Prelim Research

For my premlim task, I researched into other school magazine covers so I could gain an insight into how other real schools had created their magazine covers. This gave me an idea into how i could design my front cover.

Investigating two music magazines.

I have decided to base my music magazine on this NME special edition. The New Musical Express - NME has been published weekly since March in 1952. It was the first british paper that published a singles chart in November 1952. During the 1970's it become the best selling british music magazine. It was first associated with gonzo journalism but then became associated with punk rock.

From the issue of 21st of March 1998 onwards the magazine has no longer been printed on newsprint but it has now shifted to tabloid size with full, glossy, colour covers.

Key Facts

Price £2.30

Frequency Weekly

Circulation 56,284

Readership 411,000

Launch Date 1952

Male/Female 73%/27%

Average Age 25

ABC1 73%

Target Market Men 17-30

The content of the NME music magazines consists of having 'the best new music first.' The magazine also contains interviews with artists, the nominations for NME awards, gig guides, reviews, news and occasionally some odd world views.

More about the reader

• 34% work full-time, 18% work part-time and 26% are full time students
• 49% have been reading NME for the past 3 years
• 84% think the magazine gives them what they want, spending an average of 46 minutes reading on each issue

I have gathered this information from:

• http://www.nme.com/mediapack/pdf/nme_media_information_full.pdf
• wikipedia.com

Glossary of Terms for Magazines..

• Balance - the design principle that one side of a layout must be given equal weight compared to another. Balance is achieved through the placement of type and graphic elements.


• Banner - the place where a magazine's logo appears.


• Body Copy - The main text of an article


• Brand - the magazine is a 'brand', in the same way as GAP or Levis is a brand. With the growth of synergy, a magazine might have spin off products such as a radio station, TV channel, clothing line or merchandise.


• Bullet - a circle or dingbat before each item on a list


• Byline - the name of an article's author


• Callout - explanation of a specific area of an illustration or diagram


• Caption - also called a cutline

Prelim!

For our preliminary task we have been asked too design a front cover of a school magazine. As a starting point we decided too take some practice camera shots of ourselves and other students around the school, we tried too make ourselves look more like students so that the front cover of the magazine will clearly show what it consists of and hopefully appeal to other students. The first couple of practice images we decided to take in the sixth form common room as this is where the majority of the sixth students gather too study. The final image we decided too use is in the library, we chose this as the image that will be used on the front cover because it clearly shows what the magazine is about and because the students are making use of the schools resources.