Work completion and prep for final magazine stages:
For my design which has evolved constantly over the module, I opted to make use of 6 out of the 8 available pages. This is because, while my feature is certainly a people based article and images help to illustrate this in most cases, this is also a piece about people who vulnerable and how feeding people in need is one of many ways to avoid excessive edible food waste. So, slightly fewer pages mean that I can make use of 3 or 4 well-selected images that I feel will best accompany my feature.
In my design as it stands, there are currently Unsplash images standing in for my own photography as I have not yet been able to get out take them, but I should be able to get this done before next week (*see below*). After looking at other magazines in the newsroom for inspiration, I have instead used the placement of quotes to ensure their prominence is clear, as you can see here where I have selected a poignant quote from Lisa and created a pull quote and I think this is an eye-catching and important part of the design.
(*Here*) I was also able to get the images at the weekend following this session. I went to visit Hoping Street Kitchen in action and managed to get several dozen images and avoided taking any shots that included the faces of any of the people visiting that were not volunteers who had agreed for their profiles to be included. There were several elements that the lead to the images that I use in my feature that were as a result of shooting at night that actually I was very pleased with. The final product was a very dark set of images that, though clear, gave a real sense of how cold and difficult the world can be at the same time as showing the smiling faces of the volunteers and the vast array of food available for people who are in need to collect and either eat there or take for later.
Teamwork makes the dream work:
Over the past few weeks as the magazine has started to come together the group has needed to work together effectively as well as individually. While some people have been unable, or simply unwilling, to attend sessions this has not been the case for most people. Coming together to make design and style decisions has been vital for the magazine to begin to take shape as it has.
Over the next two weeks, the group will have to make use of this ability to work well as a team to get through the most stressful and fast-paced part of the module.
I believe that I have worked well with others and while my role as Editor has not been the same as it would be in an actual publication it has meant that people have asked for my advice and I hope that I have helped when this has been the case.