Magazine Cover.

Here is another front cover of an XXL magazine. This cover is quite a unique one as it is a double page spread front cover. How it works is that it is folded and the reader is able to unfold it fully to reveal the full concept of the front cover which shows 13 artists as a 'posse' all looking fairly angry.

The anger, yet again is another interesting trate of XXL. I have done some research and noticed that the majority of their front covers have an artist posing with anger.

If I were to make my front cover like this, it would be of high difficulties as I would have to find models to pose as a posse and make it seem 'real' also, it may be hard to explain to the examiner how my front cover is laid out.

However, this idea can be done and if so, I would like to furthermore research more into front covers like this.

Five-O or New Sound

This is a potential name for my magazine. I had decided to call my magzine Five-O because quite often, artists in a hip hop, rap genre always have lyrics that relate back to the police, also known as 'Five-O'.
Another reason for this would be, my magazine, each month would include a full review of the five biggest artists of the month. They would all have one page and for the final artist, it would be a double page spread.

A final reason for naming my magazine this would be that this magazine would be released on the 5th of every month. This would furthermore give the readers a better understanding of the magazine itself.

This is my other potential magazine name. I am in the process of choosing which one I would like to use as they both have really good representations.

With New Sound, it gives off a meaning that there is actually as new sound as my magazien focuses on indie and hip hop genres which is quite new.
The font also has a city landscape which could represent the music and the different colour could mean the different genres.

Target Audience.

My selected target audience would be aimed at 15-23 year olds. I am this specific because I know that these types of genres that I am writing about (R&B/INDIE) would not suit the majority of older people as it is a weird mix of genres and during the stages when we discover music, it was not an option. R&B/Indie collaborations have been a recent thing, with artists such as Drake and The Weeknd.

I would like to aim my price of the magazine for about £3.50 as it would be released monthly.

Survey Monkey

I have created an account on survey monkey to do my research online. It can be posted on social networking sites and I can also make print outs and hand it out to my selected target audience.

DPS.

In lesson we were taught a better understanding of what to look out for and what to do in a double page spread. We had been told what to look out for, such as presentational devices such as a headmast, pull quotes, images, fonts, colour schemes and font sizes.

We had looked at a Grazia magazine with Fearne Cotton as the main subject for their double page spread. Grazia went for a sepia, vintage looking look for it as the image took up the whole two pages and had been manipulated on photoshop for a vintage look effect. Her name, 'Fearne' had the biggest font size so we would see her name straight away, we then would focus on a quote underneath whcih was the second biggest font on the page.

What I had understood from Grazie's double page spread is that, the image and the text must work well together in order to give it a completed, finish look.

I believe that for my magazine, I will be able to acomplish the standards of a real magazine.

I created a Wordle for my blog and magazine which contained words that are highly and greatly related to what I am currently working on, as you can see many words contain artists and their songs, along with some genres, lyrics and key words towards their success.

XXL Magazine. I am going to deconstruct XXL Magazine for my set work with use of semiotics and polysemics. I chose this because it can relate to my magazine that I will be creating because it is along the lines of Hip Hop, Rap, Indie and R&B. The main cover of this magzine is of 'Jay-Z' and what we can see straight away is Jay-Z and a photoshopped reflection of a city in his glasses. Without looking at the text, we can tell that Jay-Z is serious because of the angle of gaze and his facial expression. It could represent that he may be here for something and is a serious matter.

The way the magazine is set out, with a dark background and a close up shot of Jay-Z could represent that the magazine has a dark background and another darker meaning inside, what will it be? We are not sure yet.

Now, with the text added, we are sure that the main attraction of the magzine is Jay-Z, his name is written in capitals and bold, and the outline of his name is in white. Underneath his name is written in italics 'Return of the Hustle' also written in a gold colour, which would emphasise his 'Hustle' and notice how 'Hustle' is written with a capital letter to emphasise the power. The quote also would imply that Jay-Z is back for a hustle with his music which mixes well with the image in his sunglasses as it could imply that he is out to hustle the whole city.