Conventions of Magazine cover

As well as my film trailer and poster I will also be producing a magazine front cover. Having looked at magazine covers from scream, I have looked at magazines such as film and scream and through doing this I have realised that the basic conventions of magazine front covers are the same regardless of the genre or audience for the magazine. The following conventions appear in all types of film magazines:


Firstly, the Masthead is a common convention, this is usually, well most of the time the biggest font on the cover and is often in a colour that stands out from the background and the rest of the cover. An example of a really eye catching text is shown below;

 

Dominant central image- In a mainstream magazine this is usually an A-List character whereas in an independant film magazine, this is often of a director or a less recognizeable actor from the movie the magazine is linking to.
As shown below on the left is a mainsteam magazine called 'film' which has an image of Daniel Craig on the front of it as James Bond from the new film Skyfall. On the right is an independent film magazine with, what looks like the director of the film on the front cover.

 

The price, date and issue number are also conventions of a film magazine. Shown below is an example of a 'scream' magazine with these conventions. The website is also a typical convention, this is their so that people will know what to search for if they want to go onto the magazine website, usually to subscribe or to purchase new, and old magazines.

 

 

The Bar Code --- Example below;

 

 

 Coverlines and Banners on magazines are typical conventions, these could be things like advertisements of what is in the magazine or what you can win. Or generally just sub heading enticing the reader into reading more which will make them want to buy the magazine, these are both very important conventions.