Front Cover Analysis

The majority of music magazines keep their traditional style of mastheads the same in every issue they release.  The masthead is usually strapped across the width of the page or offset to the left. For example 'Q' magazine is commonly known for keeping the colours of red and white as the layout of magazine whereas 'Top of the Pops' often change the colour schemes of their magazines but always keep the masthead in the same position.

This is a recent issue of Top of the Pops which includes a popular boyband 'Union J' as their main image for the front cover. As this band is popular with young teens (the magazines target audience) the magazine company know that by putting them on the front cover, it will bring in a higher demand of issues and selling rates will go up. A clear colour scheme of basic yet bright colours have been used, even one member of the bands shirt matches the fonts which will again be eye catching towards the readers.  A plain yet bold font has been used repeatedly on each piece of text which again attracts the readers as young teens don't want to be reading a lot of text and are more drawn to the pictures. The main colour that is represented on the front is pink which is stereotypically very girly and feminine. 

This is also another issue from Top of the Pops which i believe is affective and a good example of how a front cover can grab the readers attention.  I believe that although this is an image of a girl band, i still think that its aimed at young girls who aspire to be like them and look up to them.  The use of the word 'secret' being larger than the rest of the words in the title and their facial expressions will draw the readers into buying it as it makes you believe the interview inside will focus a lot on what you wouldn't expect from them.  Again, the main colour that you see a lot of on the cover is pink. The colour pink has connotations of feminism and innocence which is what you would expect from a pop magazine aimed at young girls.

Teen Now is another example of a popular pop magazine for young girls that use their front covers to get the audiences attention. By using a popular and well known boy band on their front cover, then it attracts more people to buy it. Just below the title there is a quote which says "Id marry a fan" with a quirky line 'Yes! It could be you' underneath that. This attracts the reader as for every girl who is a fan of this band would be initially curious to find out if they could be indeed that fan who they would claim to marry. Unlike the two issues of Top of the Pops, pink isnt a colour that is mainly used on the front of the cover. This magazine focuses on using bright colours that will grab the readers attention and will draw them into buying the magazine. 

I will apply what I have learnt from this research into my own product by making sure that I follow a similar layout to the following magazines in order for my target audience to understand what sort of genre my own magazine is. My own creative decisions will be influenced by these other products as I would like to try and interpret the way these magazines have been set out, i.e a colour scheme to fit my target audience or use of big bold fonts.