graphic design, which could relate to my new student magazine.

Colour Schemes
I researched into the different colour schemes which are in trend within print and graphic design for 2011 and this gave me inspiration for the colours which I can consider and choose for my student magazine, the colours which are in trend are pale but bright colours, therefore I had in mind the colour scheme of red for my student magazine and I found a shade of red which is in trend and this colour is a really light shade of red called Honeysuckle. I will use 3 different shades of red within my magazine as these are colours which will work well with each other and as pale colours are in trend for graphic design I will use lighter colours as these are colours which will therefore appeal to my audience through the student magazine.



Colour Scheme











Layout

I also researched into the layout of magazines, how they appear on devices such as the iPad and iPod Touch, as websites appear different on these devices as they do on the Internet or within a hard copy of the magazine. Therefore by researching into these different layouts on the iPad this has gave me information on how students may be viewing the magazines via these different devices and therefore I could get inspiration from these websites, such as the image below which shows a magazine on the iPod and this shows the magazine on the iPod touch and shows an image related to the story which is featured. This layout may therefore appeal to the target audience of students and this is a layout which I am considering for my Contents Page, of have an image related to each feature beside the contents on the page, as this is what the target audience are used to.



Layout of a Magazine Website on an iPod Touch



Typography

I have also learnt about Typography over the past week, as I have been introduced to Typography as Modern Font is known as Sans Serif and Old Fashioned font is known as Serif Font, as every font falls into these two categories of Serif and Sans Serif. I have also researched into the fonts within graphic design and how creative they are, as this shows how you can incoporate patterns into the font and how you can create a font within a certain subject. Every font represents a meaning and within creating a magazine front cover, double page spread and contents page I need to choose the fonts which will appeal to the target audience and will catch their attention.