After reviewing three popular magazines and their contents cover it now allows me to choose which forms & conventions I will be using for my contents page. Like Kerrang, my genre of music is niche, so I will perhaps go for a niche approach to my contents page – however I know already that one of the conventions is that it has to be organised, so if I find that a niche approach to my contents page proves difficult for me to also make it organised, I will then design my magazine contents page to be more conventional.
Forms & Conventions;
- Images / Photos – Articles – Logo
- Clear Headings – Captions – Quotes – Page Numbers
- Editors Letter
- Perhaps breaking into Columns – Continuous Colours (House Style) – Consistant Use of Font.
My images will be relatively small and there wont be many – I might put page numbers next to the image with either a caption or small article depending on the type of story. The editors letter will come next to my Logo / Title which will be on the top section of the contents page. The heading will have similar use of font and colours about them to give my contents page a House Style. More information will be held on the main story and the relevant page, however the story will still not be completely given away to keep it more exclusive, building up the suspense towards it.
To be certain whether to insert the use of columns or ‘sectioning it off’ I will draw several sketches in different manners to see what I feel is more appropiate to the genre and reader.
An example of how I will present articles can be demonstrated through the main story based on the covering artist ‘Leon Surrain.’ I will take the caption on the front cover ‘The Step Into Fame’ and use that as an article heading on the contents page – following this I will write in a bit more detail what the interview was about, a quote of what he said and the page the interview is on – this allows me to build up the suspense with the reader who can then skip to the exclusive story if they want to.
