Flat Plans

The front cover of my magazine conforms the conventions of most pop magazines' designs. I designed this based on the images of Top of the Pops magazine. The layout is similar and i have done this because it has a very clear but fun layout. I have used different shapes of text box and fonts to attract the readers. The colours on the front cover are going to be bright and vibrant to appeal to the target audience. The main focused colours will be pink and yellow, this is because the magazine is mainly appealing to young girls.

The contents page also conforms the conventions of pop magazines. The design is similar, it includes photos of what is going to be in the magazine and an editor's letter. Light and dramatic colours are going to be used again as this will express the genre of the magazine throughout. The same font is going to be used for the title so it remains consistent and people don't get confused with lots of different fonts. I have used stars as bullet points because this keeps in the theme of 'stars' and 'celebrities'.

The layout of my double page spread doesn't conform as much to the conventions of other pop magazines. I have chosen to do an interview as the main focus on the pages but then have a third of the page taken up with a shocking gossip story. I have done this so that people will want to read on about the story after they have read the interview. The pages have an equal amount of images and text so that the readers aren't distracted by more of one than the other. Each picture is related to the interview and includes the band and individual photos of each of them. The gutter on the double page spread is fairly wide as i wanted to be able to differentiate the two pages clearly and space each of the sections of the design grid out. I think these pages really appeal to my target audience because there isn't too much text that the young audience will be put off by and the images will grab their attention and young girls can be inspired by what the band look like and what they talk about.

Fonts

For my magazine i will have to decide what font styles i am going to use on each page and how each font will appeal to my target audience. The target audience for my magazine is mainly girls aged from 8-16, who are interested in pop music, fashion, celebrities, and celebrity gossip.

Front cover
For the main title on the front cover of my magazine, i will use the font 'Budmo'. I have chosen to use this font because it is a fun and interesting font. It is quite easy to read and it appeals to my target audience. Using this font will grab people's attention and make them want to read it as it looks fun and gives the magazine an edgy look to it. The font is also very relevant to the genre of my magazine. As the genre is pop, this font shows the lights on the letters like celebrities have over their mirror in their dressing room.

I have decided to use a different font for the rest of the features on the front cover because, if there is more text in blocks or subheadings in the Budmo font, then it could become quite unclear for the reader. Instead, i am going to use the 'Arial' font as this is a sans serif typeface, therefore it could appear clearer to read and understand with longer pieces of text. I can compare this with the front cover of Smash Hits that i analysed as this also includes both sans serif and serif typeface fonts.

Contents Page
For the contents page i will use the same fonts so that it is consistent throughout and people don't get too distracted by reading too many different font styles. I will also make the title on the contents page big and in the Budmo font so that reader's can see clearly what the page is and what it will consist of. I will use a font called 'new facebook' for the subheading 'contents' because its a very fun font and looks like the individual letters have been cut out and stuck down. I used the font 'Cheri' for some of the phrases on this page, as its a very feminine font, which appeals to my magazine audience. For the editor's note on this page i have used the font Arial', because this fits in with all the other fonts on the magazine pages. This makes it less confusing for the younger readers, as it there are lots of different fonts it can all look too much.

Double-page spread
For my double-page spread i will use the arial font again for the band's interview as it will be clear to read. This helps when there is a lot of text, because the words flow so it isn't confusing to read. Where i have the interview with the band 'The Lilas' i will use the font 'Cheri' for their name because it is a girly, fun font which represents the band interviewed and appeals to the target audience. Where i will have pull-quotes from the interview, they will be written in the font : 'Lucida Handwriting', as this looks like the band's thoughts have gone straight to paper and they have written it themselves in this style. Under the main heading i have written a little introduction to the interview and i used the font 'Snap ITC'. I used this as it is very appealing to the eye and will appeal to the target audience because it's quite a feminine font and is an edgy font, this also links to the relaxed tone of the interview and the personality of the band being interviewed.

Another font i looked at to use was 'Georgia'. It is a similar font to the 'Arial', however i preferred the 'Arial' type of font. I asked a few people in my target audience category about my choices of fonts and 4 out of 5 people preferred the Arial font, this is why i chose it as i want everything in this magazine to appeal to my target audience.
From analysing some magazines in the pop genre, all of their main titles on the front were fairly simple, so for my magazine to stand out and be unique i decided to use a bit of a more edgy and striking font.