Detailed Research into Forms and Conventions

The genre that I have chosen is Opera. The two magazines that I have analysed are called, 'Opera' and 'Opera Now' these are the only two English magazines that I could find. They both use different forms and conventions to attract their audiences. As I don't actually have an Opera magazine to hand, I have done all of it by using images from the internet.

Every magazine has to try and attract there reader in a way that they will want to read more so that they have to buy it. There are quite a lot of ways in which magazines can do this. When you first look at this front cover, the first thing that you see is the man standing there and he is looking like he is very pleased with himself, and that he has a lot of power, which could relate to the audience. The type of audience that would buy this magazine is people that would probably shop at places like Waitrose and Marks and Spencers.

            All of the colours of this page go together very well, with the masthead being a dark orange and his jacket a light gold this could link up with the upper class status because these are colours that are normally seen as upper class. The name of the magazine ‘Opera’ is simple and not very creative which links to the audience because they are probably not very creative themselves. Although the colour of the masthead blends in with the image, I think that if it was in white then it would have stood out more, but because it isn’t it means that they even want the attention to be on the man rather than the masthead. The colour of the dateline, price and splash are all in white which means that it stands out slightly but not a lot. By online having a splash on the front page gives it a very elegant feel to it because if it was all covered up with writing then it wouldn’t seem sophisticated and it would cover up the background.

 The whole of the front page is just about him. You can tell this by the way that the image has a blurry background which makes him stand out a lot more. The way that the background has been left the way that it is (not covered up) shows that the audience would be interested in it.The font of the masthead is small serif which connotates a very sophisticated style which links up very well with the audience type. The other type of font is very simple yet classic, so fits well.

The contents page, is just a single page, with on the other side an advert about the English National Opera theatre and what is showing there. The contents page itself actually has no colour on it at all; it is just black and white which connotates that it is elegant and sophisticated. The page has been split into two columns, with the masthead at the top in black. There are no images at all on this page showing what is going to happen inside which connotates that it is quite boring and wouldn’t appeal to a teenaged audience. Down the whole of the left hand column it is all just about how to contact them and it also has the editors on there.

             On the next page of the magazine, which is a double page spread, it is all about an Opera artist. There are four pictures, but they are all in black and white, which fits very well with the target audience that they are going for. The type of fonts that they have used is quite classic and elegant. For the first paragraph they have used Italics and the first letter is in bold and a lot bigger than the rest, which connotates sophistication. None of the writing overlaps into the pictures, it is just alongside it.

         
                By analyzing this magazine, it has shown me that for my magazine I want a sophisticated and elegant Masthead to attract my type of audience. It has also shown me that I don't want to overcrowd the front page with writing if there is a nice background.

           This magazine cover is designed so that it will appeal to its audience so that they will buy it. There are a number of different ways in which ‘Opera Now’ magazine does this. Immediately the first thing that you see when you look at the front cover is the opera singer who looks like she is in mid way of singing. The masthead ‘Opera Now’ and the sell out line (which is in capitals) ‘The World’s Leading Opera Magazine’ themselves already show which type of audience would go to the opera. These would be people of an A or B standard on the Jicnars scale, and I would say that they are Traditionalists or Achievers in the Psychographics. You can tell this by, for starts of the masthead, ‘Opera Now’ the way that it is a serif font and is coloured white, which connotes sophistication and upper class. Also because the font is white and it’s on a black background it stands out more, which makes the magazine seem classic.

           

Although this magazine is targeted for wealthy people, it still has the normal conventions that a standard magazine would have like the barcode, freebie in the top right hand corner and the dateline. There are two main headlines on this front cover, and that’s about it, I think that this connotates that it is a very boring magazine and isn’t really teasing there audience. I also think that this could be saying that they don’t need to give lots of contents on the front page because there audience most likely will other just buy it anyway or they are subscribers to it. The audience is assumed to be wealthy as the price of the magazine is £5.95, which is very expensive compared to a lot of other magazines. Another way that you can tell that the audience is most likely to be wealthy is because of the quality of the paper is very good, which probably is one of the reasons as to why it is so expensive.

            The layout of the double page spread is targeted very much for the target audience by the way that it is classic and quite boring because it is simply just in three columns. Also the colours that are used are very bland and quite light. Some of the writing used on the double page spread is in Italics, which connotates an upper class standard. The images that have been used on this double page spread are also very suitable for the audience that will read it. This is because the images that have been used are very simple and quite old, for example there is a picture of a house and that is in nothing special to it. None of the images on the page overlap or in contact with the writing, they have just simply been put on as they are, this style may fit with the target audience that they are going for, but if someone of my age were to look at it then they would find it very boring.