Bethany Barrows is deciding on the color scheme for her new R&B magazine. She researched other successful magazines in the genre and notes that black and white with a prominent secondary color like blue or purple is an effective style. Barrows considers purple, blue, and gold as potential main colors. Purple represents royalty and power, which suits up-and-coming music stars. Blue conveys trust and stability. Gold symbolizes wealth and glamour. Barrows analyzes examples of magazines using these colors well for inspiration in developing her own publication.

1. Colour
Ideas
By Bethany Barrows

2. I researched into other R&B magazines to see what colours I thought worked best. All
the successful ones had black and white their main colours, which is really like, and
then another more prominent colour such as blue or purple. I think this works well as
then it gives it a stylish and edgy. I particularly like cover photos that are shot on a black
background, so the model stands out more and it doesn’t look bland, and this is what I
think I am going to do for the majority of my photos. I know that I would like my
magazine to be quite dark and edgy, but I am undecided on the main colour I am going
to use, so hopefully this task will help me decide.

3. Purpl
The colour purple is associated with royalty, mobility, and power, which is a really successful
representation for the up and coming stars in my magazine. I really like this colour choice as it
goes well with black and white, my other colour choices, and is a dark colour to match my
theme. Purple also connotes wealth, wisdom, mystery, and magic, which are all positive things
to associate with my magazine. I like this magazine below, from a fellow students work, that I
find uses the colour purple really well, I like how the cover lines, the makeup, and the
masthead, all link together with the prominent colour scheme.

4. Blue
Blue is a really calm and peaceful colour, as it is associated with the sky and the sea, which
makes my magazine seem stable and enticing. The colour blue is also symbolic of trust, loyalty,
faith and heaven. Trust is a good quality to have with the readers, so they will trust the content,
and want to buy it again, therefore I think the colour blue would be a successful idea.
I really like how the colour blue is used in this ‘billboard’ magazine cover below, as the picture
looks really icy, which fits in well with the colour of the masthead.

5. Gold
Gold is immediately associated with the precious, and valuable metal, which demonstrates
qualities of wealth, prosperity, and glamour. This will make my artists look classy, and elegant.
Furthermore, gold also connotes illumination, courage, compassion, magic, and wisdom, which
are great traits that readers can recognise in their idols, whom they look up to.
I think, with a gold colour scheme, I can make the models makeup look really nice and glowy,
and use a lot of jewellery to show off the colour. I also like how the undertone of the picture
has been changed in the magazine below, to make it fit the colour scheme more.