Conventions of a celebrity/fashion magazine front cover

I have chosen to evaluate and anaylise the connotations of a popular celebrity/ fashion magazine front cover to help distinguish the similarities and differences between it and the college magazine. This will also help me with ideas when making my college magazine front cover.

The Masthead is the name of the brand the magazine is from and used to distinguish the brand from another. The magazine shown is a weekly magazine and although usually magazine masheads are exactly the same on each issue this magazine's varies week by week by changing the colour scheme however the position and placement of the text on the page aswell as the font style and size stay exactly the same each issue.

Magazines will usually include on the front page the date the issuse was published for which week commencing, the issue, the price and a tag line usually just above or below the Masthead (as shown in the image). This is to inform the audience of the information they need and to compete with other leading magazines by sometimes showing how much cheaper the magazine is compared to it's rivals.

Magazines usually have a main image which is the main headline and attraction of the magazine, in this case and in most celebrity magazines which can afford it the main picture would be a famous celebrity who is perhaps high in the media interest in that moment in time the magazine is being published, this is done so that the magazine grabs the audiences attention more than a rival magazine. This magazine has lots of colourful images on the front cover which are used also to attract the audience, the background to the bottom left hand side plug is the same colour as the masthead aswell as other focuses on the magazine which are this colour.

There are various plugs on the front of this magazine like the college magazine They also show bits of information which can be found inside the magazine. A well known example of this is to use quotes which the celebrity may have used in the exclusive interview that follows after the photoshoot but they twist the words spoken around and use them in a different context which helps draw the audience in by leaving the quote asking rhetorical questions. There are many other plugs used on the front of this magazine including two celebrity plugs one with the caption including the word "stalker" and another about how to shape up using the tips and advice from lusted and envied famous popstars "The Saturdays". There is also a plug advertising cheap dresses at gorgeous looks which is a very appealing article to the target audience at this time in crisis with the credit crunch. The last main plug is a "real life article"on how to win your ex back, the way the caption is worded makes the audience believe that if they read this article than they are guaranteed to win them back, misleading but also appealing the audience. At the top of the masthead there is an advertisement plug to win a trip to New York this is aswell a massive attraction to the audience, because of the massive prize it entails.

The main difference of connotations between this magazine and the college one is this magazine is much more chaotic and jam packed with colours, images and writing whereas on the college magazine the colours where kept to a minimum as where the images and there was not alot of writing. The white background of the magazine was also able to be seen unlike this magazine where there isn't a blank spot, every inch of the magazine front cover has something going on.