Double page spread from NME
This double page spread is published in the NME magazine. It shows Florence Welch as the main topic in the article. Florence is the main picture on the double page spread; it shows her sitting on the American flag, which suggests she has won over America’s heart and is seen as popular and a ‘big’ artist. Including ‘USA’ as a greyscale in the background of the double page spread has a relation to the flag in which she is sitting on, because the font is big and bold it suggests that it is a main topic in this article and has a huge connection with the text. Also by having ‘got the love’ after and overlapping ‘USA’ gives readers the impression that America loves her, as said previously; referring to the flag in this photograph.
By showing Florence sitting on the top step, you can see these are almost like steps because her heel is on the lower one and other heel is the one below that. She makes them look like her own because of how confident she looks and also because she is sitting at the very top; which could resemble that she is at the top of the charts, top rated in America for example. Another reason for Florence to be sitting at the top could be to show she is of high status and importance. The way in which the American flag is freely draped over the stairs makes the flag look similar to the red carpet that also has a connection with face and importance. The artist’s left foot and heel being propped up a step compared to her other one shows quite her femininity, high status, and importance again, and also feistiness. This also has a link with her dress because of the long sleeves and bold, dark colour it makes the person wearing it, Florence, look dominant and sophisticated. To add to this look of being dominant, important, feisty and successful the photographers have made Florence look face-on to the camera, which shows confidence and precision. And they have also brought her cheekbones in and made it darker around them to make the readers focus on her face even more.
A few contrasts on the page against this are; dainty, small, and petite she looks compared to the bold dress and reasonably bulky shoe boots/heels. Also the main fact of the three contrasting colours; black, red and white. These two monochrome colours; black and white, show a contrast together but the red shows an even bigger contrast against them because it is not a monochrome. They have linked the three main colours in this article well because the clothing and text appear black, the background is white and the biggest connection, I think, is the red on the American flag that brings out her bright red hair and lips. These all show good conventions of a magazine because of how well they are linked together and have been thought about by the producers to make it look professional, interesting and exact.
Florence’s curly hair links in with the font ‘got the love’ by they’re both flowy and free. The same font is used for the first letter of the main body, which makes it look like a newspaper. The other features on this double page spread make it look like newspaper article is the subtitle above the main body which insights you into what the main body is about so that you can judge whether it grabs your interest and you want to read it, if you don’t then you can carry on with other articles in the magazine so you don’t waste your time reading something not of your interest. Another reason for suggesting this double page spread looks like something you’d see in a newspaper is the layout of the text, as the text is shown in columns.
Why I don’t think this page shows good graphic design is because all of the text has been placed on one page, squashed in the corner, which suggests there is not much information and it does not give the text importance like it should to have in relation with the picture. Also having the main picture continuing onto the right side of the page scrunches up the text even more and shows a week layout, because the little extra that the picture has gone over onto the other page has no importance through the readers eyes.
Double page spread from MixMag
In MixMag December, 2009 a double page spread article about celebrity DJ’s was published. The main picture spreads across the two pages but the main focus is on the woman on the left hand side of the page. The woman is unnamed, and is not mentioned anywhere on the pages so therefore is unknown to a reader like myself, who rarely reads MixMag and knows little about this type of music. The woman is holding a small dog, Chihuahua that has no resemblance towards music but shows a typical woman celebrity whom the article has a slight link to, celebrities. She is also pulling a suitcase that I found no connection to music, apart from the fact that musicians do tours all over the world. The picture shows glamour because of the glamorous sparkly dress being worn, beads round her neck, cute dog and sunglasses worn, they all show this theme and link into the synapse on the right page where it says the word ‘glamour’. Although I feel that the photograph used has hardly any relation to the topic that is being spoken about, I think that it is attractive and would drag typically the female audience into reading about it or at least the synapse to see if they are interested in it.
The colours used are mainly black, blue, white and yellow. I feel that they all go really well together and I like how black and white have been used to show brightness, highlights, shadows and outlines. Having the text black and the backgrounds where the text is light, bright or plain colours make the text stand out and easy to read which is vital. The blue background is very different to other magazines because it isn’t just plain blue it has shadows and bright highlights on it and also a big yellow random splodge on the right top corner; I think represents the sun because it has a relation to the sunglasses worn and the suitcase in the picture, it resemble the celebrity is going on holiday. The double page is not straight on the page but is positioned at an angle that shows a variety of layout techniques and is unusual but people could say it lowers the professionalism and makes it look reasonably tacky.
The layout of the text is again compacted into the bottom right corner, very similar to the double page analysed above from NME music magazine. It makes the text seem like it has little importance compared to the picture, but I feel that the picture has little relevance compared to the actual text because the picture tells me nothing that I need to know about ‘celebrity DJ’s’.
The phrase used as a title ‘Welcome to Lame Academy’ is a pun because it plays on the words of ‘Fame Academy’, this integrities the reader as to why they are using this phrase, so makes us read on further. The first word ‘Welcome’ performs the meaning of itself by inviting us into the article and gives it a personal feel.
On this double page spread I have evidenced that at least four different fonts have been used. This suggests that the article is not consistent and does not stick to typical magazine conventions. Having the starting letter of the main body bigger and bolder, and also using columns’ makes look slightly like a newspaper article, I believe a lot of magazines do this as I have noticed the last two that have analysed use this convention. The text layout is very similar in both the NME and MixMag double page spreads.
I found NME show more coherent layout techniques compared to MixMag; I mean this in the form relating to font and pictures. I feel that NME shows expertise and perfection of what a professional music magazine should show. I think that the genre of the music in which these magazines basis are could be an impact on the way in which they are styled. MixMag’s main genres are Electronic/Tech house, which is deep house music; American club influenced, which is quite crazy like the colours and presentation of their magazine.