This magazine cover features Kanye West to appeal to its target hip-hop/rap audience. The word "Vibe" is prominently displayed in blue to emphasize the magazine name. Kanye's serious expression and baseball jacket reflect the genre. Pink bold text highlights his name as the main article. Consistent pink, blue, and black colors are used along with a sans serif font suited to the target audience. Lighting distinguishes Kanye from the grey background. Coverlines about a film and artists' songs attract readers. While no specific design principles are followed, the rule of thirds is used to segment images and text across the cover.
1. Salford City College
Eccles Centre
AS Media Studies
Foundation Portfolio
Masthead
Comment on how the design of the magazine cover attracts the target audience:
The word ‘Vibe’ is written in big, blue, bold letters
to emphasise the name of the magazine and to
appeal to its target audience. However, a large
part of the actual mast head is being cover by
Kanye West’s head, so the magazine can
emphasise more the fact that he is the main star of
this magazine.
Colour
The colours pink, blue and black are consistently
used. These colours go together and they can easily
attract the reader.
Main image
Typefaces
The main image is of Kanye West. He is putting on
a serious face to appeal to its target audience. He
is wearing a baseball jacket which typical clothing
of his genre. It is also a good way to attract its
target audience as most readers of the magazine
will like the hip-hop/rap genre.
San Serif font is used on the front cover. San Serif
font is probably better suited to the target audience
of this magazine and a serif font would probably not
go well with the theme of this magazine.
Model credit
Photography Lighting
The model credit says ‘The truth hurts Kanye
West’. The model credit is written in pink bold
letters to attract the reader and so the target
audience can easily tell who the main article of the
magazine will be about.
In terms of lighting, a little bit of lighting has been
used in order to brighten up the main image. It has
been used to distinguish between the background,
which is a greyish colour and the model himself.
Coverlines
Design Principles Used?
At the top of the page, it says ‘…10 B.I.G secrets
the film won’t tell’. That coverline attracts the
audience as it is a cover line which will make
people want to read it so they can find out more
about the film, the use of the word ’exclusive’ also
emphasises this. On the right hand side of the
cover, it has lists of other artists to show the
reader, other artists featured in the magazine.
No design principles have really been used on this
front cover as there aren’t specific things in the
primary optical area, the terminal area, the weak
fallow area and the strong fallow area.
However, the rule of thirds design principle has
been used because in each segment of the front
cover, there is part of an image or a coverline.
Main cover line
House Style
The main cover line says ‘I am rap’ and ‘His 50
greatest songs (and 10 to delete)’. It is in bold blue
letters however the size of the main cover line isn’t
very big which is surprising for a magazine.
The front cover doesn’t have much of a theme to it. However, the colours pink, black and
blue have been consistently used throughout this cover.
