Preliminary task: contents codes and conventions

Magazine Contents Pages: Codes and Conventions

The contents of a school magazine should also incorporate various codes and conventions to appeal to the specific target audience.

Firstly, page numbers indicate where you can find each piece of content within the magazine. This eliminates confusion for the reader. The page number is linked to the title of the page which it is associated with, usually by a straight line or a line of dots to allow the reader where they can find each piece of content within the magazine. Along with the title of the contents, I will also include a small description of the page. This feature was included on one of the contents pages which I analysed and it allows the reader to understand what is on each page.

I also identified that they generally contain around 2-3 photographs portraying some of the more intriguing content from within the magazine. This will appeal to the audience and persuade them to continue reading as they have noticed the more important and appealing aspects to entice them. I will include this feature on my contents page. I will also place a caption at the bottom of each photograph to describe what is being shown.

The contents page of the magazine often incorporates the school logo. This acts as a reminder of the general content as the magazine simply surrounds aspects regarding the school.

A contents page can be either image dominated or text dominated. If it is image dominated, it can allow the page to appear more noticeable and creative whereas, if it is text dominated, it can allow the writing to be easier to read and appear more formal. Therefore, as I am creating a school magazine, I believe that a text dominated contents page would be more appropriate. For instance, all of the contents pages which I analysed were text dominated to suit the genre by appearing formal and easy to read and they all appealed to the target audience.

The contents page also generally has a similar colour scheme to the front cover. This allows a continued theme to be presented for the similar reasons of intriguing the reader due to the noticeable colours and allowing the writing to stand out in contrast to the background colour. This makes the writing easier to read and is, therefore, more appealing as it will require less effort to do so. Therefore, on the contents page of my school magazine, I will be likely to incorporate a brighter coloured background with an opposite colour scheme for the writing so that it is easier to read.

On all of the contents pages which I analysed, the font was relatively simplistic. On the contents page of my magazine, I will use a simple sans serif font to allow it to be easier to read. The title is always simply “Contents” and I will include this in a larger, bold font so that it stands out and is more noticeable.