For Total Film, Empire, and Sight & Sound magazine front covers: - Total Film and Sight & Sound follow conventions like masthead placement and featured articles, while Empire's design warps text around the main image to match the movie Inception. - Sight & Sound's minimalist design places the masthead and articles around the edges of the cover in contrast to Empire's centered layout. - While most magazines use mid-shots, Sight & Sound features a close-up of the actor's face and uses black and white for the main image, diverging from colorful sci-fi movie norms.

1. Comparative Analysis
Film Magazine Front Covers
Total Film | Empire | Sight & Sound

2. For Total Film they follow most conventions for
film magazine front covers; the masthead is at
the top and in their front covers the masthead
is either in front of the main image or at the
back, they also keep a house style, where there
is one font and one type of colour scheme for
the whole of the magazine, also the featured
articles are on the side and do not block any of
the main image, the same with the main
feature of the magazine (STAR TREK) where it
is at the bottom of the page as to not block any
of the main image.
The main image is black and white, and this is
effective as it makes the masthead, articles
and sell lines pop out, and to compensate the
articles and sell lines are situated around the
actor’s face so that it is still the main focus of
the magazine

3. For the magazine EMPIRE most of the
magazines have their mastheads behind the
main image.
This magazine is cleverly designed as the
articles and the sell lines are to the side of
the main image and are warped and
distorted, which accompanies itself with the
movie Inception (where the movie is about
distorting dreams). Furthermore since the
articles and sell lines are all to the side of
the front cover, the main article (INCEPTION)
is in the middle of the page and in front of
the main image.

4. For the magazine Sight & Sound they conform
with most magazine conventions in that the
masthead is at the top and the main article is
at the bottom and stands out.
However it seemingly does not follow it’s
house style (white, black, orange) in terms of
its articles and sell lines where they are bright
red. They might have done that to make the
articles stand out more as if they were to
follow the house style it might not stand out
as much.

5. With this front cover it is different to all the
others as its design is much more creative as the
sell lines sort of follow the theme of the featured
movie (Inception) where they warp around the
image of Leonardo DiCaprio. Also the main image
of the actor is looking away from the camera, this
suggests some aspects of his characteristics, such
as him being intimidating and him having a high
status
For Sight & Sound, it conforms to the
conventions of film magazine front
covers as the featured article is at the
bottom whereas the main article for the
magazine ‘EMPIRE’ the featured article
is in the middle of the page.
In most of the magazine front covers for
S&S the mast head is either in front of
the main image or very little of the
masthead is blocked
Furthermore as compared to all the
other magazines, this magazine cover
approaches it with a minimalistic style.
Compared to the magazine EMPIRE it
is slightly bare, where the sell lines
and masthead are all around the
edges of the magazine front cover.
Another subversion of the front cover
with others is that the main image is a
close up of the actor’s face whereas
with the others it is a mid shot of the
actors.
Another way the magazine subverts
with other magazines is that the main
image is in black and white, which is
weird as the movie featured is a sci-fi
movie so it is expected to have lots of
neon colours however the black and
white is still pretty effective as it
highlights the masthead and the
articles around it
Total Film EMPIRE Sight & Sound