#11 - Preliminary Task: Magazine Cover Explanation

Hello blog!

Welcome back! In the spirit of learning from my experiences and improving my media creation skills, let's analyze my first magazine cover!

This is the graphic I'll structure my analysis with.

First, let's discuss my creative process and the cover in general. The subjects are two of my friends, Seth and Joanna, posing in a statue of the University of Miami logo. While on a tour of the campus, I was thinking about this preliminary task and what I would use as my topic. We started taking pictures with the statue and the idea of basing my magazine of college just hit me!

To determine what layout I would use for my cover, I looked to magazines like Time and People for inspiration. In the end, my cover reflected my interest in Time magazine - I felt the structure of a Time magazine fit my topic better than that of People magazine (and I also don't have the editing skills to make a good People magazine inspired cover).

Now, onto the actual elements of my cover. I made sure to include some elements of a real magazine, including an issue number, issue date, and barcode. I want my work product to look as realistic as possible, and these elements help me achieve that goal. Also, I put a brief overview of the magazine's contents on the cover, like most magazines have, to give readers an idea of what to expect. This overview also elevates the cover and makes it look even more realistic.

Next, let's analyze the picture I used for the cover. I took the picture from a long shot so I could include both my friends and the UM statue in the picture. Having both in the picture was important to me because it makes the topic, and the gestures of my friends, make more sense. I also wanted an obvious reference to the UM for readers who may not be familiar with the school and its hand gesture. They also look really enthusiastic about the school, which is perfect for a college-related magazine. I also would like to mention that these are all aspects of mise-en-scene (which I've covered in a few blogs before this one!).

Lastly, I want to discuss the photo composition. I used a picture with shallow focus to draw the readers focus away from the background and to the subjects of the photo. I want to keep the readers' eyes on the center of the page, and the shallow focus eliminates the distracting background.

All in all, creating this magazine cover exposed me to what type of creative thinking I'll have to do as I make my final project. Though I had some issue with placing the features on the page in an appealing way, I enjoyed making it and I can't wait to do more.

What do you think of the cover? Let me know down below! See you next time!

References

Graphics created in Canva