At NME we rarely use black and white images on the front of our magazine but in the past we have. The majority of the time when we use black and white images its because the band or artist is old or the photo is old but we have changed it to black and white to basically show that it is old. We would say if your using new modern bands that its probably not a good idea to use a black and white image.
What advice would you give us to make sure our front cover photo works well?
Well the first bit of advice we would give you is to make sure your band/artist is looking into the camera. Having eye contact is key, on most of our front covers we make sure the artist is looking into the camera, this just helps connect with the reader. Also the photo shouldn't fade into the background it needs to be in front of everything on the page and really stand out because they are the main feature. As you can see throughout our front covers at NME we use just head shots, we rarely use full body length shots. We predominantly do this to show the details and
face of the artist/band and on the double page spread show a variety of different shots. Plus we tend to make the head slightly bigger to attract the eye of the reader.
What else should we include or think about on our front cover?
TARGET AUDIENCE! Think careful about your target audience and what THEY would like to see and read. Everything you do you have to think whether it will fit with your target audience. Also I would say is to link everything together; the text style, layout, colours etc. Having everything linked helps the magazine to flow. Creating the masthead is key and is one of the first thing a reader sees. I would say that the mast head should connect with the theme of your photo but in NME we mainly keep the theme of red white and black although we did go through a stage of changing the colours of the logo to match the theme of magazine front cover. I would advice you to keep your logo SIMPLE! Simplicity is key as its memorable and straight to the point. In NME we use a classic font which is bold to attract the readers eye. In NME we are able to keep it classic because people know our logo due to the fact NME is a well known logo and has been for many years. With yours you want to make it different and stand out compared with all the other magazines out there. Another thing to think about is whether you want your mast head stretched across or just on the left hand side like NME.
When we come to write and plan out our double page spread is there anything we should think about including?
The first thing you should think about is how long you want the article to be which will relate to your target audience for example in the magazine 'Uncut' the articles can be pages long due to the fact the majority of the target audience who read it enjoy reading alot. Where as the younger generation are known to not like reading that much. Sometimes having to much text can look boring to some readers therefore we advise you to use nice big quotes to split the articles up and also allows the reader to see quotes of whats inside the article. Also we tend to use box outs along the side with something that is related to the article. Also doing the headline in different bold font to the subheading can attract the eye, using different fonts makes it more interesting to read by don't over do it otherwise it can look to messy and boring. The photo should frame with the text around it therefore if you have loads of space around your photo it can look good to stretch it over the two pages.
Photo shoot Process
There is a big process when doing the photo shoot obviously we have to plan out what we want them to wear, poses, background etc. We also have to think about what we want the photo to say about the person and has to closely relate to the article.
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