Compare my 1st to 2nd draft

1st Music Magazine Front Cover Draft

Below is the first draft of my music magazine that I created in the genres of Indie, Rock and Folk. After asking a few members of my audience what they believed would be a suitable title for my magazine, I got to work on finding a suitable artist for the main mid shot image for the front cover. To do this I typed into Google 'Indie Rock bands' It came up with many different results, but I needed someone who was new and someone who wasn't particularly in a band (to make it easier to place them all onto the front cover). I found out that Passenger, a musician who has only recently become well known from his chart song 'Let Her Go' was perfect for my genre and would work well for the front cover as he isn't part of a band. Passenger is also an interesting artist as he writes songs as well as performs them, he also had an interesting back story onto how be became the artist he is today.

After finding an image of him facing the camera I set to work on the title. For the title I didn't just want the name of it, I wanted it to be interesting but minimalistic. Some fonts can make a magazine look unprofessional and cheap, so keeping it minimalistic would be an easy way to keep it under control. After experimenting with a few ideas, I finally decided that two K's back to back would be a simple but interesting way to go about it. Other ideas for the title included having the C and the K to overlap, two K's to overlap or to just have one K at the end of 'Rock'.

To also make the image more interesting, I used my previous knowledge of Pixlr to edit the photo so only the eyes where in colour. Then I boosted the colour and changed the hue of the colour to make them stand out a bit more. This gave the image a focal point and draws the eyes of the audience/buyer to his face.

Next I added some relevant snippets down the side relating to similar artists and bands in that genre that I had previously found when searching on Google. After this I took inspiration from Q magazine to add a sticker and a sub heading to draw attention from the audience.

2nd Music Magazine Front Cover Draft

This is my second draft. I took in what my target audience had to say and changed it accordingly. The first thing I changed about the front cover was the positioning of the artist. Although Rule of Thirds states that if someone or something is placed in the middle it will therefore give it greater purpose, I needed to move him more to one side so the writing didn't overlap onto his face, which was something many of my audience picked up on and disliked. I also moved the sticker further down so it didn't cover his face.

The next thing I changed was the brightness of his eyes. Previously, although his eyes were green you didn't really notice it that well. This time I boosted the contrast more so his eyes were brighter, I then went on to making the sticker match his eyes and make the colour theme more obvious. Within the sticker I added a chance to win tickets to the front cover artist's new concert. Adding a competition adds to my audiences pleasures but was also suggested by my target audience during the questionnaire. This will make my target audience more willing to buy my magazine as they would feel they are being given to and would make them feel more part of these genres of music and this magazine. 

Overall, the second draft is far better than the original as you can clearly see the theme colour, it interacts with the audience and none of the writing covers the artist's face. I have also managed to change all of this whilst still keeping a minimalistic effect on the magazine front cover.