Masthead Experiments

First of all, I was unsure of a name for my magazine so began by experimenting in Photoshop.

After being inspired by a Photoshop tutorial, I experimented with lettering. I began by using a close up image of denim as my background.

Next, I added a white rectangle using the Rectangle Tool covering the denim background. I then turned the opacity of this layer down to 31% and, using the Eraser Tool with a low opacity and flow, I removed the edges of the rectangle creating a 'glow' effect in the centre of the denim.

I then added swirl patterns coming from the middle out to the left of the image.

Next, I chose the letter R to go in the centre of my image as this is one of the main letters in my genre title: R&B. I used a simple and bold font for this as I wanted it to stand out. I added a gradient overlay and a drop shadow to the layer so it looked more effective.

Lastly, I added a list of words beginning with R to the right of the R. I used words that had connections with music and highlighted the word 'Rhythm' in blue as that is the word that R stands for in R&B. I added a black stroke, outer glow and drop shadow to this layer to make the words stand out more.

I then came up with a name for my magazine: Replay. I considered a few others, such as Pulse and Verve but I felt that Replay represented my target audience best. 

EXPERIMENTS

FINAL

To make the masthead for my magazine, I firstly started with a black box using the Rectangle Tool. 

I then created a grey rectangle in the the same way which was slightly smaller than the black one.

Using the font Orator Std, I wrote Replay but left the A out. I added an outer glow on this layer to help the letters stand out more.

Next, I added two more rectangle shapes: one going along the top from the top of the R to the right corner, and another joining the right side of the Y to the other rectangle. This made the word look more interesting.

Lastly, I added a triangle in a red colour in the space of the A using the Rectangle Tool and the Polygonal Lasso Tool to cut off two of the corners making a triangle shape. I added an outer glow to the layer, like the text layer so it matched the text. I then duplicated this layer and added a black colour overlay, then using the Polygonal Lasso Tool again, I cut out a triangle shape in the middle of the black layer revealing the red triangle behind. I also added a Bevel & Emboss effect to this layer.

After asking my target audience for feedback on my masthead designs, I decided I need to make a design better suited to my genre of music magazine. I looked at designs from other hip-hop and R&B magazines again, before coming up with my new design below. I think this masthead represents my target audience and music genre better than my last designs.