College magazine preliminary Evaluation
In my front cover, for the preliminary task, I made my magazine target audience aimed at a specific group of students, and these students are “art students” I did this because I wanted my college magazine to be a niche magazine. Having a niche magazine, is at both a disadvantage and advantage, as having a niche target audience may not attract the actual audience based on the magazines content However, having a niche magazine is also an advantage as you have a specific audience which will engage towards the actual magazine.
I named the magazine “LSC ART” I did this because I wanted to aim the magazine at only Art students, although it does include content of the college itself, as I included different features and regular’s pages relating to the college in the contents page, which makes the magazine have a fan base of college students. On the front cover of the magazine, almost every cover line relates to Art, and future careers within the Art sector, I did this because it is a good way of both helping students and enticing them towards the magazine, as it gives them the knowledge and information they will need in their later life, this is important because the magazine benefits the target audience, and if its beneficial it would be more likely that the target audience buys the magazine. At the beginning when I made my college magazine plan, I had a different title, the reason I chose to change it was because I wanted the magazine to be niche, before the title was going to be "LSC LIFE", however I changed that and did not follow the plan I made previously.
The magazine is priced for £1.99, the magazine is cheap as students wouldn’t want to buy an overpriced magazine, which they would like it to be preferably priced at a lower cost, this is also affordable for students and they gain more from having the magazine, as it allows them to sign up for competitions and giveaways, which are promotional and have limited entry’s.
In the magazine front cover, I put in a lot of detail about Universities and how to "Be a good art student", I did this for a reason, and that reason is to reach out to the target audience which are Art students the age between 16 - 19, As it provides a lot of information, it is more likely to be bought by an Art students or an individual who is interested in thinking about career choices, or any Art related careers/activities.
There is a colour scheme throughout the magazine front cover, these colours are Black,yellow and red. I chose these colours as i wanted a contrast of colours that would overlap different colours in the foreground / background of the front cover. As well as this it's the same colour of the colleges lanyard, on students ID cards, which shows it the house style, reflects on the college in addition, the cover star is wearing the same colour clothing to reflect the colour scheme on the magazine front cover.
In the front cover, I made sure I used props, in this front cover the prop is a sketch book, I did this to show the cover star is dedicated towards working and is high achieving, the gesture of the cover star suggests. In the magazine front cover I also used an ID card as a prop to show representation of the college. However, I should have changed the sketch book prop as it is black, and the cover stars jumper is black, which makes it hard to see, I should've thought about changing the colour to make the prop more visible.
Overall, to improve the magazine front cover i would
1. Not use too many cover lines, as the front cover looks crowded with a lot of text.
2. Add different information of what would be inside the magazine, for example page numbers/articles.
3. Use all features of a magazine front cover
4. To not be repetitive on the use of cover lines
