The document describes the techniques used in the front cover, contents page, and double page spread (DPS) of a magazine to target a hip hop audience. For the front cover, techniques included using colors and styles common in hip hop magazines, adding the artist's name, and including pop culture images. The contents page used a gray background, creative heading, and pull quotes. The DPS sorted pages by image and article, used red to draw attention, included a provocative medium shot, and formatted the article in columns. The goal was to attract and engage the young, hip hop-interested target audience.

1. FRONT COVERIn all of the pages of UrbanFlow I have
implemented many techniques which helped
me address my magazine at my chosen target
audience. In this annotation I will
specify the used techniques.
From my research I have found out that the
typical costume for this hip hop genre and
for a white artist is a beanie hat. I have
used this code and convention as by this
it attracts the typical audience of Hip
Hop music as this is what matches their
Hip Hop influenced interests.
I have used a simple white/grey/black
colours scheme with red accents in my
magazine. This is a very trending colour
scheme as I have seen it being used in
successful Hip Hop music magazines such as
XXL. The white/grey/black composition is
very harmonizing and simple, however the
red text stands out which in fact grabs
the readers attention to the magazine.
At first I have decided to make my image
black & white however through my research
I have found that the Hip Hop magazines
have mainly used coloured images. I have
implemented this into the design as by the
image being in colour it creates a very
colourful composition. By my audience
being considerably young, they will be
attracted to colours rather than the
content meaning that this will attract
them to the magazine.
In the first draft of my magazine front
cover I have only implemented the main
cover line across the width of the whole
page. Later in my research I have found
that I this feature does not follow the
codes and conventions of a Hip Hop music
magazine as I do not state the artists
name on the front cover. I then have
decided to amend this feature and place
the artists name on the front cover. By
this the people who know who Miss M is
would recognize the name and would like
to read about her, or the audience who
never heard of her would like to pick up
the magazine in order to gain
information about her. This is a really
useful code and convention as by this
the audience is directly attracted by
the artist which is mentioned in my
magazine.
Last of all, I have implemented two
picture boosts which in fact challenge
the codes and conventions of Hip Hop
music magazines. I have implemented them
in order to attract and address my
audience. By having such picture boosts
I have emphasised on the musical content
the magazine consists of, showing the
Pop music genre. By this the audience
would be either attracted to the Hip Hop
or Pop culture as by the picture boosts
they would like to know what story or
information stands behind the image, and
as the images represent two cultures.

2. CONTENTS PAGE
The first code and convention which I
have used to attract the Hip Hop music
genre audience was to use a simple, grey
background. In my research I have found
that this is a code & convention the
magazines have used therefore I have
chosen to implement this into my design.
On the other hand I found having a
simple grey background not match my
design therefore I have implemented a
slight gradient to it ( lighter at the
top, darker at the bottom ). By having
such background to the page, I have
emphasised the content and images as
they are easily seen against it,
automatically drawing the audiences
attention.
Next of all, as an inspiration from the
XXL magazine I have chosen to implement
a creative heading design. By this I
have made the heading more attractive as
it is not simple, which makes it stand
out against other text and images on the
page. This creative heading design draws
the audiences attention as it bulkier
than the simple, one lined heading
causing the audience to pay attention to
it, and acknowledge what it states.
Another code and convention which I have
found largely used throughout Hip Hop
magazines is a specific typography
composition. This typography composition
mainly relates to the “FEATURES” list.
It consists of a bolder, sharper font
being used for the feature title and a
softer, and thinner font used for the
features description. I have implemented
this into my design for the “FEATURES”
list as we can see on the image. This
attracts the audiences attention to the
page as their attention is firstly
caught with the bold text and leading
them onto the thinner explanation text.
The last technique which I have used to
attract my audience to the magazine was
to implement pull quotes. The idea of
having pull quotes on this page was to
emphasise the articles the magazine
contains, as the quotes have been
retrieved from the various articles.
Pull quotes are a useful technique to
use as by this the audience is only
provided with a small amount of
information, not giving away the plot.
By this the audience then wants to
acknowledge what the rest of the article
states, therefore attracting them to the
magazine.

3. DPS
The main code and
convention which I have
followed for the DPS is
the sorting of the facing
pages. I have sorted the
DPS into having one page
dedicated to the image,
and the other to the
article. This attracts
the audience to the
magazine as the large
image draws their
attention to the page,
making them interested
what it represents. This
then leads them onto the
article on the opposite
side. The audience is
mainly attracted to the
image as of their young
age.
Secondly, in my DPS I have used the technique of using red
as a attention grabber. As we can see in the DPS above I
have used the colour red to emphasise the pull quote as
well as the quotes in the article. By this I have shown
the areas the audience has to focus on in on the DPS. As a
result of this, red really stands out against the darker
background and the white text which attracts the audiences
attention, playing the role of the attention grabber. I
have mainly done this in order to make sure the audience
focuses on the vital areas of the article, gaining the
best information out of the text.
Furthermore, in my DPS I have included a medium shot of
the model which follows the codes and conventions. I have
attracted the audience by this shot as by it being a
medium shot, it has portrayed a relatively large amount of
the models silhouette. The image additionally shows the
model in a very questionable body positioning which
follows the Hip Hop style. By this the audience is
questioning themselves what it does mean and would like to
know more which would lead them to reading the article. I
believe that this is a very useful technique to attract
the audience.
The last code and
convention which I have
used in my DPS is the
sorting of the article
into columns. By this the
text looks less text-
heavy, persuading the
audience to read it as
they see it as less
tiring. This addresses
the magazine at the
audience as by the
columns, the text is
aesthetically pleasing
for the audiences eye.
This is a very useful
technique, as by this the
probability of the
audience reading my
magazine is higher than
if the text was placed in
just a block of writing.