Contents Research

Right..on to magazine contents pages. Although less important in my eyes than the front page it still needs some sort of correspondence or unified house style. I can see that magazines that are weekly have generally only one page. My magazine too is weekly so will be one page. The banner across the top has the masthead in..the 'contents' is in the same font but a different colour which highlights what the page is actually about. This 'Kerrang' contents page is dominated by one main image with 3 smaller images overlapping it taking up two columns. The information on the right hand side is kept into one neat column which the banner overlaps across the top. The whole page sort of evolves from the main image of the girl. The numbering is in different colour to the text and the numbering on the images is easily identifiable. The categories are highlighted in black and yellow in a structured manner. There is a subscription promotion on the right at the bottom. In terms of colour schemes there is not a lot of continuity but the font is not as varied so you can see the continuity here.

This page is from my personally favourite mag - 'NME'. I think this a lot more aesthetically pleasing. The font initially of 'Inside This Week' hits you and then you are drawn to the Kings of Leon image. The feature is actually a controversial and potentially offensive subject which actually interests people - offence sells! (I can actually empathize with the strapline unfortunately). I really like the numbers in the bottom right of the images and a brief description underneath. It looks very presentable and clean cut. The whole page is very 'boxy' to put it casually. The column rule is kept to so everything is in place and it all fits. The same sizing of images left to right is roughly the same. It on the whole is a simplistic and spacious design which I prefer as opposed to the 'Kerrang' one.
I am leaning towards well structured contents page with listing as well as this box technique as above so I can combine both styles. Listing has the advantage of making the page look more crammed and uses up more space whereas in the boxing everything is easier to take in once at a time.