Magazine Textual Analysis 3 (Cover)

This is a magazine cover published by magazine company GQ. The cover follows the rule of thirds as the mast head and most of the feature articles are on the left hand side of the page. Bright colours fill the majority of the page. The main attraction of the page is the picture of Kanye West who fills the centre of the page. Kanye is dressed in a smart tuxedo and the cover as a whole seems very basic. The magazine appears to be written about Celeb Gossip.

The lighting and the colours on this cover are all very bright. Both the background and the majority of the writing are in bright colour. The only things that are of a darker shade on this cover photo are some of the feature articles and Kanye's blazer. I think that this magazine would be aimed at males, but more specifically 'gentleman', men who are a bit more wealthy that middle class men. Kanye's eye gaze is as he is staring directly at the reader in order to make them feel more engaged with the mag and the celebrity. Kanye also seems to be smiling at the readers, possibly to give across that this is a friendly magazine. It does not appear that Kanye is wearing make up, but he is wearing a flashy tux to further show that this is aimed at more of a classy audience. There are no props and the background is a plain shade of blue which makes it impossible to tell where this image was taken. 

The shot distance on this cover is a Close Up (CU) as Kanye's head and shoulders are the only thing visible in the image. The camera angle is just a regular eye level shot as Kanye's eyes are what is in the centre of the page. The image of Kanye almost appears to be in two parts. His head is in perfectly clear focus yet his shoulders have been slightly blurred out of the page. The film stock on this cover is rather smooth and everything is in colour. The brightness of the page indicates that the lighting is staged and not natural and is expressive of the somewhat friendly mood of the mag. The overall image is of a soft focus as i have already mentioned, part of the image is blurred out. The headline talking about Kanye is in bright bold writing and is the biggest piece of text on the page. The other pieces of text are of the same font, but are much smaller and only take up a fraction of the page. 

The preferred reading of this cover is to learn about the more classy celebrities and hear some of their personal stories. Also it can be seen as an advice magazine as well relying on the headline 'Our annual guide to the best stuff of the year.' The target audience for this magazine would most certainly be for just men, probably aged between 25-40 years old. GQ is known to be a very mature, formal magazine which talks about celebrities from mostly the older generation. Also, the fact that the main headline on this page is 'Kanye West rocks our Men of the Year issue' further shows the fact that this magazine is mainly aimed for the male audience.