Cover Analysis - Summary of findings

From my in depth analysis of these 4 covers, I've came up with a list of conventions for each area of the magazine, which I shall consider either using or challenging when making and planning my own cover.

Image

• Can be from pretty much any shot distance - The 4 covers I looked at had full length, mid and close up shots which all conveyed different effects. For instance, Madonna and Duffy were close-up portraying intimacy, and easing the reader into a comfortable situation, yet both created a barrier (Madonna's fist, Duffy's mic) just to outline their rule as celebrities. The Jonas Brothers were from a full shot which created a picturesque, perfect view of them.
• Element of celebrity - The magazines don't want to make the celebrities seem like normal people on the cover, although there might be features like this on the inside, but they enforce their celebrity status with flashy clothes, props like a microphone or just a general up-market style like on the Billboard cover. However this is often challenged like on the Rolling Stone cover, when just Amy Winehouse is used by herself, or if Madonna's clothes were used in order to relate to the audience.
• No smiling - On all of the covers I've looked at, none of the celebrities are smiling, and this is again mostly the case when I look through other covers I've collected. This may be to have more of an impact, but personally I think a happy person would attract me to the cover more than a sultry person. But this may have childish connotations or seem too cheesy which is why smiling isn't used. I do have some where the stars are smiling like on the Independence Day issue of Billboard, a Billboard issue with Miley Cyrus and a Rolling Stone issue with Zac Efron. Coincidence of the Disney stars? I think not.
• Image matches largest cover line - This is pretty obvious, that they're going to use an image to promote the biggest cover line, rather than a small one. But also the image will match what the cover line is saying. A prime example is the "Step Up" cover line for the Jonas Brothers, where they're featured on stairs. For Amy Winehouse she looked innocent and guilty on the cover while the headline said "The Diva & Her Demons", suggesting she's trying to turn over a new leaf.
• Backgrounds are mostly plain - Plain backgrounds are used on most of my covers, as to not detract attention away from celebrity images or exciting cover lines. This isn't something I'd realised so I may develop or challenge this convention when making my magazine.
• Sexual - To attract readers, some element of sexuality may be used like cleavage or abs.

Colour

• Ties in with image/masthead - On the Clash and Rolling Stone issue, they matched the colours of the text with that of the image, like the colours of Amy Winehouse's bra and tattoos and the colour of Duffy's hair and background. On Billboard, the colours of the text matched those filled in parts of the masthead. This is the case with most of the others in my collection, and I think it is to generally just make it more presentable and ties all the features together and give it an overall style. However this isn't a case for some magazines, but I think it's a convention I would like to stick to.
• White is often used - On every cover I have gathered, white is always used as either the main text colour, the background, or a main part of the image. I will definitely use this convention as it seems to be used on everything, and because my genre will be fairly different I want to stick to other s features which are widely used. The general common colours along with white, are black, grey, red and pink. The ones where red is used a lot look good, but I do like the ones that break out from using it as they seem to look fresher.
• Bright and Neutral - Brights are generally used to attract a younger audience, while more neutral sophisticated colours are used for slightly older people. I could apply this to the ones I analysed, and I would agree that Billboard and Clash are the ones more for a younger audience which are the ones that use the brighter colours.

Font

• Plain fonts are used - On both Q and Billboard, plain readable fonts are used for everything, but this is developed by Clash who use plain fonts for all the smaller cover lines, but for the masthead, a chunky graphically altered font is used to try and imprint an identity as it's a fairly new magazine (2004). This idea worked for Rolling Stone, which has been around for a long time and now has a very recognisable house-style, due to it's uses of detailed fonts.

Language

• No genre mentioned in slogan - I initially wondered if music magazine's announced anywhere on their cover what genre they were in, but apparently not. I think they do this because it would tie the magazine to 1 area of music and therefore in the reader's mind, limiting what can go in it. However, from the cover on the whole a genre can be interpreted, but not on all of them can it be instantly denoted, therefore readings will be different for different people, as the reception theory states. This is turn would probably lead to a greater variation of readers, and therefore more content to cover.
• Straightforward language, with occasional pun - The language basically just tells it how it is and meaning is normally just found with denotation, but occasionally puns and play on words are used like "Step Up" which are slightly more open to interpretations. However too many of these would make the magazine look as if they are aiming at a much younger audience.
• Artist's names for cover lines - As this is the most important part of a music magazine, the artists, the cover lines are generally just there names with smaller descriptions surrounding them. Clash is a prime example of this, but Billboard incorporates names into phrases which develops this convention slightly.

Layout

• Artist overlaps masthead - I noticed on nearly all my covers, the artist overlaps the masthead of the magazine, in order to signify that the artist is more important, and the magazine has a good enough reputation so that it doesn't need to broadcast itself in order to attract readers.
• One side writing - Both the British magazines I've looked at seem to have broke out this convention, where the cover lines use the left side and the image is on the right, as on Q, there are cover lines on both sides, although Madonna is still on the right, and on Clash Duffy is more in the middle and there are cover lines on both sides. However, on both Billboard and Rolling Stone the conventional layout is stuck to.