Feature Articles

Aim: to explore the methods magazines use in feature articles to entertain/inform audiences.

The Magazine Form.• Recap: What does form mean in relation to

magazines?

• Starter Task: Using your magazine investigate the following about the magazine form:

• How many pages does it have?• How many of these pages are adverts?• How many articles are there?• What are the dimensions of the magazine?• Does it have a gloss or matt finish?• Does it have a contents page and editors letter/page?• Are there any competitions?• Are there consumer product spreads?• Does the magazine feature reviews of any sort?

Feature Articles

• Feature articles are the selling point of the magazine. Think of the front cover as the ‘trailer’ for what’s in the actual magazine.

• Most articles are written to entertain and inform. Although in some mags articles are written purely to entertain.

• In the most populist magazines the entertainment comes from the presentation of the information – the image, the heading, the layout etc - rather than the actual quality of the writing.

• Most magazine articles will be vaguely topical but not current news as most magazines are periodical (weekly/monthly).

• Obviously the type of article featured in the magazine has to reflect the overall ‘house style’ of the magazine and be aware of its target audience.

Types of article in Music Mags• Artist features: Profiling an artist who reflects the readership. Often

interview based and often to tie in with the artists new single, album or tour etc.

• Interviews: Other sub featured artists.

• News: tells readers how the latest music news.

• Best of lists: round ups of the best of the year or decade or ever!

• Spreads: gadget or fashion spreads, again to tie in with target genre and audience.

Task: can you find examples of any of these in your magazine? Make notes on post its.

How to write an article in a few easy steps…..

• Step 1 - A high impact intro.

• Remember magazine articles are not like current news stories. They must engage the reader and there’s a number of ways to do this:

• The question intro – pose a question.• The anecdote intro- tell an interesting short tale.• The quote intro - from the subject.• The description intro – describe the scene of the interview or the

subject.• The shock intro- use sensational information.

…continued.

• Step 2 – the main body

• The main body will ask the writer to use a variety of methods to retain the initial attention of the reader.

• First person- the journalist writes in first person throughout- gains greater empathy from reader.

• Constant quotes – letting the interviewee speak as much as possible.

• Pace- The article need to be edited and paced correctly to hold the readers attention.

• Flowing prose: writers should be able to use a variety of sentence lengths, connectives and paragraphs properly!

• Length: there is no standard and it depends on the magazine. A proper double page feature should start at a 1000 words.

…and lastly

• Step 3- your style.

• The style and tone of writing is based on:

• The magazine's house style- layout, language style etc• The target audience of the magazine- demographic (age, gender,

ethnicity).

• In that order! The magazine’s audience rule.

• Styles can be:

• Formal and serious in tone.• Informal and colloquial.

Feature article layout

Headline- a quote

Main image- 50 % of copy?

synopsisText in columns

by-line

Page number and

logoName of artist in another colour

The copy• In journalism ‘the copy’ is the page and what goes on it.

One of the first rules of journalism is that you must never leave blank spaces.

• When discussing the copy you can discuss it in approximate percentages. For example 25% of the copy is image/photo, whilst 50% is editorial (text).

• Many feature articles, particularly ones centred on celebrity tend to be quite ‘image heavy’ with one or even two pages sometimes being entirely devoted to an image.

• This often means that feature articles can be 6,7 or more pages in length. You have two pages!

Task: make notes on the student examples:

What makes this an effective double page spread?

What conventions of layout design can you identify?

Analysis of Article• Paired Task: Look at an article and make

notes on:

• Introduction• The main body• The copy and the layout• The writing style

• Main Task: Write two paragraphs about the article.

Planning your story

• Firstly brainstorm some ideas

• Refine your idea into a step by step story outline.

• Write two versions of your intro.

• Make notes for your main body, including quotes.

Feature analysis task

• Upload to wiki: Take one feature article from your music magazine to analyse, read it carefully and answer the following:

• What type of article is it?• What is the headline- does it use any language techniques( pun,

rhyme)?• How many pages does the article cover and what is the word count

(approx)?• How much of the ‘ copy’ is image and what can you say about the

image?• How does the article start – consider the types of intro.• What can you say about the writer's style and methods. How does it

communicate with its reader?• What assumptions do they make about the reader? Does it represent

their reality?

• By next week!