Flat Plan for Front cover, Contents page and Double page spread.

            After looking at some pop magazines, I realised that a lot of them were similar in some ways. For example, I noticed that most pop magazines had a mid-shot of the artist that is featured in their magazine. As I want to make my magazine as realistic as possible, I tried my best to stick to the themes normally used but at the same time also make it interesting somehow. One of the main pop magazines I looked at was ‘We Love Pop’ magazine and the cover with the artist Cher Lloyd caught my attention most. This was because her body language was different to the other artists I had seen on magazines and this gives her a unique look. Also the magazine cover was very colourful in a controlled way and I felt this also kept me, as a member of the audience interested. In comparison to other types of magazines, I realised that the pop magazines were more courageous when it came to using colours. They used unusual colours to make their magazine different from other magazines. In a very similar way, I decided to make red the main colour. The logo for my magazine is red lips, and this has been used a few times in my flat plans. The bright red lips would also be used on my artist because it would then be like they’re almost representing my magazine and it will work well together (almost becoming a theme).  Although this may not be very clear on my front cover I have played around with the magazine name too. As this is aimed at young adults/ teen agers, the idea of ‘bubble gum’ has been used for the word ‘Pop’. This also goes with the word pop because bubble gum makes a ‘pop’ sound when it bursts. The main information will be bold and therefore this will catch the audience’s attention first e.g. the artists name and the magazine name. Another thing I noticed when analysing a few pop magazines is that the main artist used generally looks right into the camera, giving the ‘eye contact’ effect. The idea of the artist holding a lolly pop also plays with the name of the magazine (‘pop’) and also links well with the idea of the target audience being young people. 

When the word ‘Contents page’ comes up, people think of a page with ‘Contents Page’ written at the top of it, and then the name of pages with numbers underneath, but I wanted my contents page to stand out so I decided to give it a different unique look. I stuck with the theme of ‘red’. The colour red has been used near the title ‘CONTENTS’, on some letters in the word ‘CONTENTS’, with the artists lips (again linking to the idea of it being the logo of the magazine) and as a frame for the images on the other half of the contents page itself. This keeps the magazine consistent and allows the theme to flow easily. The different images on the other half of the page will include something that will help the audience to understand what they’re going to find in the magazine. The artist is now standing with bubble gum in their mouth, linking back to the name of the magazine and the genre of music the magazine is about.

            My double page spread will be an interview of the main artist. I played around with the normal idea of how an interview would be laid out and instead of laying it out normally one by one, I played around with the lay out and positioned the questions in different ways. This could again reflect the ‘playful’ nature of young people (target audience) and therefore they might prefer this look. I wanted to position my artist in a different way. Generally the artists are placed in the left/bottom left, right/bottom right corner of the page but I decided that to make my magazine different I would place my artist right in the centre. This could also show that all of the information is about them and so the artist is standing in the middle. The artists name will be bold, and this will catch the audience’s attention straight away. Although I am still not exactly sure what the quote will be, I thought it could be a quote reflecting their personality, the journey they have been through in order to get where they are in their life or it could be the lyrics in their songs etc.