Evaluation- Forms and Conventions

Front cover:

Masthead – Conventional, top of the page, covers around 20% of the Front cover, Whole word in Capitals grammatically incorrect, informal. Black as it follows the house style of the magazine, Black will go with ever issue’s colour scheme. Overlaid by image which is conventional for most music magazines.

Typeface’s – Conventional, around 5 typefaces used, most quite similar to avoid being overpowering.

Strapline – Conventional, above masthead.

Selling line – Conventional, below masthead, overlaid by image which is conventional for most music magazines.

Date line – Conventional, Attached to the bar code.

Inset images – 2 images, Conventional, both images in bottom third.

Sticker – Conventional, advertising free posters, bottom of the page.

Barcode – In bottom right third, Conventional, includes website, date and issue number.

Banner – Conventional, Bottom of the page.

Main image – Conventional, Main image also acts as background image for the magazine. Image overlays masthead, eye contact given, posed photo.

Headline – Conventional, takes up around 15-20% of the page, center of the page, anchors main image, typeface bold with an eroded effect.

Coverlines – Conventional, anchor the inset images, short, simple. Not much information given to encourage audience to read on inside. (However this was pointed out as a critism during my focus group).

Mode of address – informal, friendly, (e.g. biggest, hottest, loudest), appeals to my laid back audience.

Contents page:

Heading - Conventional, at the top of the page, large text, follows the house style, same typeface used as for the masthead on the front cover.

Images - Conventional, images used to represent features, drop-shadows used to lift them off the page.

Features – List of features given is Conventional, however slightly unconventional as not much information is given with them, simply the name of the artist/band.

Subscription box – Conventional, contact and price information given with past issues of the magazine.

Double page spread:

Image – Conventional, covers around a third of the page. Stretched between where the page will be folded in half, background erased from image.

Additional images – Conventional, only one other image used as the main image was quite large, any more images would have taken up too much space on the page.

Heading’s – 3 headings used, Top of the pages and the artists name below her image, Conventional, explain the articles below.

Text – Conventional, text frames the main image, broken up into paragraphs. Starts with a larger letter.

Article – Conventional, typical feature with interview intertwined and a short question and answer interview on the right hand side of the page.

Page number - Conventional, Bottom right hand corner, with magainze logo.

Byline - Conventional, journalist and photographer names given.

I chose not to break any conventions whilst producing my music magazine as I wanted it to be as believable as a real music magazine as possible, the majority of magazines follow these conventions and only on rare occasions break them, generally for a special occasion (e.g. anniversary of old artists death or first album etc), as my magazine was not based on any special event I saw no reason as to why I should try to break any conventions.