Magazine front cover

We looked at many different magazine covers to decide how too set ours out and what we needed to include on the front cover etc etc. For most of the posters we looked at we found that the main image was of the main character/actress from the film, usually dressed in the character that they play within the narrative. These well known actors/actress's will attract audiences and immediate fan bases causing more profit and interest into the magazine. Snippet's such as ' 15 films you must see', this pulls in and teases the audience which makes them want to purchase the magazine. A number of fonts,styles and colours are used which give variation and makes the magazine more appealing. For our magazine we deiced too have the front cover as the main protagonist, this followed the trend of the magazines we had researched and thought that it would give the film the most publicity possible. The picture that we chose was chosen as we felt it didn't give too much away about the protagonist yet still made the reader want too find out why she looks sad and upset. We also gave snippets of what the magazine featured, as researched too attract the readers.

For the colour scheme we decided to continue with the red and black colours as we thought it would link in with the posters and the colours within the the trailer.

After audience feedback we decided too redo the magazine front cover and improve on the points that were given too us;

•the masthead is too small and doesn't fit across the top part of the magazine.

•The blocks of empty spaces should have been filled up with text and the text is predominatly on the top half of the magazine instead of being spread out evenly.

•Needs to include more detail about other films which were also being released.

•The edges of the image need to be edited more cleanly and less jagged.


We found the internet a useful source too help us to a higher standrad of edditing and end up with a more realistic and conventional magazine cover.Although it was useful too do the first attempt as it gave us foundations too build on such as the colour schemes that we have kept the same. Too get help with the edditing we typed in 'photoshop for beginners' and useful sites came up with step by step guides or video guides of what too do such as;
http://www.pegaweb.com/
http://graphicssoft.about.com/od/photoshoptutorialsbasic/Photoshop_Basics_Tutorials_for_Photoshop_Beginners.htm
http://www.photoshopstar.com/effects/cool-effect-for-your-designs/
I found both types if instrcutions eually useful, the written step by step guides made it easy for me too get back too the same place again if i had forgotten a piece of information, it also meant i could print it out therefore have it with me other than being at the computer. However the visual guide made it easier too follow as i didint have too spend time finding the tools i needed as the guide already highlighted where they would be placed.Aswell as improving my photoshop skills re-doing the poster demonstarted too me useful websites that i can use in future refernce.
As noted before we have stuck with a red and black colour theme. This was chosen as red and black are conventionally linked too death/blood/love which all threee are included within our trailer. I feel that the font the name of the magazine cover is writen in also appeals too a horror audience as it could signify dripping blood. We got the name Kingdom from a popular film magazine called 'Empire' although we did research the sucessful horror magazine 'Fangoria' of what too include as it was in the same genre. As Kingdom may not immediately come off as being a horror magazine we have used anchorage with the tagline 'The ultimate horror magazine' under the masthead.Too attract the horror audeience on the front cover we included up and coming films that people who would enjoy our film would watch such as Daybreakers, The Wolfman and Piranha.IMDB is a good website which shows up and coming films aswell as giving useful information about them such as budget, cast and location. However if we were too do the poster again then i feel we would include films that are more on our low budget such as Paranormal activity (Oren Peli 2009)which had a budget of $15,000 (estimated).
Through the research i found similar features of all magazine covers.'A must see movie' section was one that predonminatley stood out therefore we included it into our magazine cover.Linguistic choices such as 'trouble on set' also stood too my attention therefore we put it on the magazine cover as i feel that audience's want too read about things going on off camera aswell as on it although this may take away from the exclusivity of 'A Date From Hell'.

The second magazine cover also has alot less free space which is common within magazine covers unlike our first attempt.It also shows that the 'Date From Hell' interview is an important feature of the magazine by having the main character as the centre feature, this i feel is where we went wrong in the first place as the picture was at the bottom of the cover and the writting was all at the top making it look un-balanced.Im glad we revided the magazine cover as im alot happier with this one and feel it would fit in with other horror related film magazines.If I was to do the magazine cover again, I may add a 'film-strip effect' with a variety of clips from the film as this is commonly used in industry. Too follow the audience reading from left too right if i was too do this again i would put in place 'the rule of thirds', which is having the features of my film on the right handside, the picture in the centre and general film features on the left.




Deconstruction of production of Magazine cover

•We took the photo for the magazine with a digital camera and uploaded it onto iphoto were we 'adjusted' the photo slightly to make the photo seem sharper and brighter to stand out more on the magazine cover.




•We then uploaded the photo onto photoshop and used the magic wand tool to edit round the characters face to have a plain background which we filled in black with the selection brush tool to fill in the background black.

• This was followed by adding text to the cover in a variety of colours, fonts and sizes to make it look more appealing.




Although photoshop was very useful in this case, after looking at the fonts available we decided that none were suitable for a horror film magazine front cover, such as cerif fonts which are most commonly used. We then decided too look else where and found a font called 'bloody' from a website http://simplythebest.net/fonts/, this was simple too do and gave an effective result.