Editorial Research (Chosen magazine)

Discover Britain Magazine

What is Discover Britain Magazine?
Discover Britain Magazine is a magazine which is all about Britain's heritage, each month a new magazine is released about different areas throughout the whole of great britain. As different areas are spoken about within each monthly magazine it will look beneath the chosen area and talk about the history behind it, some examples of these are;  which sorts of people go there and even famous people that may have lived there. 

The reason I chose this magazine is because I found it very interesting and also like the layout consistency throughout the pages. Another reason being I recently visited Whitsable and Canterbury in Kent and thought this could be a good opportunity to use the pictures I took and use them for a magazine like the one I have chosen. I will have to use the internet to look up some of the towns heritage and background and use this text in the double page spread.

This is a double page spread from the magazine that I have chosen, what I like about this page is how the image is the main feature on the page and how the body copy has been adapted to be visible over the image. Another reason I used this image as a research example is that images I have taken can be used in the same way covering both pages.
Taking text into consideration, the text has to be visible over the image and the placement of this is very important, the designer here chose an area where there was plain colour to give the text maximum readable effect.

This double page spread is very similar to the one above only difference being is that this page has a form of header " A Beautiful Enigma " I think this makes the page look more interesting as it gives an insight as to what the image may be about. Again the placement of text has been taking into consideration both the header and body copy have been placed where there is no images behind so that nothing clashes this is something to consider when im creating my double page spread.

This is a different styled page within the same magazine, this page consists of more images and more text, the image which is on the right is the main feature of the page and gives a clear view of the area. The smaller images on the left side of the page are different parts of the same area and the text which follows these images explains a bit about the history and background of the area. A page with this layout is more information based aposed to the 2 previous double page spreads, this is something I will take into consideration as the layout of the page will effect the information it gives the audience.

Some of Discover Britain's magazine layouts feature a bit of history behind their imagery and sometimes have an additional picture of which the history is about like the page above. What I like about these styled pages within the magazine is how that everything is linked with text and imagery this is a very similar style I am going to do within my design and will also keep the consistency of which this page has design wise.

Normally with magazine layouts everything has to be neat and concise but with this double page spread some of the text and imagery dont align up, this is the style of the magazine and something to consider when im creating my versions of spreads similar to this keeping the magazines consistency is important. I think why the imagery works so well on the page is how bright the images are that they catch your eye when you look at the page and most have headers giving a alight insight as to what the page is about.

The magazine dont always have the text in a separate column, they sometimes have text over the image but take into consideration the placement and the text may sometimes become non readable. In this double page spread the designer has placed the texted over a light blue background which means that text that is black is still highly visible over it, this is something I will keep into consideration when designing my double page spreads.

Another interesting style Discover Britain has is a past and present page, it has a image from a current new modern area of britain and then has a past image of what the area used to look like. The images are followed with information about both areas and the massive changes that have been made over the last 100 years, I think this is a very nice feature to the magazine and is something I will definitely consider doing in my double page spreads.

Evaluation of the magazine

After researching my chosen magazine I have come up with many ideas and inspiration that I can use when creating my double page spreads. As I have to keep the magazines consistency I cant travel to far form the magazines current design but keeping certain parts of it in. The magazine is very heavily image based so many of my pages will have quite large imagery followed by small amounts of text.

The magazines style in consistency always have a British feel to it hence the name of the magazine, this is very important that I keep this feel throughout the pages. I must choose correct text to fit this, types which have serifs would seem most appropriate as many of these typefaces have a British feel to them.

Typefaces

This is the typeface Rockwell, Rockwell is a serif typeface and could possible be used in my double page spread as it has a very british feel.