Decision Day

                                                                                                                                       Claire Houghton 

 

My initial impressions of InDesign and Premier Pro after participating in the class tutorials is that I thought they were extremely complicated and difficult to use, but after watching the tutorial and playing around with the programs, it got a lot easier and more fun to do. These programs may play in helping me deliver my story as well as specific components of each program and how each may assist me because I can make a magazine or video that looks like a professional did it. They may also restrict me in delivering a quality product because I'm still learning how to use the programs.

 I'm excited to work in a group because as stated in Our Place in the Universe: The Importance of Story and Story Telling in the Classroom, “a wonderful thing about storytelling projects is their ability to be completed in groups, collaboration among classmates can also be built into projects that involve peer review of single-author works.” I think this will be very helpful and make the project even more fun. 

In premier pro, I had trouble uploading my pictures and using a lot of the features it provided. I tried to keep up with the tutorial, but I couldn’t. When uploading my pictures, it took me two class periods to get them on the program. While the tutorial was going on, I was still trying to upload my video, so I missed some of the tutorial. After I uploaded my video, I tried out some to the features Premier Pro provides. For example, features like, putting effects on the video were hard to follow and changing the shades of some of the frames weren’t easy either. But after some time, I think I could learn how to use Premier Pro and make a video that looks professional. 

In InDesign, I can make a professional magazine cover. In the tutorial and in class, I learned how much the details of a cover matter. For instance, if the center of the magazine, a model, is wearing an orange shirt, then on little parts of the magazine like the border or the models name will be in that same orange again. As mentioned in the article, Survival of the fittest: four editors on the future of literary magazines, states, “love to be able to include more heavily researched writing, to better represent the branch of creative nonfiction that overlaps with journalism.” also, “magazines willing and able to adapt to the new literary landscape are poised to break fresh ground, and may end up saving the future of the lit mag.” I think this is interesting because with the use of InDesign what the article states they want, is all accessible in the program. 

My decision for my portfolio project is to do a magazine. I chose a magazine because after the class viewings, I learned a lot and think I could be very good at making covers. I found the effects and color use on InDesign very intriguing. I fi have to perfect cover photo and the use of InDesign and all it has to offer; I think I could make an amazing cover. I liked most of the assigned articles but I would change a few things. If I were to do a women's magazine sure, I would have the normal things in there like fashion and target-based information, but I would add a few things they only have in men magazines like content that explains things going on in the world which is not even mentioned in women's magazines.. So, if I do a cover like that it might have some of that content. Anyways, I like the idea of the magazine and I feel like I can do many creative things with it, but first, I'll have to learn how to work InDesign. I’ve already learned a few things from the tutorial we watched in class, but it went a little too quickly, but I'm sure once I learn I'll be able to make an amazing magazine using InDesign.