Evaluation Of Practical 2

For our magazine practical practice, our task was to go on the internet and find an existing magazine cover, and annotate it. We had to make annotations such as what each part of the cover was called (eg. masthead for the title), and what layer they were on. I did Autosport magazine.

The cover of the magazine follows all the usual conventions, bar a few. It has a masthead, a main picture although its not a person. It also has things like strap lines, a slogan, cover stories, a bar code and price and the date of its release. Something it doesn't have however, is a competition.

The main colours used on the magazine are black, red and white. This follows the usual conventions of only having 3 colours maximum on the cover. These colours in particular are used because black and white especially are related to flags used in motorsport, and therefore appeal to the target audience. Red is used because it tends to signify danger, and motorsport can be quite dangerous, so it ties in with the theme of the magazine.

The cover lines on the front of the magazine entice people into reading the magazine effectively. For example, where it says "Is Webber's New Williams Brave Enough?", or where it says "Renaults New R25- Can t Give Fisi & Alonso Race Wins?", the people who designed the magazine are asking qestions, and this makes people want to read the magazine and find out the answer to these questions.

The text used in the cover lines and strap lines mostly appeals to regular readers, as opposed to new readers. This is because in places, like where it says "Daytona 24 Hours... Newman, Franchitti, Wheldon, Da Matta, Tracy: The Best Entry Ever!", new readers of the magazine more than likely won't know who these people are, and won't be excited about reading it. However, a regular reader who DOES know who these people are would think "wow!", and want to read it to find out more.

Autosport magazine is printed and distributed by the Haymarket Media Group, and has is the worlds best motorsport magazine weekly.

When it came to producing my own copy of the magazine cover, I found that it was incredibly difficult to use photoshop effectively due to my inexperience with it. If I had more experience of using it, I feel I can use its tools more effectively. I feel a lot more confident using Imovie to edit films however at the present. In regards to the magazine itself, I've found that an incredible amount of thought and attention to detail goes into getting the desired effect on the cover, like trying to make it appealing for people to read.