Sugar magazine cover analysis (february 2008 even though i bought it in december, it said february)
Form and function--> teenage magazine cover, to stand out and attract customers, conclude the magazine for the customer in order for them to buy it
M-->
Colour scheme- red white yellow black
font -bold modern(NOT in sans serif)
masthead--red bold not behind emma rigby so doesnt expect customers to know the magazine even though they used to do that before.
Puff-the no1 teen mag
Pug-yellow bold attract audience"2 mags 4 1"
Main image- Emma rigby well known teenage actress of hollyoaks, a soap watched by teens(fits with audience range) has acted in serious roles and can be seen as a role model for young teenagers
Biggest strapline-"Fashion miracles"
Background-silver/glitz and glam --connote party/fun
Costume-Emma wearing a party top, linking to the background
I -->Hachette Filipacchi (UK) Limited-->ELLE, ELLE Decoration, Red, Sugar, Psychologies,Real Homes, Inside Soap and All About Soap.
G -->teenage magazine(females)gossip, fashion, real life stories,advice (hybrid genre)
R -->males as a desire for girls and every girl must do what it takes to get a boyfriend.appearance is everything.fashion is a must to follow.life is all about beauty and boys.
A -->12-19 female teenage young girls ranging through all socio economic groups
I -->??????????????????
N -->no narrative
key concept flow paragraphs
image-->Emma rigby well known teenage actress of hollyoaks, a soap watched by teens(fits with audience range) has acted in serious roles and can be seen as a role model for young teenagers genre-->sugar:(females)gossip,fashion,real life stories,advice,love (hybrid genre) hollyoaks:love, teenage girls audience-->12-19 female teenage young girls ranging through all socio economic groups
Colour-->bright bold red black white and yellow Representation-->fun bright bold, giving a fresh look, representing the audience as fun attractive people,also represents the magazine as something fun bright and bold.audience-->represent audience as fun party people,12-19 female teenage young girls ranging through all socio economic groups.
Masthead-->not behind emma therefore doesn't believe it is well known enough for the target audience, this is possibly because of new competitors that weren't there a few years back.Genre-->as the genre of sugar is shared by many other teenage magazines this can have an affect of how the layout of the magazine is set out Institution-->Hachette Filipacchi (UK) Limited, their other magazines such as red and elle can also appeal to the same target audience
THE ESSAY
The text analysed is a Sugar magazine cover (february 2008) , the function of this text is to be able to stand out and attract customers, conclude the magazine for the customer in order for them to buy it. This is in order to appeal and attract the right target demographic.
The main and only image on the cover is of well known teenage actress Emma rigby. She is well known becuase of the shocking yet realistic role she has adopted in hollyoaks, a programme watched by a numerous amount of teenagers across U.K. She can be seen as a role model for young teenage girls which makes it easier for the audience to relate to the character. her role during her anorexia period, allowed many serious issues to surface within the programme and related to many girls who crash diet in order to become skinny. Emma was able to show that crashdieting is not the answer. In this picture she has gone back to her figure and seems healthy.The target audience for both hollyoaks and Sugar fit in well, therefore this may have been the reason to feature Emma on the cover. The niche audience of 13-19 young females fits into hollyoaks much larger audience ranging from 12-30+ males and females, becuase their stories relate to all kinds of people. If the focus stands on Emma's story within hollyoaks, then it is clear to see that the genre between sugar and Emma's story is very similar.Emma's life is surrounded by boys looks, apperance, fashion, gossip and health problems. Sugar covers all of these within its magazine therefore making the audience for Emma very similar to Sugar's audience.This is why Emma would have been an obvious cover image for Sugar.
The colour scheme on the cover is bright and bold which makes it stand out.the 4 main colours are black, white, red, and yellow. These colours against each other make each one stand out. The colours individually connote many different things, love , friendship, death etc. but this can also convey life and the different paths individuals folklow and feel, love, friendship, death etc. All together these colours on the cover convey fun and happiness.they also link in with the party theme with Emma's photo shoot. This also represents the magazine as a fun happy loving enjoyable magazine, but not only that this appeals to the audience because they themselves are being represnted with the use of these colours. the 13-19 female teenagers are fun loving partying people, especially with the season to party (with christmas and new years) it gives a sense of a fun exciting audience.
The masthead is stated in red, part of the colour scheme which is used, however it is the biggest copy on the cover. It is not hidden behind Emma's head which shows Sugar doesn't believe they are popular or well known enough to be covered yet still recognised, however previosuly , in other previous magazine covers a few years back, sugar was able to allow the masthead to be behind the image, which shows their ratings and revenue may have decreased of some sort. This could also mean that many other competitors have risen in the last few years and sugar feels they need to re-introduce their magazine. the hybrid/sub genre that sugar is so well known for has been taken over slowly by rivals such as cosmo girl bliss mizz and so many others. these new magazines may have taken many of sugars loyal customers therefore in order to get them back, sugars cover layout may have changed because of this reason. Sugar is published by Hachette Filipacchi (UK) Limited which has also published other magazines such as Red, All about Soap, ELLE etc. overall their target demographic is extrememly wide, they cater to many age ranges genders etc.
The straplines focus around fashion, real life, and love. the straplines communicate to the audience through words such as 'your'. these directly talk in "2nd person" allowing the consumer feel like they are being talked to on a one to one level.
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