Codes and Conventions Media Studies

1. Pop magazine mastheads are
typically very bright coloured,
and are sometimes layered on
top of shapes to create an
image instead of just text. This is
to make it stand out from all the
other text boxes on the page,
and make the magazine clearly
identifiable. My magazine both
conforms and subverts this
stereotype. While it does stand
out from the rest of the text, it is
not because it has a shape
under it. I changed the
typography to make the
masthead font different to every
other font I have used on the
publication.

2. The cover lines on pop magazine
typically all use bright vibrant colours
(that will either match the house
style of the magazine, or the house
style of that particular edition). They
also use different sizes to emphasise
names or certain words which piece
together with the smaller text,
creating a “jigsaw” effect. This is
done to make the cover lines more
visually appealing instead of just
being block text. I too have used this
in my magazine, both with the
colours and the jigsaw text.
There is also normally just one main
image of the person/feature from
the main story within the publication.
As we can see in this example, they
have used a large picture of Justin
Bieber next to his headline. I have
emulated this in my own designs.

3. Even though the picture is not
the clearest, you can still identify
that there is a clear colour
scheme across the front cover
(black, white and yellow).
Billboard magazine change
their colours every edition, and
have a weekly house style
instead of just one standard one
in terms of colour. Interestingly,
this colour scheme matches the
celebrity used (yellow to mirror
Taylor Swift’s blonde hair, white
in her dress). I have not done
this in my magazine, but I do
have one clear colour scheme
that is reflected and used all the
way through the designs. I had
chosen my colours because
they were bright, and selected
as the preferred colour scheme
from the audience
questionnaire’s.

4. The headline here is
very simple, and only
actually uses the
name of the artist
featured. In most
magazines, they might
include more than just
this information, but it
will still be very limited
and restricted so as
not to give too much
away without reading
the article. I
conformed to this with
mine, as it is only the
title of the article,
which doesn’t give
much away about the
text in the main story.

5. For my music magazine, it was
important that I both conformed
and subverted different
conventions. I had to conform to
a lot of stereotypical
conventions, so that it attracted
my target audience. I found
from my research that they were
more comfortable sticking with
things they know instead of
challenging them. However, I
did want to change some
conventions, so that my
magazine stands out on its own
instead of being the same as
every other magazine currently
out there.
Progressing from my college
magazine, I think that I learnt
more about the codes and
conventions of music videos,
simply due to the availability of
music magazines on the internet
to look at as case studies. I think
this really helped me produce a
more professional magazine
after looking at different brands
of pop music magazine, instead
of just having 1/2 college
magazines to study for inspiration
and analyze.