The document discusses magazines focused on musical theater. It finds the market size for these magazines is small, with few existing products. It describes searching for and finding some magazines in this genre online, but being unable to find full issues. It then analyzes aspects of the covers, mastheads, images, and contents pages of these magazines, such as using colors that relate to the musicals featured and balancing text and images to attract readers.

2. From what I found, by looking into music
magazines based around musical
theatre, was that the market size is pretty
small, and not many existing products exist.
However, I was able to find several
magazines that do follow this genre, the
only problem is, that it has been difficult
finding all required elements of the
magazines; front covers, contents page and
double page spreads. Despite this I did
manage to find one or two of these on the
internet (I was unable to find any in a shop).

3. The masthead is large and bold in
order to stand out for the audience to be
able to see easily, this follows the
conventions of magazines in general and it
overpowers the rest of the cover without
drawing too much attention away from the
rest. It’s coloured green which follows the
colour scheme of this issue. I found that the
colour scheme of the issue is based on the
musical that appears on the cover, such as
in this issue, green, to follow Elphaba’s skin
colour.
The cover image is a picture of Elphaba
from Broadway’s Wicked, this signifies the
main article for the magazine. It is a live
shot and doesn’t look like it was staged, she
is in full costume and acting in a way she
would on stage, this gives a greater sense of
depth and reality to the magazine and
draws the audience in more. She is well lit
up and therefore stands out against the dark
black, blue background of the image.

4. Subheadings telling the audience
things that are appearing in this issue, this
is for the purpose of attracting them with
things they would want to read. The main
subheading is Wicked; you can tell this
from how it’s in a bigger font size than the
rest; this is because it is the main article for
the magazine as we can yet again tell from
the cover image. It also suggests that the
target audience isn’t just lover’s of musical
theatre but anyone in general because it’s
telling the audience what the show on the
cover is, in case they didn’t know. The
subheadings alternate colours between
bright green and a yellowy colour, this has
a nice effect and gives the magazine a much
smoother look.
Overall the magazine cover draws the
audience in with it’s use of imagery and bright
colours, whilst having plenty of information
which doesn’t distract from the rest of the
cover. The use of live imagery gives the
audience a greater sense of the theatrical
atmosphere without being at
Broadway, making them want to go and watch
the show.

5. Text/picture ratio there is an
even ratio between the two, half the
contents page involves images while
the other half contains a simplistic list
of the articles and features within the
magazine. This is so the audience can
get a feel for what’s inside the issue
before even reading it, because the
written contents only gives limited
information, the pictures expand on
this.
Categories are used in this contents
page, this breaks up the articles making
the magazine easier to navigate. By
doing this the magazine doesn’t have to
make different sections to it, it can have
a flowing range of articles, which are
still separated into categories through
use of the contents page.

6. Colour isn’t overly used in this
contents page, but the colour that is, is
used well and to it’s fullest effect. They
have used contrasting colours to make
the writing stand out against the broad
colours used to background the upper
portion of the page. Yellow to stand out
against the red, and white to stand out
against the black. This could’ve been
used to either add some brightness to
the contents page or possibly follow the
colour scheme of the issue.
Overall the contents page is well
organised, and neat, this is one of the
expectations that the magazine has of it’s
audience, making it easy to read and nice to
look at. The pictures used give it a fun lively
atmosphere, which is what you think about
when you think of the theatre. It’s not too busy
and draws the audience’s attention through
use of colour and the page layout.

7. Picture: the image used on the dps is a posed
shot from the musical in question. The characters
are in costume and on stage. It doesn’t overpower
or take up much space over the two pages, but is
used for visual support and to help the reader
keep interest in the article.
The Article dominates
the two pages, suggesting
the target audience to be
older, middle aged people
who have the time or
patience to sit and read
such a long article. By
using large, red lettering
for the masthead of the
article, the audience’s
attention is instantly
drawn away from the
other features on the page
and straight to the article.
There are also minor sub-
articles on the page which
shows the magazine is
making good use of it’s
space, and not appearing
Promotion: the magazine is using part of it’s space to promote things to be sloppy, this keeps
related indirectly to Broadway and it’s many musicals. Yet it still in keeps with the idea that the
with the theme of the magazine and will appeal to the audience. magazine is neat and well
organised.

8. The colour scheme is very simplistic and
boring for the best part of the page, which is
understandable as they do not wish to remove
attention from the article too much. However
the promotion at the side of the page is in a
bright vibrant purple, this
was done intentionally on
the hopes that it would
attract the audience’s gaze
and make them interested
in what it’s about.
Writing style: the
article is an interview with a
popular actor discussing his
Broadway debut. He is well
spoken and what he speaks
about is something fans of
the musical will be able to
relate to or understand
quite well in the best. It
gives them a sense of what
starting out on Broadway is
like.
Overall the layout is quite simple, with a sophisticated appearance
and textual depth, two of the things that the target audience look for in
a magazine. It’s not too busy so the page just flows and doesn’t distract
the reader from what they should be doing, reading the article.

9. Colour scheme: the colour scheme used
on this cover of Kerrang! is typical and
conventional for this magazine, the use of
the four colours, yellow, red, black and
white. The yellow and black stretching from
left to right across the cover has the
appearance of “keep out” tape that the police
use, this could be representative of the
“dangerous” rock elements in the magazine
that only certain people that enjoy that music
can handle and read. Whilst the white
contrasts well with the black making it stand
out vividly; and the red is a bright shocking
colour that attracts the audience’s attention.
The Masthead is rough and edgy to give
it a more free look that isn’t neat, it’s
explosive. The idea that the cover image is
overlapping the masthead could suggest that
the magazine is so popular you don’t need to
see the masthead to know what the
magazine is; either that or it could be to do
with the idea that “You Me At Six Take Over
Kerrang!” and it’s symbolic of their “take
over”.

10. The cover image is a posed shot of
You Me At Six holding a
megaphone, this shows that the
magazine is almost screaming at the
audience to buy it, this idea is reflected
through the use of large, bold text
which attracts the audience’s attention.
Although it takes up most of the
cover, the busy appearance of the
magazine cover distracts and doesn’t
keep the focus to one particular item.
Overall the cover is very busy, with lot’s
of pictures and article mentions filling the
cover, this is done to get the magazine ideas
across to it’s impatient, young audience in a
single page so as to keep them interested.
It’s use of explosive headlines and imagery
gives it an individual, exciting appearance
which will attract an audience easily and
interest them without the need for much
text.

11. Images: The images used on this
page are all posed, which gives the
audience a sense of inclusion with the
magazine. The cover image is
repeated on this made with a small
note from the band to the side of
it, this emphasises the idea that You
Me At Six’s “take over” of Kerrang!
Categories: The contents are
catgeorised so the magazine can be
navigated easily and the audience can
quickly turn to which ever articles they
wish to look at. For instance; if they
bought it for You Me At Six there is a
category “YMAS Feature Special!” to
allow the reader to head straight to it.
The colour scheme is continued
across this page, however the red is
slightly lesser than the amount featured
on the front cover. The use of contrast is
again played upon well on this page.

12. Extras: This page contains two things
which influence the audience to buy the
magazine. The first is the competition in
the top left hand corner of the
page, giving away £350’s worth of
guitar by a band that is popular among
the target audience. This takes up over a
quarter of the page so it’s one of the
main points of the page, what the
magazine feels is a big selling point to
this issue. The second is in the bottom
right hand corner, the magazine is
giving away free clothing for
subscribing to the magazine.
Overall the contents page follows the
magazine’s convention of being busy
and crowded, whilst sticking to the
conventional colour scheme of the
magazine. Despite it’s busy nature the
contents of the magazine is quite neat in
it’s layout, making it easy to browse.
However, it still has an explosive look
surrounding it.

13. Images dominate the dps both with a large
corner, naturalistic image of YMAS and with
lot’s of smaller posed pictures of one of the
band members showing stuff about their lives
that would interest a fan or the reader.
Through the use of a
non original image
“From Bus Til Dawn”
they explain what the
article is about without
the need for any detail.
The naturalistic photo
gives the audience a feel
for what life is like on
the tour bus and feel
like they’re included.
Colour: The yellow and black is on this page, following on from the contents
and cover, this is because the two seem to have been used around YMAS from the
start of the magazine and so it would seem appropriate to use the two on the
article about the band.

14. Picture quotes: Kerrang! have used humorous
anecdotes to entertain the audience and engage
them more with the article and band.
Article: The article is less
of an interview as the
quotes would suggest but
more the band describing
items in their tour bus. The
idea of this, is to give the
reader an insight into the
band that they love and a
further feeling of inclusion
with their lives that they can
only achieve through
buying Kerrang! and
reading this article.
Overall the dps has a scrapbook feel to it, which makes the magazine seem more casual and
easy to look through, rather than giving the impression that the audience has to focus solely
on reading the lengths of text. Compared to the contents and cover pages the dps doesn’t
seem too busy but the use of lot’s of pictures gives it the impression of being quite busy.

15. The cover image is a posed shot of Take
That, they are piled on top of each
other, laughing and clearly enjoying
themselves, this could be framed like this
because it shows how music can be fun and
enjoyed with friends and how it should be
celebrated in a group of people. They are all
dressed in matching clothes, black leather
jackets, this symbolises their union as a band
whilst following one of the house colours for Q
magazine, black.
Other articles, within the magazine
are featured on the cover, Green day for
instance, this is put on to show the diverse
nature of the magazine’s genre’s; by
comparing it with the main article of Take
That, because Green Day and Take That
have two completely different genres.

16. Colour scheme: the colour scheme for the
magazine is red, white and black, with some
gold thrown into the cover of this issue.
Black, white and red are used because they are
gender neutral colours which has no specific
aim, this translates to the wide, diverse range
of music used in the magazine.
Overall the cover shows a good image of
music, symbolising the enjoyment it gives to
people, whilst having a neat yet slightly
busy layout. The layout could be like this to
show the different music style’s it portrays
within, random from the neat harmonic
singing, to the heavier more explosive music.
Yet since the two work in harmony neither
the neatness or the busyness overpowers the
other.

17. Images: there are plenty of pictures used on the contents
page, posed and naturalistic, ranging from individual singers to
groups to bands, it even involves the front cover on the second
of the contents page. This just shows the diverse range of acts
that are included in the magazine.
Double page: the contents is
spread across two pages, this
stresses the mass of articles
contained in the magazine while
showing the audience how
popular and big the magazine
is, so big in fact that they can
spread their contents page across
two pages.
Layout: the layout is well
spaced giving it an easy
viewing feel but it quite busy
at the same time meaning they
have fitted a lot of information
on this page alone, but that
again expresses the quantity of
articles and items within the
magazine.
Colour scheme: the colour scheme is maintained on this
page, however, the gold has been removed as it is probably not part
of their conventional colour scheme.

18. Categories: the contents page is not itemised according
to certain categories, but instead is a continuous list of the
articles contained inside, with only a single break up, which
is the space in between the two lists. But even this space is
filled with parts of the contents.
Overall there is a lot going on
because of the amount of
pictures used on this page, but
this is countered by the tidy use
of listed articles. The page
numbers on the pictures are
sized differently depending on
how important to the magazine
the article is, for instance the
main article is the largest
number on the page. It has a
scrapbook appearance to some
of the pictures, but these are
only the live images so it may
be done intentionally to
separate the live articles from
the posed articles.

19. The article: is very textual and written in full
paragraphs, this tells us that the audience is of an older more
patient age, willing to do quite a bit of reading. There are
smaller, sub articles at the side of the page giving small amount
of information about singers and bands, called “Sound Bites”.
Alongside this, there is a
profile of “Miles Kane” a
singer who was once in a
group but has now gone
solo, and has a small quote
about how he is finding it
being a solo artist.
These articles are all set to
interest a part of the
audience, by not just
having one article on the
page it can achieve this a
lot easier.
Colour scheme: the
colour scheme, is
continued yet again in
every aspect of the
double page spread, and
therefore easily attracts
the reader’s gaze and
attention.

20. Images: Most of the images on the dps are posed pictures of
the bands/singers showing us who the articles are about.
However, one or two of the images are naturalistic and so give
the audience some depth into their lives and what it is to be at
rehearsal or watching them perform.
Overall It has a tidy
layout and is well
organised, following the
colour scheme of the
magazine. It has plenty on
the page to keep the reader
entertained and
occupied, however, it does
this without making the
page too busy or full; they
have done this by the use
of a large written article.
The use of quotations
allows the audience to feel
included and engaged with
the band and the magazine.