Magazine front cover conventions

Conventions
Conventions are repeated and recognisable elements of a media text. It helps the audience to define exactly what it is.
Conventions are like ingredients for Media (you have to include them all for it to create what you want it to)

Masthead:
-Title
-Located at the top of the cover

Main image:
-Long shot
-Medium shot
-Close shot

Cover Lines:
Cover lines tell you exactly what is going to be inside the magazine (without giving too much information to 'spoil' the magzines for the readers.

They normally have images of famous people on the front cover

Barcodes

Back grounds
images used
layout
visual look or style
stars/icons
colours
themes
issue information
content
housestyle (magazines own style)
type face
written language
puffs
barcode
cover lines
masthead

Company magazine


-Bold masthead at the top
-Barcode
-coverlines
-website
-image
-icons
-layout
-visual look/style
-Brand so established that people will still know the company even if the models head (in this case florence) covers part of the title
-plain background
-main image
-always look directly into the camera.


GQ (Gentlemans Quarterly)



-Mast head
-Blank background so everything on the page stands out
-Coverlines
-Medium/long shot
-Kobe Bryant covering the mast head slightly which shows that the main image is more important than the magazine and that the company is so established that people still know the magazine.
Smart clothing (mens suit suggests that the magazine is the aimed at an audience of sophisticated men or people who may aspire to be sophisticated.)
-Barcode in the right.
-Plain background



NME
-Colourful background
-More to the image than just Morrissey
-Masthead
-Coverlines
-barcode at the bottom right of the page (as is the same for most magazines)
-Laid back image of Morrissey showing that he is easy going
-Fonts are the same throughout the cover (unique style for NME)
-Layout

CLOSER
-Masthead
-cover lines
-skyline
-sub headings
-bullet points
-barcode
-puffs
-messy layout
-star images

Good Housekeeping


-Information packed
-masthead
-barcode
-covers masthead
-company so established that the masthead can be covered and the audience will still know what it is.
-the layout will always be similar to other issues of the magazine
-this magazine will most probably attract an older audience
-This magazine is also mainly for women
-The fonts of this cover have all sorts of different fonts (which doesn't really follow any type of house style).
-Cover lines
-Purple background

All though all these magazine covers are very different they are also very alike with the conventions that they all have, they all have a masthead which shows the title of the magazine, they all have cover lines to show us what type of things or topics will be published within the magazine. They will all have sub heading which are normally the titles of the coverlines. they all need a barcode for them to be able to be sold other wise shop keepers wouldn't know how much they are selling them for. They almost all have a Main image that is normally a well know famous person. whether its an actor or a sports person to even a business person they will all have one. Most often it will be that the mast heads are being obscured by the person in the main image which shows that the magaizne is so well established that people will still know the magazine, either by the part of the title that they can see or the house style.