Newsstand Task Part 1

This task was in two parts - the first part was to analyse a newsstand, looking at how the magazines are displayed and how the publishers have designed the front covers of the magazines to compensate for the newsstand display.

The music magazines are in the 'men's lifestyle' section and are surrounded by magazines about various sports and technologies. We can see how the publishers have taken this into account by making the front covers with bolder text. The mastheads are big and loud, therefore suggesting that these magazines are geared more toward men.

 

In this newsstand, the magazines are placed on top of each other. This means that you can see the top quarter of the magazines but not necessarily the left third, as it is with other newsstand set-ups. In this picture, we can see how most publishers have anticipated this newsstand set-up by putting the masthead in the top quarter so you can see which magazine is which.

 

 

Here, we can see how the publishers have used the top quarter of the magazines to grab the reader's attention. We can already tell that the mastheads are seemingly always in the top quarter, but there  are also skylines in the top quarter - on Kerrang! there is the skyline about posters; on NME there is the offer for an exclusive CD; on Total Guitar there is the splash; and on Q there is the skyline for three articles, two of which have pictures.

 

We can also see in this picture how the publishers have also used the left third to compensate for other newsstand set-ups. On Kerrang! there is the splash advertising the competition to win tickets to a tour; on NME the masthead is in the left third, and as you can see in the picture below, the free gift mentioned in the top quarter appears in the left third; on Total Guitar the splash is also in the left third; and on Q the masthead is also in the left third.