Research and Design Idea Mood Boards

Research and Design Idea Mood Boards

I have created these mood boards to help me formulate multiple ideas for the colour scheme, layout, style and overall look of the magazine as well as the content that it will include. 

Front Page Mood Board:

Most of the front covers that I have chosen use a dark colour scheme with bright colours to cut through the black background, this helps them stand out and attract attention, I might use this technique in my music magazine front cover for the same effect, to try and attract attention. However the effect is minimalized when all the magazines try and use it, such as on my mood board.

Most of the magazines have directly contrasting mastheads, this really makes them stand out among the background and makes the names easier to read and remember. I will also use this effect as I want my magazine to be memorable, I will help do this by making the logo or header unique and specialized.

The masthead is always at the top of the page and there is often no strapline, this helps to amplify the masthead, however I think that I will still use a strapline to help show off reasons for why an onlooker would want to read the magazine, such as interviews or new releases.

Some magazines use colourful and bright colours that mix well together but still pull in any viewers to look closer, an example of this is The Devil’s Music magazine that uses mixes similar shades of red, black, blue and white.

The majority of the fonts on the front covers use a sans serif font that seems modern and stylish, they really fit in with the modern style of either electro house or rock music that the magazines focus on. This tells me that the font that I use should be modern and easy to use. 

Contents Page Mood Boards:

 All the contents pages try to show the information written very clearly and make it as easy as possible to navigate and find a page that you might want to read. The text fonts are not particularly stylized but easy to read and clear allowing the reader to have no trouble reading. The colour of the text is in contrast to the background also to have the same effect and make the information easier to read.

The pages try and separate some perhaps popular pages that the reader might find more interesting than others from the rest of the contents list. This means that the reader can quickly identify them over having to process all the information written in the contents list. This technique is often used to point the reader to the page that focuses on the main topic on the front page, for example if the front page focuses of an interview with a certain artist then the contents page will separate the page with the interview from the rest of the pages to promote it more and try to get you to enjoy the magazine more.

Most of the contents pages I have shown display a very clean and simple colour scheme usually consisting of no more than 3 colours. This helps the reader identify and understand what is happening on the page more easily. The list of pages is usually on the left or right and snapped to the side meaning the reader can simply cancel out the rest of the page and locate a page they might want to read.

Double Page Spread Mood Board:

The colour of the texts on all of the double page spreads contrast the background colour, eg if the background is white the text would be a darker colour. This makes it easier to read but also fills the page and makes it look like it has more content on. I will definitely use this on my double page spread.

Most of the double page spreads show off a good looking model or famous celebrity; this makes the reader believe that the magazine is worth reading or that if such an important celebrity is involved then it must be interesting. The magazines tend to idealise the celeb making the topic seem more interesting.

The text warps around the pictures; this creates a better look for the page and makes the design flow. It also helps to shift the reader’s attention from the picture to the text making the topic easier to read and ultimately more enjoyable.

The celeb models are all wearing stereotypical clothes that conform with the viewers expectations of what a music producer would wear. This means that the reader can instantly identify them as music producers and get a feel for what the page will be talking about in a split second. The titles on most of the double page spreads either try to lead onto the text by using ellipses eg “the story behind her…” or try to emphasise the topic shouting the music artists name eg “ROXY”

Influential Mood Board: