Completed Table of Contents Discussion Part One

The following is an analytic look of the process of creating my table of contents.

I used lighting effects to alter my image. Because it depicts a happy dog at the beach, increasing the lighting makes the picture much brighter, and a bright, sunny day at the beach is great fun. This depicts making animals happy and enjoying time with them happily, which is what my magazine attempts to catch. The setting of the shot, the beach, is a place of vacation, relaxation, and just plain fun, so taking your pet here shows good ownership and love. 

I researched other pet magazines to learn the typical structure of them. I learned the modern design choice of using half the spread for a picture and half for the contents. I also learned using a gradient allows for the features to stand out, so I used this on my spread. On top of that, I decided to apply this to the title and headings of the pages to make them standout as well. My audience research shows that they like eye-catching content, so the use of this adorable, attention-grabbing photo along with bright, colored section titles and bright gradients, I can successfully draw and maintain attention.

Planning for the table of contents started with an initial sketch that I stayed fairly true to. This helped me realize what would look nice and helped me remember what I wanted to do. For planning my photo shoot, I asked everyone in my yearbook class if they had pets that I could photograph. I ended up looking at everyone's dogs, and then when I found my model, Kisses, I went with the owner to the beach to take pictures.

My decisions and revisions mainly came as I went on actually designing my layout. I knew from the beginning that I would be taking on certain designs, like the color-coordinated sections and the half-page design, but I began tinkering more and more when I applied those features in my sketch. I went off of what I would see on other magazines that would embellish my spread.