Front Cover Mood

board.
By James Leach.

What Can I Learn From My Mood

board?
From doing a mood board, it allows you to understand what the expectations of the front cover are and
develops your understanding of codes and conventions.
One thing I can understand about music magazines in the rock and heavy metal genre, is that the
central image is always focused on a specific band or artist. It is commonly either one member, who
would be the most well known, or someone considered the most important member, such as the lead
singer or lead guitarist. Or, the central image contains the whole band.
Typically, the central image is a mid-shot. This seems like an effective angle to use because it gives
enough space for coverlines. Where as if you use a close up, this will most likely take up a lot of the front
cover, therefore putting coverlines over the top of the image would obscure it. However, a longshot may
mean that the image is not clear enough. From my mood board, it is clear that a convention of music
magazines is to have the central image as a mid shot, a mid close-up or mid long-shot.
Furthermore, another thing, that I will try to include in my magazine, that is shown in the mood board, is
the heavy use of the colour red across the magazines. This may be because the colour red connotes
danger; which also a theme with the rock and metal genre.
Also, especially with the more metal magazines, such as Kerrang and Metal Hammer, the logos are
often distorted in some way. It is shown for Kerrang as the masthead has a cracked glass effect,
however for Metal Hammer, there appears to be dirt creeping in on the sides of the masthead. This
reflects the distortion of the music in the genre, therefore conforming with the codes and conventions of
the genre.