ANALYSIS OF THE CODES AND CONVENTIONS OF A FILM MAGAZINE COVER

I have chosen to analyse a film magazine cover from Total films edition featuring the film ‘Avatar’. This film was released in 2009, and the cover features a number of conventions which are often repeatedly seen on other magazine covers. The features often relate to the film itself aiding promotion of the product.

The masthead is placed at the top of the page slightly behind the main focal photo which shows the character ‘Jake Sully’ who occupies an avatar of the species ‘Na’vi’ in the film. The masthead is cleverly designed as it places one word from magazines title within the other, this layout is more interesting and unique compared to a plain masthead. Similar to ‘Empires’ layout, they have chosen to place the focal image overlapping the masthead as it is recognisable by regular readers and follows a pattern.

The image is placed centrally and takes up the majority of the cover, the camera angle is a medium close up revealing the whole identity of the character. The character has a human upper body but an animalistic face, in particular its ears, nose and eyes could be similar to a cat's facial features. This is fascinating as it appears to the reader that the character could be physically alien like but still have human emotions. It is predominantly a blue colour and is equipped with weapons potential used during medieval times. The background is a similar shade of blue as the main focal image, the colour blue usually connotes strength, wisdom and peace, potential characteristics of this character. The focal image may have involved some sort of photoshop which enhances the mythological and unrealistic features of the character. This computer generated image may strike a potential reader's eyes amongst any other magazine.

The colour scheme is mainly a mixture of dark and light shades of blue combined with white and grey colours. I believe these 3 colours have been chosen as they represent out of the ordinary things such as space or planets. This could coincide with the film ‘Star wars’ which is another sci-fi genre film, follow this sort galaxy/ space layout pattern.   

Below and around the main focal image a number of coverline’s reveal features within the magazine, they are usually placed there as they are easily accessible to read by anyone passing. One coverline in particular reads ‘A decade in the making’, this piece of information is significant as it reveals that avatar may have taken around 10 years to make, informing the audience that they took a lot of time and effort to perfect the film. A skyline runs along the top of the article and calls out additional information to the reader; this particular cover reveals the article may include information about other films. This edition doesn't really feature a puff but does still offer exclusive offers around the main focal image. The typography used for the masthead, the title of the film and the skyline are all the same, using white, bold capital letters. These three pieces of information are the largest and boldest because they are probably the most necessary information at first glance.

There could be a number of potential buyers or readers that may be film fanatics who are willing to buy a magazine about films or anyone interested in films. A more specific target audience would be anyone wanting to watch the film Avatar or anyone who enjoys films that follow the sci-fi/fantasy/action genre.