Mock ups and conventions

In lesson we looked at several different examples of magazines. We looked at the layout of them, and created mock ups to help us notice some similarities that were common over all genres of magazine. I looked at an issue of the film magazine 'Empire' and the technology magazine 'Stuff'.

This is a mock up from a hobbit edition of Empire - it featured a main image of Bilbo and Golem, which clearly linked to the main article within this issue of the magazine. All text was in capitals and even the text in the plug was in capitals. Obviously the typical conventions of every magazine, including a bar code and a mast head were main features on the cover, and a colour scheme of black, gold for the mast head, red for the main title and white for tag lines and cover lines made sure that this issue was specified as being a special edition (the denotations of gold and red both have connotations of importance and ensure that the reader know that the Hobbit edition is a special one). This was very effective for this issue, as the Hobbit is a very popular franchise, and this cover will draw in many fans mainly through the effective use of imagery. We can see that Empire is a very popular magazine, as the image overlays the masthead - this shows that it is so well known, that it does not even need to be fully visible for it to be recognisable.

This mock up is of an issue of 'Stuff' magazine. Again, the masthead, although large is over layed with the image of a woman and the man, which shows it is also very recognisble and well known. A more simple colour scheme is used on this cover, with only red, black and white being used draws more attention to the images that have been used. This magazine is definitely aimed at men - the main image of a woman holding a piece of technology definitely would attract a man, and in this case, the use of the woman is very effective.