Cheyenne's Magazine Textual Analysis

Total film published by Future Publishing is Britain’s second biggest selling film magazine. The magazine was launched in 1997 and is published every four weeks. The film is also licensed to publish local editions of the film in countries such as Turkey, Russia and Serbia.

 The magazine provides a range of features from people who work behind the scenes such as the directors and producers to up-coming actors. The magazine in 2004 also produced a total film survey which gave a list of the greatest British films of all time. The target audience for this magazine is likely to be from aged 15-35. However, the main target group is 16-24 who are of middle class backgrounds and Caucasian.

 The denotation of the magazine cover is a medium long shot of a single image of the character Iron man. His NVC stands very bold with the characters’ hand facing in front with a Bluish light shining off it. Behind the character appears to be a Bluish background likely to be the reflection of the blue light from his body armour. The body armour is made from metal with Red coating. The face of the body armour is gold with a blue light with the characters’ eyes shining Blue light.

 The image of Iron man is very symmetrical connoting the control the image has on the magazine cover with the coverlines on either side. The lighting used in the shot is very low key and becomes much more shadowed at the bottom of the shot. At the top of the shot there is high key lighting likely to be used through editing to have some elements of the film. The lighting enables the characters NVC to come out and helps to show the Blue light that is being reflected throughout. The lighting also connotes the power that Iron man has which is also shown in his NVC. The use of lighting and editing in this shot keeps the character in his elements so to portray what he does in the film. This is common with Total Film magazine covers; they are likely to be edited so it is adjusted for the film purpose. Iron man also has full eye contact with the audience engaging the reader which Total Film try to achieve.

 The costume of the character connotes a masculine build and the colour Red instantly draws the attention of the audience which creates an over powering message for the audience.

 The masthead is a White sans serif font with the ‘Total’ written in Black Sans serif font. The masthead is very bright and fills up the typeface making it recognisable to audiences. The masthead is edited in a different way to the rest of the magazine for this reason. The bold masthead is very eye catching to the audience and connotes a modern feel as most films today are aimed at young people aged 16-24. This age group in particular will be attracted to this magazine. It appears that the text ‘FILM’ is in bold compared to ‘Total’ as that is what the magazine is about and it instantly tells the audience that it is about film. The standard bar code is at the bottom right corner which also has the publishing company of the magazine advertised. It is conventional for most barcodes to be placed in the corner of a magazine or sometimes at the back.

 The coverlines on the cover is carefully placed not to distract the focus of the main image. The coverline placed in the middle is about the character. ‘IRON MAN’ which is in bold serif font tells the audience that it about this image that they are looking and also that the main story will be about the new Iron Man film. The coverlines on either side don’t distract the image which allows the audience to focus on what the magazine is trying to sell them. The coverlines are in Sans serif font which connotes modernity to appeal to young readers. The colour palette used for the coverlines is White and Gold as not to clash with the Red used on the single image. The Gold coverlines help to attract the audiences’ attention of what else is in the magazine as well as the main feature but doesn’t take away the attention of image. The colour palette used in the magazine cover such as Gold is a colour that connotes power and supremacy and everything masculine. This echoes Iron Man’s image. The coverlines are also very minimal so not to make it complicated for the reader and so it doesn’t run over the image too much.

 Above the ‘M’ is the dateline which is May 22^nd along with the issue publication. They have also given another source which is their website so more information can be accessed. This could also be a unique way of Total Film and where they decide to place their dateline. Most datelines are often placed where the price is. However, some magazines tend to change specific parts of the cover as there maybe a new release of a film.