Denotation:
The front cover is made up of a medium long shot photograph of a woman, showing her head, arms and waist, looking at the camera. Her clothing is a dress covered in vibrant coloured flowers. She is holding her hands to her chest, with her head leaning slightly back. The background to the photo is pink; the image takes up most of the magazine cover and covers part of the Billboard masthead – which is behind her head. There are six cover-lines – including the main – in black and yellow. Katy Perry’s name is in big, bold letters.
Masthead:
The Billboard masthead is simple but effective; it is black sans serif font with red, yellow, blue, and green filling in the lowercase letters. The fact that the main image is placed on top of the masthead connotes that it is iconic, and does not need the reader to see all of it to know what magazine they are looking at. The sans serif font is very business like which gives the reader the idea of the magazine taking what they do and the music industry seriously. The word ‘billboard’ is the definition of a large object or board on which adverts or notices are usually placed. This has the connotations of the magazine having valuable information that is relevant and worth reading. However, from the masthead alone, it is not clear that the magazine is music based.
Character:
The main image is of the famous American pop singer ‘Katy Perry’
Composition:
She is posed in an innocent yet seductive way. By holding her hands close to her chest she appears as vulnerable, this is supported by her clothing and the arrangement of flowers. Her facial expression is seductive and connotes the typical ‘come hither’ behaviour of an attractive woman.
Costume:
Her clothing is a short, mini-dress that although covering her upper body, would expose a lot of her legs – were they visible. The dress is a maroon colour, which contrasts with the light background and bright colours of the flowers which are covering her dress and hair. This costume is aimed mainly towards a female audience because it is very girly and feminine, which is very similar to her image and music.
NVC:
Her non-verbal communication is seductive but not in a vulgar way. Her mouth is slightly parted emphasising her pink lips and white teeth; this behaviour could be aimed towards a male target audience, although it does not exclude a female audience because she looks serene as well. She is looking directly at the camera, engaging the target audience.
Lighting:
There is high-key lighting, which has the connotations of daytime, and pure beauty. This goes well with the bubbly and vibrant personality that Perry is known for.
Setting:
There is no setting, which shows the reader that Perry does not need anything to make her noticed; she is well known and does not need any gimmicks to support her on the front cover of a magazine. The pink background connotes a very girly innocence, therefore keeping with the point supported by her NVC and costume.
Cover-lines:
The main cover-line relates to Katy Perry, saying "Inside The Court Of The New Queen Of Pop". This is telling the reader of how highly praised Katy Perry is in the music industry, the cover-line is royally themed to really state the fact that Perry is one of the biggest female artists around in pop. This part of the cover-line is in white in between the other cover-lines in black, this means that it stands out and will not be lost among the other stories being promoted by the cover, therefore showing its importance and relevance to the main image. The various coverlines on the cover show that the magazine talks about different genres of music as well, and incorporates non-music articles too - they focus on what will be interesting to the reader. Different artists named are Taylor Swift, Mike Posner and Sheryl Crow (different genres and generations). Also mentioned is the famous social networking site Facebook - showing the magazine is up to date and modern. The Mercury Prize is also named, this reveals that the magazine also praises rising and successful artists and chooses to make this known to its readers. All of the cover-lines are in sans serif font connoting a modern magazine. However there are two cover-lines that are in serif font, this makes them stand out among the others, telling the reader that they are the more notable articles.
Target Audience:
From the cover, it shows that the likely target audience of the magazine is both male and females (especially females for this issue) with a variety of ages, showing that the magazine is open to a wide range of ages and is not centred towards a small group. There would be a wide range of musical interest, styles and musical knowledge
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