Evaluation of my newspaper cover

For my newspaper cover I decided to use the newspaper ‘The Daily Telegraph’. This is a daily morning broadsheet paper. It’s a right winged paper which means it is supportive of the conservative party. This paper also costs £1 which suggests that this paper is aimed at a high social class with conservative political views as they can afford a relatively expensive paper. This type of audience will be interested in real, detailed news and the political issues; they’re unlikely to be interested in reading celebrity gossip and other tabloids. The Paper must therefore be professional, formal and informative.

The image used on my front cover is a picture of a burning building set in Croydon. Underneath the picture is a caption to briefly explain what is going on. This huge fire is a dramatic, eye catching image and therefore draws in the reader. An eye catching image on the cover is essential as it encourages the reader to read on and therefore purchase the magazine.

For the main article I used the title ‘London Burns’ in big bold letters. I used the font ‘Times New Roman’ because it is a very formal, professional font. The title relates to the picture of the burning building and also relates to the historic event ‘The Great fire of London’ and marks this as another tragic historic event. The text used in the main article is also ‘Times New Roman’ and it is size 9. It is a small size because the newspaper is aimed at a high social class and also people of a high intellect. The language would be formal and polite. This article also unusually has 3 subtitles which relate to the subject of the riots. This is common for the daily telegraph. The first subheading I used was ‘Police struggle controlling London’s Streets’, This would catch the reader’s attention as a higher social class of people would be very worried about this lack of control as they are very concerned about the economy and know that their tax is what pays these policemen. The second subheading used was ‘Cameron ends holiday early to deal with crisis’, This kind of heading is expected from the daily telegraph because of their strong conservative views, They would be expected to tell the reader what the conservative president was doing to handle the situation. The final subheading relates to the picture saying ‘Hundreds of shops destroyed’.

A second smaller article is placed underneath with the title ‘Bring in the Water Cannons says head of police’ I used this title because It was an important event during the riots and made the crisis a lot more real. The fact that this was an important event would draw in the reader and increase the likeliness of them purchasing this paper.

Underneath the smaller article is a bar code and a brief economy related section with a small graph. This would encourage a higher class of people, who are interested in money, to buy the newspaper and read on about the economy.

In the middle of the main article there is also a political cartoon to create some kind of humour but still an intelligent type of humour with political references and a small preview of the contents to draw the reader in and persuade them to buy the newspaper and read on. To the bottom right hand corner there is an expensive advertisement. This advertisement will bring the paper more money but placing it in the bottom right corner means it will be the last thing the reader sees as they will mainly read left to right and from the top to the bottom.

The fact that my newspaper cover puts across the point that Cameron is ending his holiday early puts the government forward as doing the right thing. The sub article also shows that the police are doing all they can. This therefore places the blame for the riots on the rioters themselves.