•In all of the magazine covers, including my own, none of the artists and their poses happen to look too flashy and flamboyant, they all manage to show a sensible and mature persona to themselves.

This is not a hip-hop or rock magazine, so the artists do not need to look tough, intimidating or somewhat bizarre and unorthodox. It is not a pop magazine, which may present the artists to be overly happy and cheery, instead the artists in each magazine are holding a calm expression, both presented in their face and their posture, regardless of the fact that some look certainly more happy/ angry than another, they still manage to look calm and not excessively showy.

•There is a simple range and use of colours that are being used. None of the main colour schemes are incredibly bright and stick out too much, but much rather are of a low tone and feel much warmer. This is what is best suited towards a more matured audience.

•There is not a massive amount of cover lines used in the covers, only an essential and necessary amount, preventing the magazines from looking too clustered and florid.

•Simple background used in order to prevent from becoming a distraction to what is the main focus.

•The attires for each of the cover models are all very smart and sophisticated, reflecting on the age group that the magazine is intended for.

Similarities with Smooth Magazine and Others

These magazine covers happen to go against and contradict the register of my type of magazine as:

•The artists do indeed look incredibly flamboyant.

• They possess a great load of images and cover lines.

•The artists are dressed in a less sophisticated manner, and instead are dressed in an appropriate way for whatever convention they are appealing to.

•There is a large use of colouring, and many range from being very bright, or simply not feeling like a warm, soothing colour but may instead connote danger, adolescence or loudness.

Too many different-sized fonts are present, making the covers look less orthodox and very irregular.

Differences with Smooth Magazine and Others

The Colour Scheme – Brand Identity

•Gold border for Contents page/ smaller black ones.

•Gold circles for page numbers

•Cream background

•Gold text

•Black and white attire

•Black background

•Gold text for interview questions

Masthead

Puff

Slogan

Cover/ Sell lines

Main cover line/ Title

Barcode

Price/ Web address

Issue number

Floating quote

Comparisons

Although the cover models presented in each magazine are wearing very similar attire, the portrayal of the magazines are incredibly different

The Vibe magazine looks very dangerous and presents their cover model as being intimidating and scary (as his image is so massive in the page), and also because he is looking very stern and serious and not smiling at all. There is great usage of black and white apparent in both magazine covers however there is a strong amount of are used, which symbolises danger.

My Smooth magazine however is presenting the cover models as being very friendly and approachable, as they look very calm and are smiling and smirking. The colours at great use are gold and cream which are sophisticated like red, however connote warmness and maturity.

Both Soul and Hip-Hop happen to be genres that are greatly associated with black culture, so you are more often than not going to find a black cover artist for the magazine, since the audience is dominated by black fans even though people from all cultures may enjoy the genres. Therefore I made sure to use black cover artists for my magazine cover to fit the magazine cover into the stereotype and convention that it lays in.

Comparisons

The poses and camera shots used are typical and conventional. The models in each magazine are smiling and looking very mature, and they both fit the soul/jazz genres (they are not pulling any ‘wacky’ or eccentric expressions and are not going against the stereotype. Both are mid-shots of the artists, therefore ensuring full focus on the artists’ faces and bodies, allowing them to flaunt a complete pose that can reflect the genre well.

A direct mode of address has also been used in order to draw in the audience and capture their attention.

At times it is good and innovative to challenge and subvert conventions however doing so for the main front cover I believed would be unwise, as this is the key element that will draw in newcomers to the magazine. If they happened to look against and different to the genre, then the audience will be less convinced to buy this as it doesn’t seem true to its genre. Challenge in conventions are best when they are subtle, and not the key element to view.

Comparisons

The Jazz and Soul genres are a sophisticated industry and therefore artists within it portray this by their smart outfits and costume in order to connect to fans of the industry, and create their significant identities.

Both sets of artists are wearing suits or smart clothing to be familiar with the genres, and this will therefore affiliate with that genre’s audience.

“A dynamic group of musicians consisting of the ‘Funkster’ acknowledged as the most electrifying man in the industry today. The man known to leave you in sweet tingles for more slick jingles and leave your boots knockin’ like a Jehovah’s Witness, Mr Smooth Operator, Chintu Anderson. The angelic passionate, spiritual Diva beholding the beautiful, gorgeous, mellow voice; Ms Denise Greene. And lastly, not forgetting Mr ‘Soul-man’ himself; the handsome, harmonic instrumentalist of the group, the Cat said to hit that sweet spot you never knew existed, Mr Jamie Biggums.”

A challenge to the convention of the Soul industry is at place here as the text is offering slight humour and hilarity, whereas normally a genre that targets an older audience would tend to just be strictly and directly straight-forward. This was done to offer a difference from those other normal and typical magazines that would be so straight-forward, and therefore humorous language and colloquialisms were used to prevent the magazine from becoming predictable and too simple and boring. However this was only done to a subtle extent, in order to keep the very formal and smart brand identity existent and to not throw off the reader too much.

The caption here which is also a general thing you would find in magazines and their double page spreads, happens to show levels of humour, however it doesn’t go overboard that would ruin the brand identity and become too informal.

Language

A floating quote is a feature that would be typically seen in a magazine. It can allow the reader to affiliate themselves more with the reader as it is highlighting a certain statement and piece of information that the reader would be very interested in, and therefore not only making them want to read on, but also feeling closer to the artist as this information is instantly calling out to them and telling them a bit about the artists’ personal life that the reader now has scolded into their head.

Each of the mastheads all happen to share strong similarities and traits and help to portray itself in the genre of music it is professing in.

I believe my masthead turned out to be a success as it is very simplistic which reflects upon the mature audience, and it also follows the colour scheme to a great extent, showing gold and appearing to convey rich, adult and warm connotations. The colour scheme also manages to look very eye-catching and appealing in comparison to the others that seem to look rather too plain and simple and less innovative.

The slogan for the magazine is also incorporated into the masthead well, and is subtle, clever and powerful due to the language devices it uses. Whereas the slogans for the other mastheads may in a way appear either too clear-cut and unimaginative, and not even be present at all.

The Masthead

The main cover line in my magazine I believe is also successful as it manages to stick out above all pieces of text and yet still remain aesthetically pleasing on the eye, and yet does not manage to conflict with the actual masthead and logo of the magazine and become disorientating from it.

The cover lines in general also reflect the colour scheme and stay true to the brand identity, making the reader become more familiar to the magazine they are reading and the style and character it holds.

Main cover line is proportional in size to the masthead in comparison to my own.

The Cover Lines