Magazine Cover Analysis

Teen Pop Magazine

We heart pop magazine is a music gossip magazine which is targeted mainly at younger girls and younger teenagers, the main consumers of the magazine would be aimed at girls around 11-14 years old. This is made evident by looking at the style of the masthead, the use of san serif font and the heart graphic is a way of interpreting the word 'love', it is a fun and modern way of creating an iconic name for the magazine. Younger girls would appeal to it because its not something that would be used on other styles or genres of magazines, it makes it unique. The bold and stand out representation of the title is quirky and well suited to the audience and genre of the magazine. The font is less sophisticated than a serif classic font in which would be regularly used on magazines targeted at older women, the contrast shows the clear differentiation between the audiences. The use of the speech bubble relates to the gossip feel to the magazine.

 The colours that have been selected are bright greens, reds and black and white, this are stand out colours and are colours which young girls would appeal too more so than duller bold colours. The neon feel gives a sense of youth and fun and creates the unique element to the magazine design. Young girls are appealed to by the use of fashion as well as the music genre. The use of fashion images presented at the bottom of the cover would capture the attention of girls who are into fashion. 

The audience is also easily distinguished by the use of celebrities on the cover, they are all teenage boys who are famous in the music industry for their pop songs who attract millions of teenage girls and therefore are icons to many people, this would draw girls in to buying the magazine because they have an interest in these celebs. They are central on the cover and are looking directly at the consumer; this is a easy method of grabbing the attention and making people buy the magazine. 

The use of the main cover line will also entice girls to buy the magazine because it indicates that the three boys are single and therefore girls would be interested in discovering more into that concept. It also uses a plug and puff 'Niall. George and Justin. Pops Most Wanted' which corroborates the ideology that girls should find these boys attractive and appeal to them. Another use of a plug and puff is the 'Fit Aston Poster' also used for the intention of making young girls want to buy the magazine for the boys that are featured in it. The picture of the poster is illustrated next to it in order to convey the image that the girls would want.

The audience is represented through the uses of the teenage boys, it demonstrates a obvious idea that girls would find these boys attractive and would have a huge interest and diverse appeal to their life and gossip. It suggests all girls should like pop music and particularly boy bands because of the vibe they create. Most girls should be drawn to buying these types of magazines because of the concept of them. 

Magazine Cover Analysis

Fashion Magazine

By analyzing this cover of ‘Company’ magazine there are many connotations to be mentioned. It is evident that this magazine is targeted for girls, aiming at a niche audience of young girls between the ages of 16-25. This is clear because it presents its main image as a young model, the colour scheme is suited to girls and the genre of the magazine being fashion makes it easily identifiable that its aim is for girls.

 The image used is the winner of ‘Britain and Irelands Next Top Model’ this would attract the audience into buying it if they watched the series and also if they aspire to be a model themselves. The ideology of this cover is that the image is so dominant and illustrates a young model with a perfect complexion, figure and sense of fashion, it projects that all young girls should be fond of this and take an interest. The model used is someone who certain people wouldn’t know unless they had a liking to the fashion genre, therefore it is only endearing for certain girls. 

This is a regard to younger girls as apposed to older women because the style and format of what is included in the magazine is appealed to a different sense of fashion, only including clothing that are appropriate for the younger audience. Older women wouldn’t be enticed to buy the magazine due to the modern feel of the cover; the font style is quirky and aesthetic in comparison to font used in magazines targeted at older aged women. The colours are also bright which is a contrast to the ideological bold, darker colours that are used on other magazines; these colours would attract teenagers more so.

The use of the main cover line ‘new season fashion’ corroborates this idea that girls should follow the new trends along with the new season and therefore buying this magazine will help approach this. Having images of clothing and style will make girls who have an interest in fashion to buy it so that they can be aware of the new season fashion. The cover itself is very restricted to girls because of the codes and conventions it has used.

Magazines and Audiences

Fashion Magazines 

These are examples of magazines which fall in the fashion genre. Its clear target audience is women, due to the conventions that have purposely been pursued in the covers of these well known magazines. The main consumers of these magazines would be those who are mainly younger, ranging from around 16-25 year olds who have an interest and liking to fashion and the latest trends. All fashion genre magazines illustrate a similar image and iconic code and convention. They are similar because the audience and genre have to be recognised instantly when placed on the shelves in shops, this is to draw attention to the cover so that when looking for a specific magazine it is easily identifiable and allows magazines to become iconic.

From these covers the genre is obvious due to the main images and the cover lines which include the words associated to fashion, such as 'style', 'trend' and even using the word fashion so conveniently to entice the reader. These words are used to make it clear to the audiences that they are going to feature things of this association and therefore make it so clear to the buyers that it is a fashion magazine. 

From gathering these magazines it is noticeable that they all include an iconic masthead in which are recognised globally, they are presented largely on the cover and they are also all of similar font styles using serif font which interprets the audience it is aimed at, due to the font being more suited to a women's magazine. Serifs are classically used and therefore are widely known and understood. They have grown to be well recognised mastheads because of the popularity of these magazines. The titles must be boldly presented on the cover so that audiences are able to be drawn to the cover due to the name of the magazine that they intend to buy. However the covers also have a range of san serif font styles to attract the audience. Having a variety of font styles makes the cover look more interesting and eye catching. 

I can see a clear use of a main image being a fashion model which entices people to buy the magazine because of the representation it conveys, it suggests women should be into fashion and take an interest of their image to look good. The colours used differentiates on each cover, but the scheme used are those that would attract girls because they are bold and bright. They use a thematic link between the colour scheme and the month that they will be sold, for example the dark colours used would indicate months like November, December, in contrast pastel light colours would be featured on a summer edition of the magazine. From the magazines i collected they all correspond a variety of colours, this displays the use of thematic links. It is evident that they all have a particular colour scheme to it, and use the same colours through the colour, even matching the cover line, masthead and the clothing worn by the model, this makes the covers look slick and presentable. 

They are all similar due to the representation of young girls being used to sell the magazine and the indication of fashion and beauty. Girls would be drawn into buying these magazines because of the well known models, and the identification that they will include fashion items for inspiration. The use of celebrities will entice any girl to buy the magazine just because of the feature of that one particular figure, it is a way of gaining more sales and making girl inspired. They are all showing perfect skin, hair, make up, fashion and figure which portrays a sense of femininity and also make the cover dominate from other types of magazine. 

Notes on Magazine Design

• All magazines have a target audience in mind, a niche market to aim at 
• Magazines are clearly differentiated due to the target audience 
• They follow the code and convention, so that we can easily interpret the content and have the expectation of what the magazine should be like and what people hope to buy
• Price, barcode, date, issue number are all presented on the cover 
• Magazines have a main image placed in the centre of the cover, it dominates the page and has a direct relation to a feature article 
• Recognisable masthead (title), it is an iconic aspect
• Plugs and Puffs are used to entice the audience to buy the magazine
• Use of numbers to grab customers attention
• Main cover line is the biggest font size on the cover, it corroborates an article inside
• A quote is pulled out from an article and displayed along with the main cover line
• Cover lines are used around the cover to draw people in to reading it
• A colour scheme is effectively used 
• There is a thematic link between the colours and month/season it is published, i.e summer will use pastel or bright colours
• Magazine covers are sectioned into three parts, left third, centre and right
• Left third contains most text, it is the section people are likely to see first due to the way its presented on shelfs in shops
• Loads of different genres in magazines i.e fashion, film, music, lifestyle, fitness, motoring
• Audiences could include the age, gender, class, sexuality of the consumer
• The representation of the audiences uses ideology (powerful idea) e.g womens magazines would be a representation of what woman should be like (femininity) and mens would be how men should be perceived (masculinity) 

Glossary

Terminology associated with magazine design

Airbrush:
A compressed air tool that sprays a fine mist of paint or ink, used in illustration and photo retouching

Dateline:

This shows the month and year of which the magazine is published. This is often shown with the price also. Both of these are near the barcode.

Cover Line:

Titles associated with the content of the magazine. The sizes are slightly smaller than the main cover line so it captures the eye but doesn't drag it completely away from the main cover line.

Genre:

A category of artistic composition, as in music, fashion or film, characterised by similarities in form, style or subject matter

Left Third:

The left section of the magazine which includes the most text, it is the busiest of the three sections. magazines are sectioned into three parts the second being the centre image and the right third containing limited text and headlines.

Main Cover Line:

The text is the largest on the cover and therefore stands out and uses the colours associated with the main design. It has relation to the main article in the magazine.

Main Image:

The main image of the magazine. They usually have an iconic figure making eye contact at any customer that wishes to buy the magazine and it is big enough to capture the customer's eye.

Masthead:

The name of the magazine. The title usually has its own unique typeface so it is easily recognizable. It is iconic to the audience.

Page Layout:

The assembly of the elements on a page, including text and graphics. Also called page composition or page makeup.

Plugs and Puffs:

Used to entice people to buy the magazine. They are usually seen in a bubble or shape to stand out on the cover. 

Scale:

To reduce or enlarge an image or a page proportionally.

Selling Line:

This encourages people to buy it. A main part in showing the main marketing point of the magazine.

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