Mood Board (Fonts)

Before creating my magazine front cover, I created a mood board of fonts to find something that would work well as my masthead. I wanted to find a font that would connote/suggest a certain theme or genre to my target audience; for example, you can see one of the font I've circled is slightly eroded and looks worn which could suggest the magazine is slightly vintage or not ordinary. Although this font suited the style of my magazine, I felt it was too masculine as my target audience were teenage girls. Therefore I tried other fonts that had curls to connote femininity (circled above). However, I felt that the font was too feminine as my magazine was about women with power. I also decided to try something that was more formal, for example you can see I tried a serif font which again looked quite old but I felt that it would appeal more to an adult audience. In order to find something in the middle I tried using a more conventional font similar to what I'd seen when researching existing magazines. You can see the last font I circled is a sans serif font which makes it more informal. It is also quite soft with rounded sides to connote the idea of femininity without being too 'girly'. Overall, I felt that this was the most successful font.

Mood Board (Colours)

In order to find colours suitable for my music magazine, I tried creating a mood board of different colours. Keeping my target audience in mind, I also considered conventional colours other existing magazines used. For example, NME gave me most of my inspiration and they use colours similar to red, yellows and blacks. However, Billboard also have a target audience of young girls and they use pastel colours like pinks, blues and yellows. However, billboard's target audience was a far more conventional view of young girls that are 'girly'. In order to find some middle ground and ensure that the colours I chose would appeal to teenage girl with an alternative edge, I tried mixing different colours like reds, blacks, whites and yellows as well as adding some graphics that were pink or blue.

Details of Locations, Props and Models

For my three main products I organised three separate photo-shoots. The first photo-shoot I organised was for my main band that would be featured throughout all three products; this photo-shoot took place in my living room where I used a white backdrop and some lights. In terms of props, I had the models pose differently using a microphone and a guitar. The models used were teenage girls; I asked them to wear black torn tops, Denim shorts, Dr Martens, American flag tops, Red jeans, Floral print jackets, Bandannas, black rimmed glasses and red lipstick. I had initially decided that I wanted my magazine to fairly professional and glossy; this is why I thought using a white backdrop would work best as it would be easy to edit out the space surrounding the models. The lighting used was to also highlight certain features and make the main aspects of my images look professional. However, the music genre I wanted to include in my magazine was pop rock, therefore I felt it was necessary to use instruments as props to demonstrate that the band are all about music rather than just the auto-tuned sounding pop stars. Prior to the shoot, I had decided that my target audience consisted of: ‘trendies’, ‘hipsters’ and ‘indie scenesters’, due to this I ensured that the models in the band all wore items of clothing that were popular with these stereotypes. For example, the Dr Martens represent the ‘hipsters’, whereas the black rimmed glasses represent ‘indie scenesters’ and the floral print represents the ‘Trendies’. All of these representations used entice my target audience of fashion followers/mainstreamers with that alternative edge into buying my magazine.

However, I also wanted to ensure that my magazine would appeal to a small male audience and people more interested in rock music; therefore my second Photo-shoot was slightly different. This time round, I decided to use two male models one of which would appeal to the male mainstreamers and the other would appeal to the male ‘rockers’. Again, I used a white background, however this time I used a white wall; this was to keep the professional, glossy appeal to my magazine. However, for the male ‘rocker’ I used a real guitar as a prop; my main aim was to make the instrument much more prominent than I had done before to emphasize the idea of being a musician. I also paid attention to detail by ensuring I used a model with long swept hair to connote rock and a plain white shirt to suggest the idea of old school or classic rock. The other part of this photo-shoot was for male mainstreamers; for this I decided I wanted to try and make my model look like an old school rapper, again, this was to go for the vintage/retro style. Therefore the costume I used was a big over-sized jumper and a woolly hat. I also tried a different way of using the microphone, by raising it slightly and having it pointing down from above it demonstrates how a rapper would hold their microphone.

My third and final photo-shoot was located in my bedroom where I used my feature wall as a background design. To ensure my magazine still had a sense of ‘grunge’ and ‘rock & roll’ I wanted to stop using plain white backgrounds. In order to put more emphasis on the links to my indie target audience, I decided to use a model that was very thin and dainty with two toned hair; this is very representative to a typical ‘indie kid’. For this shoot I used no props/instruments and this was to suggest to the audience that this artist was mainly about the voice. To highlight the dainty, innocence of this model I decided that their facial expression should have a ‘puppy dog’ look; as for the costume I decided on tights with stripes and a long, khaki, suede shirt. Again, this represented the ‘indie scenesters’ but it also added to the vintage style that was demonstrated throughout my magazine. 

Process of Construction (Double Page Spread)

Process of Construction

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Contents Page Draft

First draft for double page spread article

 Only a month after their success on Britain’s most popular talent show, ‘singstars’, newly acclaimed girlband ‘Twist’ are becoming accustomed to life in the spotlight. After their new single ‘Cannonball’ climbed the charts to number one, the girls took a moment to reflect upon their recent achievement. Chart sat down with them for their very first exclusive interview.

Chart: Now that you’ve dominated the music industry, do you have any other ambitions?

Selina: I love fashion and being a model for a day, given the opportunity, I’d love to have my own line in Topshop or any other similar store. It’s a passion of mine that I’d love to do something with even if it was just styling the group for a video shoot...

Chart: Did any of you predict the amount of attention ‘Cannonball’ would get?

Harriet: [laughs] At the time, the most important thing to us was nailing our performances every Saturday on the show. We tried to stop ourselves from thinking about the future to save disappointment, but in all honesty, we had no clue our first single would even make the charts, let alone number one.

Chart: What sets you appart from other girl groups?

Sophie: I think that fame doesn’t phase us, we’re still the same people; just as crazy and loud as   ever. We’re not afraid to just be ourselves and I think most girls can relate to us still and that is what makes us slightly different... [smiles]

Chart: You say you’re slightly crazy, so what’s your idea of fun?

Harriet: We’re young and just doing what any other 17 year old girls do. We like to shop, watch films and probably the funniest thing we do is competing to see who can pull the strangest faces. We don’t enjoy being rebellious, we just enjoy each other’s company.

Chart: ...does each other’s company ever become too much?

Selina: if you mean do we ever have arguments, then yes, just like all groups of friends we do have spats, but the difference is we make up within 5 minutes.

Chart: What can we expect next from Twist?

Sophie: you can expect more music, that’s what all our time is dedicated to right now, so on that note... [laughs]

As the girls left in their sweat pants with their hair tied back, it became apparent that they are three young, ordinary girls at the beginning of what promises to be a very exciting journey.

Original Images

Contents Page Analysis

NME_contents_page, a photo by Katie Nightingale on Flickr.

Paper draft for double page spread

For my double page spread I planned on using the logo in a bar at the top of the page; this would include the colour scheme (red, white and black) to make the house style consistent. For my sidebar section I planned to make it black. I also planned on adding a sidebar that looked similar to a notepad in red .For the pull quotes and captions I wanted to stick to my colour scheme by using red and white.

Contents Page Analysis

karang_contents, a photo by Katie Nightingale on Flickr.

Contents Page Analysis

contents-page1, a photo by Katie Nightingale on Flickr.

Double page spread

Double page spread, a photo by Katie Nightingale on Flickr.

Third analysis of double page spread.

Double page spread

Double page spread, a photo by Katie Nightingale on Flickr.

Second analysis of a double page spread

Double page spread from Kerrang

Double page spread from Kerrang, a photo by Katie Nightingale on Flickr.

First analysis of double page spread

Moodboard

Before I started to create my front cover, I created a moodboard of images, colours, logos and the type of fonts I might want to incorporate into my own work; I did this to be able to gain an understanding of how I wanted my front cover to look and how to portray a certain genre of music to my target audience.

Paper Draft for Music Magazine

The image above is my paper draft:

For my final music magazine I decided on the layout and what I wanted to be included on the front. I decided I wanted to include four images on the front (one main image), and then have various cover lines/strap lines. I also experimented with colours, to make the magazine appeal to my target audience I tried bright colours, however, I wanted to experiment further with colours once I start producing the final cover.

Audience Research Results

Audience Research Results

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My own music magazine; initial ideas

Working title of magazine- Chart (a music magazine that incorporates chart music)

Target audience (demographic)- I want my magazine to target an age range of twelve to nineteen. I also want to aim my magazine at middle class people so that the magazine isn’t too expensive but isn’t cheap looking either.

Target audience (psychographics)- I want to aim my magazine at mainstream people that keep up to date with chart music and listen to whatever is new. This way the target audience is wider and the magazine will appeal to more people. However, I want to aim my magazine at the mainstreamers that like to consider themselves alternative; this means creating a magazine that could appeal to everyone but have a slight twist to make it more interesting.

Price point- I want my magazine to have lots of content so that a higher price seems a fair price to pay. I also want the magazine to look like high quality and therefore I want to charge roughly £1.20, then it’s not too expensive to buy and not cheap/tacky.

Weekly or monthly- I would have an issue of the magazine on a monthly basis so that there is lots of new music to include in the magazine.

Content- For the content of my magazine, I want to include popular artists and recent music that is topping the charts. This could include: dates for concerts, official chart, interviews, photo shoots etc. Everything included in the magazine will be the most popular topics/artists/music so that the magazine appeals to mainstreamers. However, I also want my popular artists to look slightly more edgy so that it appeals to more people.

Style- I want my magazine to look similar to a fashion/lifestyle magazine but to orientate it towards music; this could include individual artists on the front cover, a simple colour scheme with splashes of different colours and graphics. I want my magazine to look like it has lots of content, therefore I want to include lots on the front cover without making it look to crowded and tacky.

USP- The unique selling point of the magazine would be the fact that it’s a mainstream music magazine which there aren’t many of. However, by including artists that are mainstream with a slight edginess, hopefull my unique selling point will be that it's a magazine that's mainstream and alternative so it's a much wider audience.

Magazine Cover Flickr analysis

paramore-magazine-covers-paramore-7740690-600-852, a photo by Katie Nightingale on Flickr.

Analysis of Big Cheese magazine front cover

Analysis of magazine cover

Music magazine 1, a photo by Katie Nightingale on Flickr.

Analysis of XXL magazine front cover