The name of my magazine will be ‘Royalty Rap’. Through using this name it clearly

identifies the genre and through the word ‘royalty’ connotes that my magazine will be

about the good things in the rap industry. My magazine will be about the latest news

with various artists i.e. through the form of the exclusive interviews with artists about

new projects they have coming out. My magazine will also appreciate the history of

the rap industry whereby there will be a legendary section in each section giving

honour and respect to former artists etc. The issue will be the December monthly

release.The issue of Royalty Rap that I will be constructing is a ‘special issue’ as it is

at the end of the year, the magazine will respect artists achievements throughout the

year by having an honours section whereby awards will be delegated to the best Hip

Hop artist, best new comer, best music video etc. The audience will be aware that this

honour section is not a regular feature of the magazine as I will clearly separate it

from the ‘regulars’ in the contents page.

The target audience will have a shared understanding of the Hip Hop genre; they will

have a firm knowledge and understanding of the genre. Due to my target audience

having a shared understanding of the Hip Hop genre some of my cover lines will

attain field specific words that are relevant to the genre, such as ‘Beat-Box’ or jargon

relevant to the genre such as ‘whip’ indicating a car. The target audience will be

between the 18-25 year old brackets, young adults potentially. It will be aimed at the

black ethnicity due to Hip-Hop being a genre cultured by black people, however it

won’t just be subjective to only black people, and it will be accessible to all ethnic

groups as long as they have an interest in the genre. The economic backgrounds of my

target audience will be middle class and working class as they are more likely to be

able to relate to artists who have been through tough circumstances prior to becoming

an artist. My magazine will be sold for £1.99; I have chosen this price so that it is

affordable for my target audience of the working and middle class.

My magazine cover will only use two to three fonts as I don’t want it to appear

confusing. In addition from my research Hip Hop genres tend to only use two to three

fonts, using too many fonts can make the magazine cover less cohesive. The

typography in the masthead will represent the gritty path where the Hip Hop genre

came from. My magazine cover will only use three font colours with white being one

of them, this is to create consistency in my magazine cover. In addition if there was

too many colours the audience won’t focus on things such as the main cover line and

the main image as much, which would make the cover less appealing.

The colour scheme employs a gritty approach.

This is reflective of the roots of the Hip-Hop

genre, as a lot of legendary artists like Biggie

and Tupac Shakur came from ‘gritty’ tough

conditions in the projects. The lifestyle of a lot

of Hip Hop artists was a hard life whereby in

the projects (least valuable areas of the USA),

they we’re exposed to a lot of violent and

illegal activities this is shown in this lyrics

which employ a ‘gritty’ approach.

This masthead has a different title. The

masthead employs a more positive approach to

the Hip Hop genre this is connoted by the use

of warm colours. Warm colours symbolise

good vibrant things this would be reflective of

the positive cover lines and features in my

magazine.

Attached with my masthead I will be using a picture of a microphone

with a firm fist to accentuate the rap industry as rappers hold

microphones at a much tighter grip than other genre artists do such as

singers.

When constructing my masthead I intend on utilising a font that associates with the

conventions of the Hip Hop genre. Above is a prototype of the font that I will use for

my masthead. Hip Hop has connotations of being a gritty genre due to this I want my

mastheads font to have an erosive approach. This font develops a gritty approach and

I may use this font for my masthead, as at the bottom of each letter is an engraved

shape of what looks like towers which can indicate the estates and council houses

where a lot of Hip Hop artists grew up.

This is a rough design of how I want my magazine cover to be

laid out and the features I want to place in it. The main image

will focus on the costume and facial expressions in the mise-en-

scene. Whilst the other image will focus on other elements of

the mise-en-scene as it will focus on other aspects such as

props.

I have adjusted my masthead slightly lower than the top to

allow appropriate room for my strap line and sky line.

I have chosen to keep my cover lines aligned to the left due to it

being conventional of Hip Hop magazines to have cover lines

aligned to one side in a relative small font as this allows the

main cover line to be more dominant in the layout as it isn’t

aligned with the other cover lines and is a much larger font.

This is the type of image that I will use on my front cover. I intend

on my main image to hold conventions of the Hip Hop genre.

Through the miss-en-scene in this image the costume reflects the

Hip Hop genre. New Era baseball caps are conventional to the Hip

Hop genre as a lot of artists wear them. The facial expressions in

this image are almost motionless but through the use of the sunglass

suggest that he is confident and cool. This is how a lot of famous

artists in the Hip Hop genre are perceived i.e. Jay Z. I may not use

this picture for the main image as it could consist of more

conventions of the Hip-Hop genre, possibly through jewellery etc.

My main image costume will be conventional to the hip hop genre

through designer clothing indicating the wealth of Hip Hop artists.

The main image will show a rapper who is confident through his

facial expressions, body language and costume. This is reflective of

the contents of my magazine as it will only be positive articles

about artists doing well.

In the additional image on my magazine cover I will aim to enhance the Hip Hop

genre by focusing on conventional props of the genre. The image above shows the

type of picture it will be. Props such as DJ decks and people rapping into microphones

are conventions of the genre. Through an image of a dj and his deck will represent the

Hip Hop genre as vinyl mixing and deejaying formed from the roots of the genre. The

second image will capture the hip hop genre more than the main image will do

through it having more props whilst still having costume relevant to the Hip Hop

genre. The additional image will have a strong influence on making the genre of the

magazine stand out to the audience from just looking at it at a glance.