Genre Research

Genre:

• Cooking Magazine

Genre Conventions – Content

• Includes Steps on how to cook one or multiple dishes, the proportions needed for the ingredients, and tips on how to be more efficient when handling the ingredients.
• Interviews focus on sharing information about the person’s cooking style, inspirations, and career standing/career goals.
• Magazines in this genre vary in terms of the type of information they provide. Some focus on the cost of the food while others focus on the season the food is popular in.
• The pictures are varied sizes, four small images would be on one page while one large image would be on the second.
• Both individual photos and collages are used. When displaying ingredients, collages are used. When presenting the final dish an individual picture is used.
• Appealing descriptive words are commonly used such as crispy and tender. These words are used to make the dish sound appealing, so the reader is more likely to try them.
• Seasons, holidays, and trends impact the content. At different points in time certain ingredients become more accessible meaning more people will have them so magazines would want to prioritize them more to catch a wider audience. Some foods are only in season once, like pumpkins so recipes would focus on more pumpkin heavy dishes during the fall.
• Puns and alliteration are commonly used to catch the reader's attention.
• Food brands and kitchen appliance brands are usually advertised.  

Features the ingredient portions and step-by-step guides on how to create the dishes.

from:

Delish Quarterly

Holiday Treats

Genre Conventions – Production Techniques

• On the cover the images were shot with a shallow depth of field and a low f-stop. It keeps the food sharply in focus while the background is blurred out. 
• It would have a fast shutter speed allowing photos to be taken mid action such as drizzling sauce or sprinkling herbs. 
• The ISO would be low to keep the image clean by avoiding the formation of noise. The image would be closely cropped leaving only the food visible since that is the focal point. 
• For lighting soft, diffused lighting is used to prevent harsh, unappealing shadows from forming. Natural light is best recommended.
• The mastheads have a different font, size, and sometimes color from the rest of the text. It is done to draw the reader's attention to the company the magazine is published under.
• The main cover line is used to draw the reader's attention to the magazine.
• The cover also includes other information like barcodes/website information, special feature callouts, issue date, and price.
•   Slogans are used to create brand recognition because a catchy slogan is memorable which makes brands stand out among their competitors.
• Texts stay relatively consistent in terms of font and color, but size can vary if there are headings and subheadings in the articles.
• Capital letters/phrases, symbols, and punctuation are used to grab the reader’s attention. All three of these are usually found on the cover page of the magazine.
•   Bylines are included in the articles.
• Color is influenced by holidays and seasons. Magazines that market themselves based on seasonal or holiday foods use colors strongly associated with the time like fall and orange or Christmas and red/green.

Uses natural lighting & Shallow depth of field

4.     Institutional Conventions – How the Genre is Marketed 

• The primary audience are people interested in cooking and meal planning. Overall, the age range is 25-65 because those are the people interested in learning to cook and plan meals for themselves.
•  Different types of customers are targeted; it depends on what is being presented. Gourmet dishes are usually targeted towards wealthier and more affluent consumers while family friendly meals are targeted towards consumers who are parents or in a similar caregiving role.
• They have used online resources to market themselves such as social media, websites, emails, and blogs. 

Magazine Sample Analysis

Bon Appetit 

    On the cover the typography of the magazine’s masthead is in a large, pink front. This was done to grab the reader's attention. To the side of the main image the cover lines give the reader a preview of what recipes are featured. The main cover image is taken in high key lighting, indicated by the complete lack of shadows. This makes the food more attractive to the reader, thus making them more likely to continue reading. The spreads feature a variety of images with varied sizes, some are individual while others are in collages. The food images that have a busy background are taken with shallow depth of field to put the focus on the food. Most of the photos are taken from a bird's eye view so the audience can get a good look at the food. It would make the audience more likely to try and prepare the meal since they know what it is supposed to look like. The pictures are closely cropped to only show the focal points of the image. Page five features a step-by-step guide on ranch sheet pan chicken. It adds utility and functionality to the magazine by allowing readers to recreate the recipe. Page six feature advertisements for kitchen appliances, this was done to inform the reader on what was used to prepare the dishes and where to get them. All these characteristics are used to emphasize the food featured or give instruction/ insight to how it was prepared which is vital in creating magazines in the cooking genre.

Forks over Knives

    On the cover page the typography for the masthead is in all caps. The headline has the largest font in bright pink written in all caps. This was done to draw the reader attention to the cover. The cover lines tell the number of recipes featured. It also features two buzz phrases below. This was done to entice readers to continue through the magazine. Page seven has a step-by-step guide on how to prepare collard greens. This gives the magazine functionality by providing a guide to how to cook something. Page four contains the byline, showing all the people who contributed to the magazine's creation. This shows the people who contributed had sufficient credibility due to their background as chefs. All their food centric photos are taken from bird's eye view. All the images are also individual and closely cropped. This provides a clear visual of the final product along with keeping the focus on the food featured. The lighting is intense and most likely artificial, indicated by the extreme shadows and highlights on the food. This is done to give visual interest by providing heavy contrast which makes the colors of the fruits and vegetables pop. All these factors combined to create appealing images which are necessary to create a good cooking magazine.