Research of Magazines

I chose to research the different techniques used in the music magazine BillBoard - an American weekly that closely follows the charting world, that has a target audience of older teenagers, and young adults. The magazine is simple, effective and sophisticated. A plain background, keeps the readers' attention, and does not distract them. The main image catches the audiences' eye, making sure that the main subject is captured. The title is large and clear, and the traditional house style is used of black text with the four basic colours being used within 'closed' letters. As I am having a female model for my magazine, I decided to look at mainly covers that feature females, to see the positioning of the subjects and how 'the look' is created overall. This cover I chose, as I like the feature of just a head shot on the cover. I like the basic layout of this magazine as it concentrates on just the main 'topic' for that week, meaning it is more effective in capturing the audience.

Other 'Billboard' magazines, have a very similar layout, that features the main subject in the centre of the cover, and short text highlighting stories around the page, with the signature house style at the top of the page, usually 'behind' the subject image. However this 'Alicia Keys' edition features the artist in a much more posing position, which I think I would like to use on my final magazine cover.

I also researched the magazine 'Blender'. This is much more aimed at teenagers (15 - 19) with young pop and charting acts featuring the spreads. I chose to research this magazine as many artists featured are females - something that links with my magazine. The cover below of Katy Perry, shows her full figure, something that is particularly effective, 'Blender' uses their house style of a thick bold black headline that catches the audiences' attention, which again is featured behind the subject so that the main image is in the foreground, something I would like to use within my magazine. The colour scheme of black and pink is simple and not too 'busy' it also matches with the clothing that the subject is wearing. Another 'Blender' edition uses the subject on a 'tilt'. This creates a nice effective shot, and makes sure that the cover stands out. The subject's position is natural and the layout is within the same house style as the previous 'Blender' edition. The consistency of both editions shows professionalism and effectiveness. The title in the 'Leona Lewis' edition is a different colour to the 'Katy Perry' edition. However using different colours on each cover, with the black makes each edition unique. This is effective and simplistic. The different subtitles around the page, break up the page and make it organised.

The contents page of 'Billboard' is structurally organsised, and is very easy to naviaget around. The text used is a simple black font, but each page topic is highlighted in the colour blue. The page is seperated by blue borders, text, and columns. The images split the page, making it easy to see what is within the magazine. Seperate headings and sub headings make the magazine look more professional, and I think I will be using this within my contents.