Front Page Construction

The typographic components that I used for my front page attract the readers eye to the stories that are going to be in the magazine.

The font that I used for my title is nova solid, the block text looks good with the name.

I decided to make the general colour scheme red and black, this is a simple colour scheme and will be simple to keep consistent throughout the magazine.

I put the text in coloured boxes to show to the reader that they are important pieces of information.

Trying to choose the fonts that would go on my magazine cover was the hardest thing, making the fonts look professional and like a genuine music magazine is a challenge. Here I added a design element that grabs the readers attention.










I decided to use this picture for my front cover, I think that it portrays the genre that I want my magazine to be well because the clothing looks typically 'indie' and the guitar shows clearly that it is a music magazine

 I had to edit this picture and change the brightness and contrast to make it look like a more professional picture, to do this I went to image, adjustments and brightness and contrast and adjusted the levels. I experimented a lot with the brightness and contrast to try and find the best look for my picture. I added a union jack badge to my front page, this design element shows the reader that this edition of 'riot' will talk about the upcoming British festivals which - if they want to go to them - will give the reader incentive to buy the magazine

I have made many changes since the beginning process of my magazine, I changed the colour or the title and added an outline to it, as well as this I finished the writing in the black block at the bottom of the cover, a picture of this is shown below.

                                                                 

Here I was trying to find an appropriate colour for the text at the bottom of the cover, I experimented with a deep red/burgandy colour but in the end settled for a golden brown because the dark red was too difficult to read, the new colour of the text allows the reader to easily read the text.         

Picture Planning

I have been looking through pictures of Florence Welch, Laura Marling and Alexa Chung (because they are all influential women for both fashion and music in the indie culture) to try and help me decide on the lighting, colour and pose of my model for the picture on my front page. Here are some pictures that I found that have inspired and helped me with my photograph for my front page.

This cover of NME features Florence Welch, her famous red hair is styled so that it covers a lot of the magazine and the coverlines are white so that they stand out against her hair. This shot is from the shoulders up so that Florence's face dominates the entire cover, her name is the only writing that is in black; it immediately attracts the readers eye to the fact that Florence is the main feature in the magazine.

 

This issue of rolling stone features Lady Gaga, she is not looking directly at the camera which is unusual. The headline is behind her on the cover and the coverlines almost do a text wrap around her head, this makes her the dominant feature on the front cover of the magazine.

 

 

 

This issue of VIBE features Beyoncé, the picture on this front cover clearly shows that the target audience is males, this picture of beyoncé is trying to portray her as a sex symbol and the women that are on the front covers of VIBE are often wearing very little clothing...not really a magazine that a woman would want to buy. The medium long shot of this photograph allows a lot of space for coverlines.

 

 

 

 

 

This issue of KERRANG! features paramore on its cover, however it only features front woman Hayley Williams as opposed to the entire band. Her facial expression and hand action suggest edgyness which goes with the genre of her music and the genre of the magazine.

Font Ideas

In my opinion this font would suit the tone of my magazine and would match the genre of music that will be associated with it, I like that there is no gaps and the holes that are usually in the letters are filled in; it looks different.

I like this font because the vintage look to it could be easily associated with the content of my magazine because the music that will be featured is usually listened to by 'indie' people and this culture can be linked to vintage fashion.

I like the simplicity of this font and think it would be good for my magazine because of the edgy - not neat appearance of it. This font would be appropriate for the cover lines of my front page; it would catch the readers eye.

Second Magazine Analysis

• Q is produced by the Bauer Media group, it is called Q because when it was first published its producers wanted to call it cue (as in cueing a record, preparing it to play) but they then worried that it would be mistaken by buyers as a snooker magazine so thay simply named it 'Q'
• Q has 162 pages. 19 of which are adverts. The adverts in the magazine distinguish what the target audience is, the adverts are a 212 VIP male fragrance- the fact that this is an advert for a male fragrance shows that the target audience is men- an Amy Winehouse album, a braun shaver, albums from Ed sheeran, Black Keys, Red Hot Chilli Peppers and Coldplay and a Jack Daniels advertisement along with 4 pages of dates that are advertising gigs.

• The house style of Q shows the modernity of the magazine, the paper used- glossy paper- shows why the magazine is so expensive. The font and the general colour scheme of the magazine (red) connects and brings it all together, the red 'Q' logo is featured in the bottom right hand corner of each page.
• According to pressgazette.co.uk the average circulation for Q magazine is 80, 418, this has changed 10.1% in the last year. 

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  There are 23 double page spreads in this issue of Q magazine, one of which is an interview with Serge Pizzorno (kasabian) and Noel Fielding (the mighty boosh), this is a regular feature in the magazine called "a round with" featuring different musical acts every week.

Indie Rock

Indie rock originated from artists that would join independent music labels like Rough Trade. During the 90's bands such as Oasis, Blur, The Smiths and The Verve signed to independent labels and began to perfom intimate gigs, this type of music began to gain a following and evolved into the 'indie' culture. The independent labels supported the 'do it yourself' attitude of bands. I am basing my magazine around this genre of music because I think that I would be able to write about it in a professional way and because I have always been inspired by the music that is created by these artists.

As well as music,  the indie scene is also very centralised around fashion. Artists such as Florence Welch and Laura Marling are perfect examples of the indie culture. During the picture taking aspect of my coursework, I think that it is very important to make sure that the clothing that my model is wearing matches the tone and genre of the magazine. For example, different genres of music are often stereotyped by the clothes that the artists wear, you wouldn't expect to see N-Dubz wearing skinny jeans and a baracuta harrington jacket just like you wouldn't expect Florence Welch to be wandering around in a velour tracksuit.

Magazine titles ideas

Ideas for magazine titles:

• Riot (or ROS- riot of sound)
• Anarchy

My magazine is going to be in the genre of Indie Rock. My colour scheme will be Burgundy and white so that attention is drawn to the coloured title.
Some bands that will be featured on the cover of my magazine will be, Foo Fighters, Little Comets, Vampire Weekend and Noah and the Whale.
This will distingish the indie rock genre of the magazine. My target audience is going to be the ages between 16-30, my magazine will be appropriate for both men and women.

Magazine Analysis

 

The cover

• The title stands for 'New Musical Express', it is called this because the magazine is about new releases of indie rock music, however, readers that have never before seen the magazine could potentially not know that it is a magazine if purely based on the title, the other content on the front page such as the picture and mentioning of musical acts would suggest to the reader that it is a music magazine.

• The main image used in this issue of NME is a picture of Florence Welch, her face looks sullen and serious which matches the general tone of her music/new album. She is at eyeline with the camera and her clothing matches the indie tone of her music. Her arms are in a position that shows off her birdcage tattoo on her hand.
  
• Only one other image appears on the cover, this is a picture of an Ian Curtis poster that is featured inside the magazine, this is aimed to make the reader think that they are receiving something that is free which gives them more incentive to buy the magazine 
• A Steve Jobs tribute is promoted by the cover lines, this can be an aspect that makes the reader buy the magazine because Steve Jobs was influential in the development of music and many people would want to buy NME so that they can read about this and pay their own respects. Also a review of Noel Gallagher's new album, an interview with Florence Welch and a revelation of the best track of the last 15 years.
  
• The simplicity of the fonts on the cover suggest to the reader that the content will be simple and to the point. the colour scheme consists of 3 colours; orange, black and white. The white and black are used to make the photograph the main attraction to the audience and the bold orange 'FLORENCE' is orange because it grabs the readers eye immediately and matches the colour of Florence's hair.
• The language on the cover can be seen as humorous, "And, er, quite a lot more" this comforts the reader because it has a comedy element to it. As well as this, the phrase "the greatest" is used to describe a track, this suggests that NME has the status to decided what the 'greatest' track.
• NME and Kerrang! are both music magazines but the covers and content are very dissimilar. The cover of NME is very simple, there is a little amount of writing on the front page and the picture is the main focus whereas the front cover of Kerrang! is very busy, there are a lot of bright colours and this combined with the picture shows that there is too much fighting for the audiences attention. The colour schemes of the two magazines are very different, the NME cover only has one bright colour, orange, to attract the readers attention to the main feature in the magazine, but Kerrang! has several bright colours on its front cover. The two different front covers show different genre's of music, people that generally like indie rock music would more likely purchase NME whereas people that would prefer heavy metal would be more likely to purchase Kerrang! Another important difference between the two magazines is the paper that is used, NME uses paper that is similar to the paper that is used by newspapers, this is because the when it was first produced it was very similar to the size and shape of a general newspaper but its content was based around music, the magazine has evolved to having a glossy cover and being a conventional magazine size. The paper that is used in Kerrang! is high quality paper that you would usually associate with being used in a fashion magazine. The titles of the magazines are also very different in style, the NME is an abbreviation where as KERRANG! is an onomatopoeic word for the sound that a guitar makes when strummed, this relates to the genre of music that is featured in KERRANG! because it implies to the reader that it is a rock magazine.

                                                     The house style of Kerrang! is very modern and shows clearly what its target audience is, there are a lot of pictures featured in the magazine and the fonts usually represent the edgy undertone of the magazine.









                                                                          General

• IPC media produces NME
• The target audience is men that are aged between 16-34
• The magazine costs £2.40 and is released weekly or a years subscription is £74.99
• The circulation of this magazine is 29, 020, this has gone down by 14.3% over the past year, according to pressgazette.co.uk IPC media said that NME "continues to be an exemplar of a modern multiplatform media brand"
• The approximate monthly revenue streams from advertising and circulation are £495, 29920 a month and £67, 071 a month on advertising

                                                                             Inside

               

• There are 66 pages in NME, 14 of which are adverts, the advertised products are clothing, alcohol, music and live gigs.
  • "Does Rock'n'Roll kill braincells?" is a feature in the magazine, this feature asks musicians questions about previous albums/experiences and gives points for every question answered correctly.

• There are 14 double page spreads in this magazine, one of these double page spreads is about Florence which is the main feature in the magazine, this feature on Florence takes up 5 pages which shows that this feature is the dominant article in the magazine.
• The house style of NME is very contemporary and relevant to its target audience, there are a lot of pictures throughout the magazine which successfully breaks up the text and makes the pages more interesting for the reader

Media Preliminary Task

Plan

AS Brief

Preliminary exercise: using DTP and an image manipulation program, produce the front page of a new school/college magazine, featuring a photograph of a student in medium close-up plus some appropriately laid-out text and a masthead. Additionally you must produce a mock-up of the layout of the contents page to demonstrate your grasp of DTP.

Main task: the front page, contents and double page spread of a new music magazine (if done as group task, each member of the group to produce an individual edition of the magazine, following the same house style).