Exemplar A grade Work

Layout Drafts of Magazine Pages

You should by now, have completed the following  Research tasks:

1. Labelled the conventions of a magazine cover
2. Analysed two magazine covers
3. Analysed a contents page
4. Analysed a double page article
5. Created a questionnaire and given it out to at least 10 people (who are your target audience).
6. Collated the results and turned them into graphs using Excel.
7. Analysed your results and written a magazine proposal.

Once you have completed the above tasks you will be ready to plan the layout of your magazine pages on paper. You do not have to be an artist to gain high marks in the planning. What you need to do, however,  is to show you know and understand the conventional layout of magazine pages.

I have included some examples of layout drafts below.

Front Cover

Contents Page



Double Page Article Page 1



Double Page Article page 2

Analysing Questionnaire Results

Learning about your target audiences wants and needs is a really important part of the magazine planning process. At this point you should have handed out your questionnaires to at least10 members of your target audience. The next stepis to analyse those results and use them to decide what type of magazine you are going to produce.

1) Collate your evidence. Using Excel, create a range of pie charts to present your results – you don’t have to do all of them, pick the 5 most important ones.

2) Place all of your pie charts onto the same A4 page in Word.

3) Answer these questions:

Magazine Proposal

• Who is your target audience? (think about age, sex, interests and hobbies)
• Will your magazine be a mainstream or niche magazine? What will the magazine be about?
• How often will your magazine come out (you may have asked your audience which they prefer – weekly, fortnightly, monthly)
• How much will your magazine cost? Why did you decide on this?
• How will you design the front cover of your magazine to attract the audience? Did your questionnaire help you to find out what your audience finds most attractive?
• What types of articles will be found inside your magazine? What did the audience say they want to see?

Double Page Article Analysis Questions

1) What does the choice of artist featured in the article suggest who the target audience is?

2) What type of language is used in the article? Is the language used informal (e.g. slang that the audience will understand) or does it have a more academic quality? Give examples of words or phrases which are specific to the style of the magazine.

3) What tone does the magazine use to address the reader (as a close friend, a member of an 'in' crowd or an informed intelligent fan?) - provide evidence

4) What style of text is used? What font do you think it is (Sans Serif is commonly used)

5) How is the interview laid out? Are various entry points used and why?

6) How are the pages laid out? How much of the pages are taken up by images and how much by text? How does this reflect the audience?

7) How is the artist/band/celebrity presented to the audience through the images? How is meaning created through the anchorage text? You may wish to carry out a textual analysis looking at mise-en-scene (setting, costume, body language, colour) and camera shot used. Are they posed images in a studio or are they live shots at a concert or sports event?

8) Does the style of the article match the style of the front cover? Is a house style being developed across all the pages you have analysed?

Contents Page Analysis Questions

Answer the following questions about your chosen contents page.

1. How is the information organised so that it is accessible to the audience? What are the main areas of interest that the magazine covers? What does the magazine consider to be important? What does this suggest about the audiences interests and values?

2. Is the readers’ eye drawn to any special features? How is this achieved?

3. What colours and fonts are used? Does this support the style of the front cover? Is a house style being developed?

4. Does the magazine use images? How many images are there? How have these images been constructed? How do they appeal to the target audience?

5. Are there any promotional features? Is the magazine logo placed anywhere on the page? How dominant is it? Does the brand have any other franchises? Are these promoted on the contents page?

Magazine Front Cover Analysis Questions

As part of your magazine coursework you need to analyse a range of magazine pages in order to prepare for the production task. Answer the questions below to help structure your analysis.

1. What genre of magazine is it?  Is it a mainstream or niche magazine?

2. Who is the target audience for the magazine? What particular age group, gender, interests?

3. Look at the central image. Who is on the front cover and why? Is the person a celebrity?

4. What shot type is used and why? What mode of address is the cover model using? (Direct or indirect mode of address) What does this tell you about the type of relationship the magazine wants with its reader?

5. How has the central image been represented? – Comment on facial expression/ body language, hairstyle, makeup costume, setting.

6. What does the anchorage text say? What does this imply about the person?

7. What overall message is the main person giving?

8. Are there any ‘buzz’ words? What effect does it have on the reader?

9. What does the title of the magazine tell you about
• the readership (target audience)
• its image
• its style

10.  What do the ‘puffs’ suggest will be inside the magazine? What does this tell you about the type of audience the magazine expects to get?

11.  Is there a slogan? What does it tell you about the magazine? How does it help to attract readers?

12.  What colours are used? What fonts are used and why?

13.   What stereotypes does the magazine reinforce about the target audience?

Analysing the Conventions of a Magazine Cover

Lesson Task 1

Using the internet find a magazine front cover and save it in your documents. Label the conventions on the front cover of the magazine and give an explanation for each. See the example below for more guidance.

Lesson Task 2

Using the worksheet provided and the magazine you were asked to bring to today's lesson, carry out a detailed analysis of the magazine front cover. This task will help you to examine the ways in which a magazine front cover is constructed to appeal to the target audience.

Conventions of a Magazine Cover

Magazine Unit Checklist

Below is a list of the work you will need to complete for the magazine unit. The magazine unit is worth 50 % of your total coursework grade (30% of your  overall Media GCSE grade).

Research Tasks

1. Label the front cover
2. Analysis of Magazine cover x2
3. Analysis of Contents page
4. Analysis of double page article
5. Questionnaire
6. Questionnaire results in graphs with analysis
7. Magazine proposal 

The deadline for all research work is Friday 21st October

Planning Tasks

1. Layout drafts of magazine cover, contents page & double page article

Production Tasks

1. Create a magazine cover, contents page & double page article 
2. Write an evaluation (800 words)