All three magazine covers have similarities and difference to interest their target
audience. Some of the bigger magazine companies don’t have a target audience as
they know that their magazine is so popular that the majority of people will buy their
magazine. As we can see in the KERRANG! Magazine the font for the title they have
used is very bold and it’s all in capitals, this could suggest that they are a less popular
than some other music magazine brands. Their choice of font with the cracks in it
could inform the viewer that they are a rock music magazine, we could use our
general knowledge to get this idea because as we know rock music is stereotypically
represented by glass smashing and people breaking things.
However, in the billboard magazine cover the title is less bold and uses a smoother
font for its title. This could suggest the music that they cover in the magazine could be
of a more popular nature. We get this idea from the fact that the font is very round and
living in the 21st century as we know everything is becoming more round shaped like
our phones, buildings and vehicles. So for the magazine to use a rounder font leads us
to believe it is a more “up to date” music magazine.
All of the magazines use a direct mode of address. What this means is that the person
on the main cover is looking directly at the camera. By doing this it brings a friendlier
message to the magazine as by the person looking at them invites them to read inside.
To support this all of the magazines use bright colours to catch the viewers’ attention.
By doing this people will look at the magazine for the colours and end up reading the
title and other text on the front cover. This will then interest the viewer to open the
magazine and they will end up buying it if interested, resulting into money for the
magazine company
A difference between all of the magazines is their choice of placing of the person on
the main cover and where the title is placed behind them or in front of the. By doing
this it could suggest many different things about the magazine or the importance of
the person in the front. In the billboard magazine the title is placed behind the man on
the front cover this suggests that the magazine is a more popular magazine. We could
get this idea from the fact that the magazine doesn’t even need to show its title as
people will already know what the magazine is called just by it recycled lay out.
By doing this with the layout it could also suggest that the person on the front is really
important person or someone with a high status during the release of the magazine as
they are put in front of all the text and title of the magazine.
With the mojo magazine we can see the audience is for an older generation or for
older music. We know this as the magazine cover is very different to the other
magazines of this generation we get this idea from the fact that pink Floyd is featured
at the front of the cover. We could use our knowledge to know that pink Floyd was
most popular from 70s to the 80s and for a magazine to be released today with them
as the main feature is highly unlikely unless it’s a magazine for the older generation.
We also know that pink Floyd have split up and are no longer a band this supports the
idea that the magazine is targeted at an older audience as none of the other magazines
have older band member on the front. Another point could be the fact their picture is
in black and white and we associate black and white images to an older generation
because the TVs never had colour in them.
