Final Cover

I chose this layout because it gets to the point and is clear it is a magazine cover as it has a typical magazine design. I like the composition of the images and text put together. I only added one caption because it has quite a busy composition and so I didn't want text to over-do it. I think the one caption sums up the content of this issue of the magazine anyway. 'How we Celebrated Christmas this year' suggests that the magazine will consist of information and images of the activities that the students took part in, in connection with Christmas.
The main image is of a textiles student working (you can see he is doing practical work rather than written, which makes it unique because most school magazines just have a student doing written work). In terms of costume, the student is wearing uniform with an amusing Christmas hat on to symbolise the date of this issue. I also like how the word 'Christmas' is visible on the hat, emphasising the Christmas factor more. The three small images at the bottom have a faded border on a scale of 63%. The images are all of different subjects too - art, resistant materials and textiles. The fading of the images symbolise that all of the images belong together at school, including the main image. The textiles image is of a sixth form student working on her dress that she has made. The position and composition of this small image shows good, A* work. It also adds my own personal touch to the cover because I like fashion. The art image is of three year eight students, smiling and showing off their work against another bright piece of work. The image is colourful and brings in more red (which links with the text colour and the christmas hat). The smiles add happiness which is different to the other images because they all show students seriously working whereas this one is students showing off the work that they are proud of. Linking the image to famous magazine covers, it would be refered as 'super-smilers'. All of the other image don't fit in with any of the other categories; 'romantic', 'invitational' or 'chocolate box' so I decided to make up my own name to suit models who aren't looking at the camera - 'individualists'. This is a suitable category name as it suggests students they are on their own, doing their own thing. The resistant materials image show the students looking up at the teacher, as if he is their idol.
The colour scheme is mainly red which is a bold colour and stands out. Green is also a common colour on the cover, which links with the colour of the uniform. Coincedentially, red and green are christmas colours, which, again, links to the theme of the issue. The lighting is all natural/available light which is realistic. Studio lighting has connotations of being setup, planned and false.
The audience of the magazine are teachers, students and parents. The synthetic personalisation talks to the audience to attract them. The audience would be classes E-C1 families. Anyone in the higher classes are more likely to attend private schools whereas my magazine cover focuses as a secondary school.