The Truth About Chuck - Charlie Magazine

It is done. We couldn't be happier.

After 2 weeks of sacrificing sleep, family time, and some good home-cooked meals, the creation of Charlie magazine definitely put up a fight - a good fight.

I guess this was the nature of group work though; late nights, endless group meetings, relying on each other to finish the work, and of course, lots of arguing. I must admit, the group atmosphere got really heavy at times and there was at least one definite time when I wanted to leave the room. Then, I wiped my tears (figuratively), took a deep breath and said "Charlie has poisoned your mind but you're still my friend" and continued working. Everyone had good intentions to finish the magazine strong, but because we were a bunch of CreComm superstars put into one stellar magazine group, our creative ideas didn't really work well with each other's. In the end, we just had to communicate as a group and work with all the ideas we've pitched. I really hoped that what we have in our hands was something everyone in the group would be proud of for the rest of their CreComm careers.

If you were wondering what our cover looks like, you're just going to have to wait until the magazine trade show/fair on April 1st. Unlike the other magazine groups, the creators of Charlie magazine chose to unveil their cover page at the trade show. It will definitely be worth the wait. We had to find a photographer, make-up artist, props, and one beautiful model to create a photo that was cover-worthy for a magazine that was visually stunning. Charlie's content was also fun, informative, and best of all, a good read!

The creators really poured their heart and soul (and money!) into the magazine and that would show through the overall layout and content of our product. Creating a magazine from start to finish was truly an amazing experience. I still couldn't believe that we wrote all the articles, advertisements, took photos, layed it out, then had it printed at a professional print shop. Magazine business is hard business - that I can attest to!

Being in a magazine group has many key learnings. Here were some of the things I took away from the entire experience:

1) Working in a group of four was tough! Three would have been better because there wouldn't have been too many ideas flying around and less people to butt heads with :)

I thought the hardest part of being in a group was making sure that everyone in the group was heard. Sometimes it was easy to listen and empathize with a member in the group and just let them talk about how they feel. But when another member in your group confided in you, it made it difficult to continue knowing that members weren't communicating through out the group.

So key to working in a group (and in any relationship) was open communication! With open communication, there wouldn't be misunderstandings and every group member would be on the same page. If one member didn't like an idea then he/she should say so before it was too late.

2) Knowing your role/having a role/taking a role in a group was also key. Sometimes in a group you have way too many people wanting to do all the work and that was great! But when you have talented people who want to put their mark on everything, you need to decide where to stand: Do you push your idea instead or do you find other avenues to help out? Once you thought about it, the answer was pretty clear. Again, this was a group project so you need to do what was necessary to achieve group harmony.

3) At the end of the day, it was just a project! Some people might think that getting top marks on this magazine project would determine the success of their project but when everything was said and done the important thing to take away from the CreComm group project were the things that couldn't be marked with a letter grade. Things like:

What did I learn about myself when working in a group?
How did I react when someone didn't like my idea?
Did I accommodate everyone's ideas or did I fight to stick with mine?
Did I listen more than I did talking?
What did I learn about using InDesign? Photoshop? Using a camera?
What I did learn as a journalist?
What did I learn about managing my time? My group's time?
How did I react when things didn't go my way?

I'm sure you could have added a lot of other things to this list. No matter, how you thought you're magazine turned out, the best thing you could have taken away from the magazine project was the fact that you learned how to work in a group of A-type students in an environment under a high-level of stress and survived to tell the tale. That alone was commendable. So congratulations to all the magazine groups for a job well done!

Here are some behind-the-scene pics of my interview with Constance Popp, a profile interview featured in the upcoming Charlie magazine available April 1 in the Red River College Princess Campus Atrium :)


This necklace was provided by Chocolatier Constance Popp. The necklace was dipped in artisan chocolate then dusted to give it an "Amazon" feel.



These chocolate cigars are neat! - Available at Chocolatier Constance Popp (1853 Portage Ave. Winnipeg, MB. Ph. 204-897-0689)



Dog's love chocolate! A special visitor was at the shop when I interviewed Constance



These and more pics will be available at the Magazine Fair on April 1, 2010 RRC Princess Campus South Atrium where Charlie Magazine's booth will be located.

See you there!