COM109 Magazine Portfolio LIM ZU HUI 34446637

JAZZ

Volume 12, Issue 5

NOVEMBER 13,2023

MAGAZINE

the magazine for Jazz Music Lovers

Top 30 Jazz Music of Free Jazz Music CDs for early-birds!!!

all time

How to enjoy Jazz Music

Contents page Editor Blurb 3 Audio 4-5 Video 6-7 Landscape image 8-9 Portrait image 10-11 Close-up image 12-13 Action image 14-15 Zombie image 16-17 Image mesh-up 18-19 Advertisement 20

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Editor’s Blurb

I am Lim Zu Hui, a final-year Murdoch University student majoring in Web Communications and Marketing, taking Com 109 Introduction Digital Media Skills as my last semester.

Although I have some prior experience in using some of the Adobe software like Photoshop and In-design in my other modules, I still have not fully mastered them yet, I need to refresh my memory to re-learn them again.

On top of this, I have to learn two additional new Adobe software, the Premiere Pro and the Audition; hence, all these are practical challenges confronting me. Nevertheless, I managed to overcome all these immediate challenges, and I learned all these software progressively along the way whilst doing my assignment, which is interesting as there are many amazing things to explore.

The main body of the Jazz Magazine encompassed the total compilation of all my design-related workshop exercises and assessments from the different Adobe Creative Suite software, such as Adobe Audition, Adobe Premiere Pro, Adobe Photoshop and Adobe In-Design, throughout the whole COM109 unit, which also included a short sound and video interview, as well as a Mini-movie assignment and six edited Photoshop images.

The Jazz Magazine’s theme projected a simple, modern, and elegant style, targeting a more musical jazz ambience. It comprised a few bright colours associated with jazz music, such as yellow, purple and blue for its background and shapes. In contrast, its font text consisted of black and white colours to make it stand out so that the appearance looks even more elegant and stylish. My main rationale for selecting this musical jazz theme for my magazine is my inherent interest in listening to jazz music daily, as it gives me a more relaxing, calm, and focused mind when doing my school assignments.

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Audio

Audio recording

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Audio

workspace in audition

Click here to view ( Sound interview)

The process of the sound editing in the finalised mix-down workshop exercise that is created in Adobe Audition starts with a few separate voice recordings from a short interview with my coursemates by asking 3 to 5 questions regarding topics of their course of studies, their lives and personal plans, which lasts about one minute, then followed by a short introduction, advertising break and outro recording which last around 30 seconds. Finally, towards the end, there is a music recording sourced from a royalty-free website, a pixel bay that I have used for my sound editing.

The whole finalised mix-down recording is constrained to about 1 minute 30 seconds. Therefore, I must reduce unnecessary speeches, such as unwanted pauses and background noises. The controls used are adjusted accordingly, such as the lowering of the volume level and normalising the voice, adding effects that are aligned to someone speaking to a large crowd of people so that the recording is more neutral and smoother, as having a loud background noise could affect the overall recording, as such they need to be consistent throughout the recording process.

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Video

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This video process involved one video exercise that required at least 30 seconds and a mini movie assessment that needed at least 1 minute 30 seconds, created using Adobe Premiere Pro software.

Firstly, for the first video interview workshop exercise, I commenced by recording 2 of my classmates and getting one of them to ask them and discuss random open-ended questions about life and their favourite mobile phones, etc.

The main editing technique used herein was a Standard cut, which takes out unnecessary parts that were not important in the video, while the effects used were adjusting the hue and saturation of the colour background, making it brighter and adding the Gaussian blur effect to block unwanted audiences that are an obstruction to the video process.

Secondly, the Mini-movie assessment will incorporate my editing skills from my voice-over and music recording that needs to be done in the audition inside the Premiere Pro software.

The duration is 1 minute and 30 seconds.

Video Click here to view ( Short interview)

click here to view (Mini-Movie video)

The video tells a short story of a person known as Jenny, who has completed her final exams and she went to a relaxing place in the park to read her favourite book. Sometime later, she was distracted by messages from her phone and decided to leave for her home. The theme for this video is aimed towards a minimalistic style and a more chilling mood with really smooth music played throughout the video.

I was taught how to use different types of video shots such over the shoulder, wide and mid shot, creative shot and many more video shots and also use the rule of thirds; for example, I have to set the phone camera to a frame that is in a tip tag toe mode that has helped me take better video shots in this assessment. The main editing technique will be the standard cut, trimming the unwanted parts of my video and clicking and dragging my video clip to its full length. The fading in and out and the cross-dissolve effects are the main effects that are utilised in my video.

The introduction and the selected font used in the background colour, which is black in colour, help to create a cinematic feel of a combination of authentic and simple styles. The small screenshots of my storyboard and the Premiere Pro workspace are also featured in the magazine.

Some of the problems encountered when doing this assessment are the need for more clarity of over-adding different transitions as there are too many to use and also deciding which video clip to trim even after watching too many YouTube videos. Moreover, as it is also my first time using this Premiere Pro software, it is quite challenging for me to accomplish this video assignment.

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Landscape image

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Landscape image

This landscape image was taken at a nearby park using my mobile phone and then edited using Adobe Photoshop software.

This image’s theme and mood are intended to have a brighter and more refreshing feel. Some Photoshop tools were used to edit this image by adjusting the layers of the software like changing the image’s attitude, trying out different mixtures of colours in hue and saturation, brightness and contrast, colour balance, exposure, and curve tools.

Lastly, the colours used are according to the RGB: three red, green and blue selections

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Portrait image

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Portrait image

This Portrait’s image was taken quite recently using my mobile phone, and subsequently it was edited using Adobe Photoshop for this workshop’s exercise. Regarding the theme and mood, my main aim was to create a more stylish and elegant which can give a cool and swag style by adding sunglass photos and utilising different tools in Photoshop software.

This process started with removing the original background of this image to white, adding various tools using the adjustment layers of the software like melody blues, cinematic and blue mood, sunshine feel, adding the photo repair by lightening the picture, adjusting the hue and saturation of the colour background of the portrait image, its brightness and contrast, photo filters, colour balance, gradient map icon, exposure and vibrance icon, channel mixer, colour lookup control and numerous curves.

Next, I have to source a relevant sunglasses image that is royalty-free from Pixel Bay. I copied and resized it in a word document into a desired size, then copied and dragged it over to my main image, removed the sunglasses image’s background, and then dragged the shot to cover my glasses. Thereafter I have to find another black location for my sunglasses image to cover up the hole as there is a visible hole in the sunglasses image, thus making the sunglasses picture more realistic, authentic, and artistic.

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Close-up image

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Close-up image

The original close-up image was taken near my house’s room, and then edited using Adobe Photoshop. The theme and mood of this image is an imagination of myself being in a particular cold country, shivering in this cold weather, nearby an open sea filled with dark-blue colour water.

The process for editing this image was to firstly removing the original background image and replacing it with another background portrait image, which is blue and also has the seawater atmosphere from Pixel Bay which is royalty-free. Thereafter I would add them into the main workspace in Photoshop itself, and clicking on to the arrange button to send it backwards and then using the moving selection tool to drag and move around my water bottle and background image to its suitable position.

After that, I utilised the numerous adjustment layers in this software to beautify my appearances, like choosing the blue mood and cinematic soft sepia layers, adjusting the brightness /contrast, hue and saturation, exposure and colour levels and balances, photo filter, selective colours, gradient map and posterise tool to make it to a more fictional, authentic and stylish image.

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Action image

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Action image

This action-shot image is created using the Adobe Photoshop software. The theme and mood for editing this finalised image is to create a mixture of night ambience and cinematic view, making it more like a comical television scene.

This process commenced by firstly removing the original image background and then add the main action image into another layer. Secondly, I searched for a relevant background image that is suitable for a more comical view and then copy it into a separate file, copying and dragging the image into my Photoshoot’s file and then clicking the arrange button to send it backwards.

Lastly to touch up on the image I used the various adjustment layers in the software to orientate this image into a more creative environment such as a dark fade and cinematic -soft sepia mood, adding the black and white control and adjusting the hue and saturation, brightness and contrast, colour balance mixers to darken and brighten up the entire image making it more comical.

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Zombie image

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Zombie image I created this zombie image in this workshop exercise using the Adobe Photoshop software. The theme and mood of this image is to make it into a funny and scary scarecrow, which has a dark atmosphere associated with a night ambience.

The first step to the editing stage of this image is to search for a royalty-free image from Pixel Bay and then add it to my Photoshop file. I also added another background image from the same website and arranged it into a suitable size and position for the idea.

To make the image darker, I added different effects like, for example, the stroke, inner shadow and glow, colour and gradient overlay, drop shadow, bevel and emboss, and finally, inserted the gradient map controls and for their eyes I used the brush tool to colour and whiten the eyes to make it look funnier.

A combination of layer’s blender tools, like the dark and light modes, were used in this image. The main problem I faced doing this zombie image was that I tried using certain guidelines from the school briefs to modify or adapt it but somehow, I faced some difficulties as they didn’t suit and fit well into my intended vision as planned. So in the end, I decided to make it into a simplified image as shown in the magazine.

The above whole processes required taking some numerous meticulous tasks and steps to complete this whole process for this workshop exercise.

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Image Mesh-up

1. Describe the original image and how you altered it This workshop exercise’s mesh-up image is created using this Adobe Photoshop software. The theme and mood for this image is intended to have a more simplified and modern feel. The main motivation for creating this image is to encourage individuals from all walks of life that everyone has their ups and downs, which has background in darker colour. Still, they must not give up hope as there are boundless opportunities for anyone to invest in themselves by travelling to nice and attractive places to relax and relieve their daily stress as they need rejuvenate and have a positive mindset To explain the various tasks clearly, I tabulate them as follow:a)First of all, the process of creating this image is to source a mixture of 10 images of skyscrapers and waterfalls, a portrait, and a background image. b)Secondly, I will resize all the pictures in a Word document to my desired size before copying them one by one into my Photoshop file. c)Thirdly, I added the portrait image into Photoshop and then clicked the select and inverse buttons to select my final portrait mage that I desired. Then I counted on the clipping mask tool to the image, and then I slowly placed the ten images one by one and resized them again, and then I arranged it to the back of each of the ten pictures and balance them using the layer’s opacity for these images. d)Fourthly, I utilised other effects like the adjustment layers, for example, the hue and saturation, brightness and contrast, selective colour, exposure, black and white, colour balance, colour levels and curves controls in the layers panel, e) and lastly, I added the dark background image that I have found from Pixel Bay. Then I add in Photoshop, and I clicked the arrange button to be sent back and utilise the same layers to darken my background image.

These are the various steps/tasks required to complete the above whole process for my meshup image.

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Image Mesh-up 2.. Discuss from a legal, ethical and creative viewpoint if the image belongs to you.

From my creative and aesthetic viewpoint, as any creative individual, we must be unique by creating new design techniques and finding inspiration from other creators to use their inspiration and recreate them into our own realistic and relevant authentic design. That has an independent mindset. Alternatively, we can search and download our desired images from Pixel Bay, which are royalty-free and then adapt them to suit our design idea. (Admin, 2018) In terms of aesthetics, I have considered the various design’s pleasing qualities before even altering the structure to fit into the right type of image, for example, the colour balance, layout, height and width. (What Is Aesthetics?, n.d.)

From my legality and ethics viewpoint, it is always important for me as the user to be more transparent and responsible by complying with the current relevant law regulations for these design principles and seeking help from professionals for their advice before even altering the other’s original image as it is morally wrong to just straightaway copy and paste other people without consulting or even acknowledging the rightful owner’s information from online sources.

Likewise, even with their kind consent, I will still also give due consideration and credit to the original owner for their initial works and for giving me the inspiration that led to my creation to avoid misinformation and unnecessary troubles from the general public, to ensure that there is a clear distinction in my image creation. (How to Use Images on Your Website without Violating Singapore’s Copyright Laws, n.d.) (Five Ways to Verify an Image and Identify the Copyright Owner, n.d.) (5 Ways to Implement Design Ethics, n.d.)

Image Mesh-up

3. Discuss if you would be happy to use the image for personal use I am so glad and pleased to use this mesh-up image for my personal use as it is created and conceived from my own creative and innovative ideas.

I am also happy to share this self-created image with the general public if they approach me to seek my blessings.

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