Magazine Cover Reveiw

In today’s world sitting down and reading a magazine is very rare. “And reading a full magazine article--as opposed to scanning, perusing, surfing--is so twentieth century, so retirement home, so William Shawn (Scherer, 2002).” Most people don’t have time, even those who are retired don’t sit down and pick up a magazine, adults are always working and teens barley read as it is. But those who do don’t always read the whole thing. Most of these magazines have lengthy feature articles which cause those who read it to lose interest half way through. “they have shorter attention spans than any previous generation; they are chronically over-stimulated and easily bored (Scherer, 2002)” When creating a magazine, you have to be straight to the point; no body wants to sit there and read a 2-page article on something they are interested in when you drag it out. In the Vogue magazine it grabs your attention from the start. The front page is Vogue in big white text, they keep it very simple at least enough to keep your attention. In the feature article there’s not much happening they keep it short and sweet making sure they have their audience attention while continuing to educate you on whatever it might be. Although this magazine is mainly directed to those interested in fashion; as the cover is a model. Another magazine that is good with making sure they don’t lose you is, Better Homes and Gardens. This magazine will no doubt catch your attention while your checking out at the grocery store. Grabbing the attention of mainly mothers and retired residents, it is very straight to the content. The cover page always goes along with what the feature article is about. On the cover the colors are bright, they have the text on a black background so everything stands out. They give you hands on activities to try out at home whether it’s baking, crafts, or redecorating. Furthermore, a magazine that would probably not have a huge audience would be Cosmopolitan. This magazine will yes grab your attention however may lose your attention after only the cover page. The cover page of this magazine is very bright, with big white title font however there are little subtitles giving you a glimpse of the feature article. Although that is a great idea for this company it may not be. Cosmopolitan tells you what you should do and those attracted to it may not like that.

After previewing many different types of magazines, I feel like this could be a good fit for my project. It allows you to set outside of the box. Although it teaches you to not get carried away in your words as you can lose your audience’s attention.