front page

Front Page Analysis

1. The layout of the front page follows a similar style to the rest of the magazine, however being the first thing the audience will see means it will be setting the tone.
For example the mast-head typically is bold, it follows a similar font style to the rest of the text, however it is in block capitals, emphasising its importance amongst the page's other features. It also follows the colour scheme keeping with the same tone as the other sub-headings on the page i.e. the band name 'arcade fire' that is big and bold in the centre of the page has a more significant or important appearance than even the mast-head which makes it more interesting and intrigues the audience.
The size of the mast-head is a lot different from that of other text on the page, it's quite a bit larger,this has been done as it has with the use of block capitals to affect the heading giving it a higher level of importance over the other features. It draws interest from the reader immediately identifying it to them as the title of the magazine, however the mast-head is overlapped indicating that people may not necessarily need to see the whole thing, from this we can infer that it is a well known magazine.

The text dotted around the page in sub-headings and article tasters use a typical chatty style of casual, informal language that is often used in many magazines spanning across pretty much every genre. It is used for the specific effect of comfort, when a member of the target audience is  reading through a magazine they want it to be a nice comfortable experience and so the language in them has been adapted to create just that effect, making any magazine much more appealing to its target audience.

Institutional information such as the date, issue number or price are shown in the top left corner, kept out of the way from the actual magazine content so it's not distracting, yet this information is still available to the customer should they need it.

The colour scheme uses blue, black and white, this has various effects that benefit the magazine .Firstly it allows for the use of a simple black background that gives a certain degree of contrast with the text which is always favourable, secondly it makes the image on the page more defined, the contours of the image become more visible and it presents the focus in much deeper detail. The effect this has on the audience is that it creates an isolated view of the page, pulling your attention towards the image also gaining a sense of importance by standing alone on the page.
   The shot types used for the image also help to back up this idea of importance. The image is taken from a low angle perspective this means that we are looking up at the character in the image and this is effectively the impression given off, we look up to this person putting them in a position of importance and high stature.

The font varies in different styles in different sections of the text, this is something that is made necessary by the absence of full stops and like colour scheme it is something that's used to separate and split up the different sections of the page. 



2. The main images on the front covers of music magazines are usually very large, covering a huge portion of the page. Their large size indicates importance and stature, this helps to make them standout among other magazines, everything featured on the front page is very much all about selling the magazine rather than explaining individual pieces of information featured within it. For example the image presents two important figures who presumably relate to one of the main articles featured within, this is not explained to us in any text it is just the initial impression given off by the image which is interpreted by the target audience.

In the image the two figures are staring at the camera, this is employing the technique of direct address which is the use of features that manage to in some way relate to the reader/viewer whether in text, using words like 'you' or in images where the person pictured is looking or pointing out at the audience. This helps to draw focus to certain points on the page, basically it means that the editor can use this to grasp the attention of those looking to buy a magazine, and so selling the product which is the company's target/objective.
This form of direct address gives a more personal feel to the magazine, it gives the illusion of being specific to you, giving you the information that it is a product that specifically appeals to you.

The strap line at the top shows important news, it's more bold and colourful than the rest of the page, this makes it more urgent, however the mast-head and main image do overlap it slightly which limits its urgency but does still keep it obvious and noticeable.

In the centre of the page we have some text which links with the image directly behind this, the audience can tell this by it's proximity to the image, this plays on the audiences eye line effortlessly connecting the image with the text in an effective manner.

The text itself is displayed in different colours, the names of the band members are in white while the general descriptive text is in red, this makes their names more distinctive, giving them more impact and making them stand out more, making them easily noticeable and easy for the audience to pick out.The image shows two figures and the text presents two names, to make it easier for the audience to identify "who's who", the names of each person are directly beneath their image.



3. The text and images are ordered into a reasonably neat layout with text down one side of the page rounding off at the bottom of the page underneath the main image.
A lot of magazines use a neat, straight layout like this which helps to make the page feel more consistent and allows for an easier read.

Likewise the colour scheme keeps to a basic small set of colour which scarcely ranges in tone, it is all quite bright and kept at this consistent level of brightness this contrasts with the darkly toned background making it easier to read and defines difference between images and text.

Overall this creates a clear and consistent layout for easy reading and creates an attractive and enticing magazine cover.
The yellows and reds used, generally both of these colours can be associated with warnings and so this colour scheme pulls together giving a sense of urgency or importance, it creates this impact that really helps to catch the attention of the audience.

The names of bands are up in bold almost entirely covering the page, listing all of these well known bands helps to play on the strengths of the magazine. Using well known groups and individual artists will attract more attention and allows the viewer to easily pick out what interests them and so in this sense the artists can be thought of as brands. It works in the same way as a logo, if the audience recognises the word or the name then it will catch their attention, this is something that can be used to great effect and something I will definatley introduce into my own work.

The main image of the page is a close up of one of the featured artists, the artist is looking straight out at the camera and so uses a form of direct address. The result of using direct address is that the audience will feel a more personal appeal from the magazine because the appearance is that the image is looking out at you and therefore directly addressing you.
The close up also helps to identify the facial expressions of the person in the image, in this particular image the artist has an enigmatic expression on his face, this could indicate a sense of mystery or intrigue into the piece and so encourages the audience to buy the magazine in order to read about the artist. 

Features to include in my own work:

When considering the layout it needs to be neat, it needs to keep text to columns and cannot obstruct the image, however the image can overlap certain parts of the text such as the heading or in this case the name/brand of the magazine. A reason for this is likely to be that the magazine is well known and so blocking out one or two letters would be fine because the reader would be able recognise the name, this could  be contributed to the font, size or colour which over time will have become more memorable.

Text generally encircles the main image which creates a more layered effect. It also helps to link the text and the image in a way that keeping them perfectly separate does not, it gives the reader a more comfortable feeling while reading, this is because a more casual layout style promotes a more casual feeling that is interpreted by the reader.

Colour scheme generally keeps to a three or four tone set, using contrasting colours is very important for making it easy to read. If it's easier to read then it creates a much more casual and comforting atmosphere for the reader. At the same time contrasting colours are used to attract attention and interest from the reader or target audience, this is because contrast between dark and bright colours makes text/images stand out more, again making them more interesting which is a greater appeal to the reader.

The image needs to present some form of direct address as this will help to attract audiences, making them feel more involved when reading and ultimately make the decision to buy the magazine that much more tempting.

The page needs to be filled, if the reader decides that it seems too vague then they won't want to buy it,  more text will create the idea that the magazine is packed full of information and therefore well worth buying in order to read on.

Development of Front Cover

Just like with the rest of the pages in my magazine, I wanted to keep to a similar colour scheme so that it would be consistent throughout and there by appear more professional to the target audience. Using the same colour palette as I used in previous work I then asked for the opinions of my focus group to see how they believed I should adapt my page to better suit the target audience.

In their response they explained that I should use the exact same colour scheme for all pages because this would help give my magazine an identity, so that it would be easily recognised, making it different from its competitors.

Coming up with a Logo

All magazines, newspapers, big brand companies these days have a logo that is easy to spot and that we would all associate with that company for example the BBC logo as you can see below.

The BBC logo is a very memorable logo that much is obvious, as is the logo for the popular music magazine NME and the similarity doesn't stop there both of them are abbreviations, British broadcasting corporation and new musical express, this is something that could help me with the production of my own magazines name and logo.


Working on this idea I decided to choose the name 'indie magazine UK' and to abbreviate it to 'IMUK' however when putting this into production, the 'UK' didn't seem to work as well as I had hoped and so I began building on a new initial design and the following is the process it went through.

You can see that I started from scratch using a simple two letter title, I then adapted and changed this to form a circle shape for the background, building on this I added the title name, all the while in keeping with the set colour scheme I had previously produced for the magazine pages and then finally adding the 'UK' in smaller lettering this gives the desired impact whilst keeping a bold and bright title heading for the page .

Photo Shoot

In order to create a good looking front page for my magazine I needed to come up with a decent image, something that meets all the requirements, and so I went out and did another photo shoot to try and get this perfect picture, after playing around with a few different shot types  like close ups, long shots, mid-shots, high angle, low angle etc. I managed to gather several suitable images fit for a front cover.

After the photo shoot I started to play around the the different effects I could use, how to edit them and what colours I should use. This was difficult bearing in mind that I wanted to keep to my magazine's colour so I experimented with using red and white colouring and dark colours, black and white contrast settings and so on.

 After editing I needed to decide which pictures were the best to incorporate into my work and the overall design of my final front page, so I picked out these few good looking pictures, cycled through some more effects and finally chose to go with this.

I chose this particular image because it provides a decent area of background that can be filled with the text featured on the front page, this means that no compromises will be made in moving around the text or image and nothing will be obstructed. The actual colouring effects added to the image also hold to the colour scheme of my magazine.

Layout of Front Cover

After producing these three layout options for the design of my front cover I took them to my focus group to get an idea of what the target audience would think of the plan and I allowed them to choose the best, these are the reactions they gave.
-  Design idea number 2. Has a larger image space which is good, it fills the page and makes it more interesting. However it doesn't have much space for writing or information that makes it kind of boring.
-  Design idea number 1. Is nice, it has a larger space for the heading which makes it easier to see and there's lots of information that kind of fills the corners of the page. It's very spaced out yet still neat, which is good it makes it very easy to read.
-  Design idea number 3. Has a bit too much on it, it's quite tightly packed there's not much room on the page which make's it difficult to read and there's not much space for the image. It seems like it would be difficult to fit in the information.


And then I decided it was best to take a vote with the focus group, and the result was a tie between design ideas one and two, so I included my own vote which gave the outcome of the desired design idea being number one. I myself chose design idea one because it seemed to me to be the best and was the one I based mostly on other pre-existing forms of magazine cover, this I thought gave it a nice professional look.

Draft Design of Front Cover

This is the design and layout I plan to stick with for my final version of my front cover, and after I have taken the pictures I need they will hopefully not prove too obstructive for the rest of the page's features.

Here as you can see is the final result, the finished design for my front cover in which I made sure to include all the factors that I had discovered in research and distilled into my plans and designs over the course of the project.

However I felt that this still didn't have the right look, I wanted to change certain aspects and so I altered the design to give me this.

The changes I made were to eliminate this dark area that was created by the image in the background, because of the images deep contrast there was a large dark area and this wasn't really in keeping with the rest of the magazine's colour scheme because the background of the other pages, (for example the contents page has a very bright, in fact white background).

I began to change the image by blocking out sections of the image, this then developed into a pattern which I believe suits the genre of music. But then in order to counter the added brightness I needed to change the colour of the text on the page, as it had previously been white I have now swapped this for black, this is so that it provides a high enough contrast with the background to make it easily visible and simple to read, while also managing to keep to the colour scheme.