This magazine cover targets an indie music audience through its use of bold colors, contrasts, and photography that portray the featured artist as powerful. The cover uses red, white, and black colors that stand out and contrast with each other. A close-up photo of the red-haired artist Florence Welch fills the cover and contrasts with her pale skin. Simple fonts are used for readability. Design principles create visual interest without being overcrowded, matching the indie theme.

1. Salford City College
Eccles Centre
AS Media Studies
Foundation Portfolio
MastheadWhite bold clear masthead. Clean and
Comment on how the design of the magazine cover attracts the target audience:
ColourThere are 3 colours that are continuously
simply presented. Contrasts with the red hair and
stands out due to being placed on top of a vibrant
red, this therefore makes the magazine easily
recognisable.
used throughout this magazine cover: black, white
and red. These three colours contrast with one
another as they are all harsh, very bold and are all
dominant colours.
Main imageExtreme lose up image with high key
TypefacesThe fonts used within this magazine
lighting of Florence Welch. Red hair contrasts
against pail skin. Face fills up the entire cover area.
cover are all fairly simple and therefore portray a
simple layout and format. The fonts are also very
easy to read in comparison to other fonts used in
different covers. The name of the artist is in a
separate and larger font in comparison to the
remainder of the text which therefore makes the
name stand out more.
Model creditFLORENCE is in large bold black
capital letters in the bottom left hand corner of the
magazine and this piece of text is the only piece
which is written in this colour as the remainder is
white. The black therefore stands out more than
the remainder of the text and is eye catching.
Photography LightingHigh key lighting on
Florence’s face which therefore creates the illusion
that she is paler than in reality. This creates a large
contrast due to her hair being such a bold bright red
colour. Due to the hair colour being so vibrant and
powerful, it denotes that Florence is representing all
women as powerful and strong.
CoverlinesWhite font used for all cover lines.
Main titles use a more Arial orientated font whereas
the writing beneath the titles are of a Georgia type.
The white font stands out when placed on top of
the red hair and therefore makes a visual contrast
of colours. Bold font draws more attention.
Design Principles Used?Guttenberg design
principle has been used to an extent as the weak
fallow area is the area which holds the majority and
the most important information. This is an effective
design as it makes sure the primary optical area,
weak fallow field and the terminal area are all filled
with either text or images. This makes the magazine
look full and busy, but not too busy to look over
crowded. This corresponds with the ‘indie-rock’’
theme that Florence Welch creates in the image.
Main cover line‘I would of never have got
through the X Factor auditions’ is a quote from the
inside interview and this gives the viewer of the
magazine an snippet of what the interview entails.
The harsh contrast between the black and white
fonts brings more attention to the weak fallow area.
This relates to the target audience as it is implying
that the X Factor is only searching for one specific
type of music which is known as ‘main-stream’
whereas Florence, and the music found inside tends
to leave the mainstream path and is more original in
comparison.
House StyleOnly two colours used on the entire magazine cover (black and white) and
these create a large contrast with the remainder of the magazine – Florence’s red hair.
The NME logo is in the same place as it is usually found in all of the NME magazines and this
therefore shows that the house style is constantly used within every magazine. In addition
to this, the barcode is also found in the right hand corner of the magazine which is the
same position that it is found in every other cover.