KATIE JONES

Film Magazines

Empire

Published by Bauer Consumer Media – globally established publishing company.

Sold monthly, at the price of £3.99. Targeted to general fans of films. Well respected, opinions often utilised on

release posters, trailers and alike. Front cover usually explicitly features one

character – generally the antagonist of a newly released film. Established pattern of characters head overlapping masthead. Despite the masthead featuring in different colours, it’s recognizable due to the consistent bold font.

Maintains conventional elements of magazines, E.G. coverline, tagline and key image. Some use of sweetspot.

Contains interviews, reviews, previews of films, and features.

Total Film

Published by Future Publishing Inc. Published monthly, at the price of £3.99. Targeted at the general fans of films. Similarly to Empire, the opinions of Total Film

are respected and are often quoted within release posters, trailers, and alike.

Contains interviews, reviews, previews of films, and features. Also releases ‘special issues’ such as the October 2012 ‘Cool Issue’.

Explicitly features one main character within front cover, similarly to Empire, the head of the character coincides with masthead. Masthead is distinguishable due to the specific font, and layout (total featuring within the f of film).

Maintains conventional elements of magazines, E.G. coverline, tagline and key image. Some use of sweetspot.

Sight and Sound

Published by the British Film Institute, has secondary purpose to educate.

Published on a monthly basis at the price of £3.95

Features in-depth interviews, opposed to the outcome of ‘press-junket’ question and answers.

Focus’ more explicitly upon prominent characters within film industry, instead of celebrating latest releases etc

More sophisticated front cover image when compared to Empire and Total Film. Masthead usually placed within left hand corner. Overall image seems more organised.

Uncut

Published by IPC Media Released on a monthly basis, at the price of

£3.99. Uncut is a hybrid magazine, featuring

elements from both the film and music industry. Resulting in the target audience being more musically orientated – considering the ratio of music to film is approximately 3:1. Films incorporated chosen to relate to the interests of the readership – aimed at a more mature audience.

In terms of the graphology of the front cover, the main feature’s head coincides with the masthead. Masthead recognizable due to the font.

Maintains conventional elements of magazines, E.G. coverline, tagline and key image. Some use of sweetspot.

Little White Lies

Published independently by The Church of London Creative Agency.

Little White Lies is released bi-monthly at the price of £5.00.

The front cover of this magazine is influenced by the featuring film within the specific edition. – Each includes a detailed illustration of the main character.

Considering the magazine is particularly stylised, and the price of the magazine is reasonably high – it is indicative to me that the target audience is quite niched.

The masthead is the most obvious aspect of the front cover, and is consistently placed centrally at the top of the page.

SFX

SFX is published by Future Publishing Inc. This magazine is released monthly, at the

price of £3.99. Contains interviews, reviews, previews of

films, and features – from a range of film genres, varying from sci-fi to anime.

Occasional special issues offered to readership, which explicitly feature a specific theme, such as the ‘Superheroes’ issue.

More often than not the front cover places a focus on the character featuring within the respective film. Similarly to virtually all other magazine covers, the head of the key image coincides with the masthead.

Maintains conventional elements of magazines, E.G. coverline, tagline and key image. Some use of sweetspot.

Summary

After having researched a series of magazines, I have noticed a variety of interesting aspects which relate to the creation process of a film magazine.

Re-occurring features I’ve noticed are: There is an explicit focus placed upon one single key character. Mostly, magazines are released monthly. The key characters heads often coincide with the masthead. The masthead is free to change in colour – as it is style

recognizable due to the style of fonts. Most magazines I’ve research include conventions such as a

masthead, tagline, and coverlines anchoring images. Whilst considering my own trailer, I don’t think I could

immediately place it in a specific magazine – purely because of the genre, Rom-Com. If I had to place it in a single film magazine, I suppose I would choose Empire, or Total Film – purely because I can see these magazines receiving the most generalised magazines.