Front pages of tabloid newspapers and magazines

After looking at the front pages of tabloid newspapers I have found that many are similar to magazine front pages.

Tabloid newspapers:

Magazine covers:

They are both made up of mostly pictures with a big headline and main story. The mastheads on some are also quite similar, for example The Sun, The Mirror and OK! Magazine. Most also include a sneak peak of exclusive stories that can be found inside the newspaper or magazine.

As I want my newspaper to be aimed at a young audience, I want it to have a magazine type feel to it to attract this market. So I aim to take elements from both tabloid newspapers and gossip magazines when creating my newspaper.

Layout ideas including my chosen masthead

This is my chosen headline on a selection of layout ideas that I have created on Adobe Indesign.

Mastheads

I have looked at the mastheads of various national newspapers:

Most of these national newspaper mastheads arei n red, white and black.

I have also looked at the mastheads of local newspapers:

These local newspaper mastheads are more colourful, including blues and yellow. As my newspaper is a local paper I will incorpate colour in my masthead. These mastheads also allow me to see where the date, and in some cases price and website are situated.


Using Photoshop I have experimented with text to create a masthead for my newspaper.

When creating newspaper layouts on Adobe Indesign I first used a dark purple colour for my masthead. However I feel a light blue is more appropriate for the seaside town of Southend.




I have used the typeface Constantia and increased the vertical scale of it.



On this one I have warped the text 'Southned Local'

On this one I have added a thick blue stroke around the warped text.

On this one I have added a drop shadow to the text. I like this effect as I think it makes it stand out more.

On this one I have kept the shadow around the text and added a gradient overlay to the background rectange.






I have added an outer glow to the text on this one and reversed the gradient of the background rectangle. I like this one the most as I think it looks effective they way the background fades out where the underline of the waped text is. I have therefore chosen this as my masthead.



This is how my chosen masthead will look on one of the newspaper layouts that I have made:

Master Pages

Whilst producing my layout on Indesign I have created Master pages so that certain parts of the layout are repeated on every page.



I set up master pages A, B and C.

A is for the front page as this is a one off page that does not need to be repeated. B and C are for the double spread pages, B is for all the even number pages and C is for all the odd numbers. So whatever is put on these master pages would then be repeated on all the even or all the odd numbered pages throughout the newspaper.

Target Audience & Layouts

Target Audience
As my target audience is 18-30 year olds, I asked a 10 people in this age range what would attract them and make them interested in reading a new local newspaper.
5 people said there should be more mention of local events that are going on that will appeal to their generation. Therefore I will aim to include news on local events such as music gigs, sporting events and different events that are happening at local nightclubs.
6 people said more colour and photographs would attract them into reading it. Therefore I will aim to make my newspaper look more magazine like to appeal to this market.
4 people said offers, vouchers and discounts for local places - I could have a token in each issue that people need to save up to get money off something or a special offer, this would encourage people to buy the newspaper.



Experimenting with ideas for layout
I have created these using Adobe Indesign and then transfered them onto Photoshop to make them smaller images.


The masthead typeface is Constantia


I have added the date on the right hand corner of the masthead and the price and newspaper website centered underneath it. I have also put an exculsive that is inside the paper in a box to grab the readers attention and make them want to buy the newspaper.

I have changed the typeface of the headline from Segoe UI to Trebuchet MS to experiment and see which looked best.