Magazine Analysis

This is Love magazine its a high fashion magazine and it is released twice annually. Firstly, looking at the colour palette it is easy to see that it is very plain, but practical in that it is easily read, and still captures the essence of the photograph used. I think the use of black, grey and white is quite nice although too much of it makes it seem a little bleak, and in need of a splash of colour. I do however really like it on the photograph, i've also seen other photographs in greyscale and i find that it is a very flattering effect on any model. The layout of the whole front cover is extremely simple but to-the-point. We can easily see the theme and spotlight of the magazine by reading the small caption. Looking at the masthead, I really like the fact it is a single syllable, and four letters give an even look to the whole page - as it spreads across the top. I like the fact it takes up the whole width, however I think the font is very formal, and quite boring, but this is infact saved by the 'hand-written' look of the coverline that reads "Fashion and Fame."
Amelia's magazine is based around art and music which the art side of the theme can easily be recognized through the front cover. It is not a common looking magazine, it has absolutely no cover lines - it just relies on the intriguing art work used. I think the colour palette is really nice, but I also understand that they haven't really restricted their palette, as it is a picture - needing many different colours. I love the font of the title saying "amelia's" and judging by that and the overall name, it's easy to see what gender the target audience is - female. Another thing that inspires me - although very insignificant - is the positioning of the bar code, the bottom left hand corner of a front cover is a very popular place to keep it, as it's quite out of sight.

Beginning Idea's for Double Page Spread

Firstly, I know that I want to do an interview, as this is relevant to an up-and-coming music magazine as people will want to know more about featured artists, but also as I can use questions that tie the fashion and art themes into the magazine. I don't want to ask ordinary, boring questions that will just allow you into their musical life, I want to ask other curious questions that may sound childish - but i'm sure it's something people are interested to know. Here are questions that I could use;

What is your favourite item of clothing?, What's your favourite colour?, If you were left on a desert island what item would you take?, Who is your favourite musician?, What is your favourite food?, etc. - silly questions but unusual, fun and could provoke quite interesting answers that can show personality well.

I also want to have a sort of photo montage of the featured artist, it would be good if I could find a way to make the photographs look unusual asthough from a photobooth, or from a polaroid camera or on a negatives strip.

Post-Feedback Magazine Mock

After my feedback from Mr Ford I took his advice into account and changed my magazine a little. The changes I made were editting out the musical notes, and changing the slogan. I also scanned some buttons to test out the effect they could get - I initially thought that it wouldn't work well, as they aren't something scanners are made for but infact I think it looks really good, and goes with the theme along with the ribbon

I also looked more into the coverlines and highlighting key parts of them, as making the font bigger didn't quite capture the look I wanted. So instead I used my pastel colour palette to create rounded boxes with the writing inside. I think this works well, although I feel I may still experiment with this, but this idea is not to be forgotten :) (looks more effective in full size, not blog picture size.)

Teacher Feedback

Speaking to my teacher today (Mrs Frearson) I have been advised to do some research into logo's after giving her my idea of using buttons on the front cover. She also gave an interesting suggestion of using these buttons in the double page spread to show continuity.
Also after looking at my mock front cover, she suggested a colour picker tool so that I can use the greyscale edit but keep certain parts in real colour.

Conclusion to pitch.

Whilst carrying out my pitch, my class mates and teacher filled out sheets about me work they listed; The title, The genre, The target market, Other existing similar magazines, Possible problems, Good points and Advice. Here is the feedback I received.

Other existing similar magazines
Amelia, I.D

Possible problems
Might be difficult to make it look handmade, May be too narrow aiming at a female audience, Time consuming, Small age range and I may find it difficult to give the magazine an arty look.

Good Points
Good title, Well thought out, Stylish Interesting and Contemporary, Strong ideas, Unique, Good choice of colours, Fashion/art will give a lot of idea's to go off,

Advice
Research similar magazines for the fashion/art angle, Take lots of photos, Get all the images I want/need, Test the scanning fabric idea and Be sure to make music the obvious theme.

My 25 Word Pitch.

name: in flux. Fashion/art inspired music magazine. Up-and-coming music - all genres. High quality photography - grayscale, pastel colours to contrast. Females, 17-25. Overall handmade look.

Adding them together - Mock

Additional decoration to magazine

After realising that there is not much connection to the music genre of the magazine as of yet, I then went on to scan some ribbon, and create musical notes on photoshop to add a little more detail. I think this works well - without being in-your-face and the pastel blue ribbon ties in with the pastel colour palette I specifically want.

Rough Mock of "in flux" Magazine

I have created two mock magazine covers that fit my original design brief. For the first I took a photograph from Google.com of a patchwork fabric piece to use as a background. I then also took a photograph from the same resource of the actor, Robert Pattinson, editted this into grayscale and added him to the background. To give an arty look I used paintbrush on photoshop to colour in his jacket, I used pastel shades as this is what I want my colour palette to consist of. I also used hashed lines around the figure to add a simple design, I do intend to use this on my final product but they will be much smaller and more intricate - much more like a sewn line. I played around with the positioning of the masthead and finally decided that I liked it best in the top left corner, purely for aesthetic reasons. In my opinion this is just a very rough copy to me, the patchwork is something I don't intend to use and infact now I have used a fabric background I don't think this is what I will choose to use as it's very hard to make the coverlines easily visible due to the pale pastel pallette.

The second attempt at a Mock magazine cover was by far better, for this I tore brown paper to give a textured effect and then scanned it, this went on to become the background and infact I really liked the effect it gave. I then took a 'more' midshot of Robert Pattinson from Google, to give a more full shot and again editted this into grayscale. Rather than taking a huge section of the photograph and 'paintbrushing' it, I took a small detail from his t-shirt and focused on this, again I think this works better than on the first one as it looks less messy, and more arty. I kept the masthead the same, as I had no problem with this, and I also added in a coverline which again I feel works really well with the whole look of the cover. I love how the colours go together, the pastel colours with the grayscale on the brown paper look brilliant. In my opinion anyway. :)