Graphic Design 2: Magazine Cover and Spread

The purpose of the following assignment was to create a magazine cover and two page spread for an existing design magazine.  I chose to work with Photoshop User magazine.  The content of the spread and the focus of the cover I designed were the results I achieved from Photoshop tutorials I completed from Smashing Magazine. 

I began the project by purchasing Photoshop User magazine and examining the format and structure of the cover and inside spreads.  I then completed two Photoshop tutorials from Smashing Magazine.  The first tutorial gave step-by-step instructions on how to replace the sky in a photograph.  For this tutorial, I started with the following two pictures:

I followed the tutorial, and when I replaced the sky in the original photograph, this was the result:

I also completed a second tutorial that gave step-by-step instructions on creating a burst of light effect surrounding text in Photoshop.  This was the final result:

I chose to use the burst of light effect for my cover of Photoshop User magazine.  For the inside spread, I used screen shots I created when I followed the step-by-step tutorial instructions.  However, before designing my cover and two page spread on the computer, I created several thumbnail sketches.  There was not a lot of variation in the sketches since I was following the existing format and structure used in Photoshop User magazine.

After selecting my favorite layout, I then created the cover and two page spread in InDesign.