Analysis of Film Magazine Covers

By Hannah Thorpe

Empire• Publisher – Bauer Consumer Media• Cost- £3.99• How often is it published – Monthly• Target audience – aimed about 12 - 25, people into big blockbuster films. • Typical content – Blockbuster sci fi films, well known sagas, such as Harry Potter and The

Hunger Games• Their title is usually red, apart from in special editions when they have used white, gold or

blue to fit in with the feature article film. It often has actor’s heads blocking part of it but as it is such an iconic logo, their readers still know what it is.

• Above the title, their is always a tag line to incorporate the feature film. Eg. “Meet the new action a-list” (Iron Man), “Spectacular Potter photo special” (Harry Potter), “Nobody does it better” (James Bond)

• The layout differs throughout most of the editions depending on the films that are featured on the front cover. Overall, they do a good job of making the main tag line stand out to link with the image. Under ever main tag line, they have a caption. For example, The tag line is “IRON MAN” and the caption is “Attitude? You damn betcha!” or “POTTER 7” “The end begins”

• The colour scheme and layout targets a mass market as the genre is so large and unisex.• The date and price (US Dollars and pounds) are always found inside the “M” so their

readers know where to find how much it is and also whether they are up to date with the issues by looking at the date.

Total Film• Publisher – Future Publishing• Cost - £3.99• How often is it published – 13 times a year (Every 4 weeks)• Target audience – 15+ males • Typical content – Action Blockbusters• This magazine has a few different types of layout that they use, although there

are some consistencies. The title of the magazine always has the “total” inside the “F” and it is always in the same position – about a 1cm-3cm from the top, depending on what they put about it. If they just simply use their caption “The Modern Guide to Movies”, it is about 1cm away, whereas, like above in the Sherlock Holmes issue, they have put another feature of that issue above it, moving the title down ever so slightly.

• In most issues, they just have the one character in the centre with their heads covering at least part of the title, mainly the “L”.

• The name is clear and the audience knows what to expect even though they may never have heard of it. Putting “Total” before “film” makes you know that it is nothing but film and will tell you all you need to know about the films that have been released around the release time of the issue.

Sight & Sound• Publisher – British Film Institute• Cost - £5.50• How often is it published – Quarterly• Target audience – Older audience, arty, male and female, • Typical Content – International films but also featuring some more well known films,

articles on directors and screen writers• The Yellow box in the top left corner with the title and caption and the other yellow

box in the top right corner with the barcode are both consistent throughout pretty much every issue.

• They have used the Z format, going from left to right along the top where we see the title, diagonally down towards the bottom left where the title of the film is often placed and then along the bottom where there is often a tag line.

• Most of Sight & Sound’s issues follow the expected layout of a movie magazine• They have used quite dark colours and some have a vintage feel to them. This

attracts their target market well. Whereas, if they used bright blues and pinks, it would attract more of a young teenage audience.

• The name Sight & Sound doesn’t make it overly obvious that it’s a film magazine, but it does make sense once you know what it is. This is because films are multimodal and uses both sight to see the images and sound to hear the dialogue.

Little White Lies• Publisher – The Church of London• Cost - £6 to £30 (It is also available to read

online for free here- http://issuu.com/lwlies/docs)• How often is it published – 6 times a year • Target audience – Typically male and females in their 20s and features indie films. Collector

magazines. Quite a niche audience.• Typical Content – Cover story and articles inspired by the chosen film, theatre reviews,

comments from the editor, a look forward to the future issues. Own special film ranking system.

• The font for the title is simple and sans, giving a sort of minimalist feel. Although, looking at their older issues like the “Future” issue above, they used more of a formal-feeling font.

• This magazine definitely goes against most conventions. They never use normal photographs, but instead they use illustrations of different things. These are usually of a person but are sometimes mainly typography.

• The style is very typical of each magazine and is unique enough for it to be almost branded to Little White Lies. This is mainly the white (Always white) circle with the barcode, title and slogan. Also on many of them, they will say “The ... Issue”. For example, “The Napoleon Dynamite Issue”, “The Tetro Issue”, “the Kick-ass Issue”.

• They have created their own little theme instead of looking like most of magazines. This way the magazine stands out and builds up a niche following.

• Inside, they seem to split up each article into “Acts”. I have also seen one which splits them up into “Chapters”.

SFX• Publisher – Future Plc• Cost - £4.99• How often is it published – Every 4 weeks • Target audience – 15+ Male based, fans of supernatural/fantasy• Typical Content – Films and TV that are of a supernatural element, eg. Star Trek, Dr Who,

Avatar. Sci-fi, Fantasy, Horror• The silver/metallic style font gives the impression of supernatural/action genre. The style is

streamline and soft which reflects which might reflect the body of a spaceship.• The lines in the background of this specific cover makes the main picture almost jump out of

the page. It gives a slightly 3D effects, which would catch the audience’s eye when on the shelves in a store.

• The cover is quite busy with a lot going on. It is clear what the cover story is with the title taking up almost a third of page. The image of Spiderman and Emma Stone is incredibly well known meaning most people would recognise what the feature article will be without even reading the title.

• The title of the magazine can be partly covered as many of their target market would recognise the style of the cover.

• It follows the typical “Z” formation with your eye being drawn to the “S” first, reading across to the right, diagonally down to the “Your Thrilling 2015 Preview”, crossing over the image and the type saying “The Amazing Spider-Man 2”, and finally reading to the right across the other articles featuring in the magazine.

Summary of Research• I have learnt that the magazines that are targeting a

mass audience generally don’t change their layouts or style. (Eg. Empire) This is because this sort of market will generally buy it quickly in a supermarket so it needs to stand out and have consistencies throughout each issue. These sort of magazines would feature big, well known Blockbuster films.

• Whereas the magazines targeting a niche audience like collectors, can afford to switch each issue up and make each one unique. (Eg. Little White Lies) This makes each issue special in it’s own way, making a collection even more valuable. These would include indie-sort of films.