Spine

The spine of the album should always be noticeable so that when on sale in a shop it is distinguishable to a buying audience. My own spine design is shown below:
The spine has been designed in a basic way intentionally so as to remove any source of distraction to the audience. The name of the album is "Amber Rhythm". This is a traditional theme in that the debut album is named after the artist or band as they want to make their imprint on the music industry and therefore make their name memorable. Instead of using a font, I kept the image of the bands logo to reinforce their name and image to the audience. The same background is used to allow for the continuity and flow of the digipak itself. I also kept the same background of purple cloth so as to again allow continuity but also so that the background does not distract the buyer from the name and logo of the band.

Back Cover

When designing the back cover of my digipak, I had to consider all the information and features that are included in traditional digipak designs. I researched Artic Monkey's Favourite Worst Nightmare album cover and found that this includes the barcode, website of the artist or band, record company and producer name and of course the song listing. My design is shown below:
My back cover continues the theme of musical notes that were used on the front cover as well as the inside, allowing it to remain a constant theme. The font for the song lists is a "handwriting" effect. This makes the album seem a lot more personal, allowing a connection between artist and audience. The silver colour contrasts the purple effectively, instantly catching your eye. I have included the bands logo, although a larger size to again reinforce the name of the band as an important feature of the product. I have made the feature single "Superman" the third track as when researching other digipaks, the albums debut single seemed to either be track 3 or 4, unlike the stereotypical first track. The barcode is a conventional trait always portrayed on the back covers of albums. Its size is not too big, making it less distracting. I included the record company logo as well as the bands website. This information was made compact as it is not usually read by the customer but it is also discreet so as not to take away from the digipaks overall image.

Inside Covers - Second and Final Draft

I was not entirely happy with my first attempts at the inside covers. I decided to experiment further with my second and final drafts. The final inside cover is shown below.
This is my second attempt at the first of the two inside covers. I had decided to mimic the layout of a comic book with the different sized panels in order to continue highlighting the connotations of a comic book. Furthermore this would appeal to a teenage audience, as comic books have always been associated as childlike. The red and blue colour creates synergy between the digipak and the music video, as these are the colours always associated with Superman. I have kept the musical notes to include the flow between each cover, as well as the love heart symbolising the love of music.
The second inside cover continued the idea of the comic book layout. The colour background is different however, a lighter purple than the front cover. The upside down image of the female artist creates a feeling of surrealness, as well as dizyness as I have blurred her feet and creates the idea that she has been swept off her feet by her superman. I have incorporated the band's logo so as to almost drill that logo into the audience's mind so as not to forget. Once more, the heart with musical notes has been included to reflect the love of music. However after more thought, I changed the design of my inside covers for a final time. The results are shown below:
I have changed the background back to "cloth purple". This was done to create a flow and familarity throughout the product. I have also used the musical notes again to continue a flow and to make it constant. However this time I have included the bands logo in a more recognizable place on the layout, in the center. I have cut the logo in half as it will continue across onto the other panel, reinforcing the image of the band on the customer. The blue glow adds to the comic book/surreal effect.

The final inside cover is shown below. Again the musical notes have continued across onto this panel to reinforce the constant theme throught the digipak, of music. The second half of the bands logo is placed at the top of the cover, immediately drawing the audience's eye. And the speech bubble again reinforces the theme of cartoon and comics, due to the bands "hit single" Superman, creating synergy between the video and digipak.

Inside Covers- First Draft

I wanted my digipak to flow throughout and so I contemplated using the same background but felt that the purple became too bland and boring to be used over four covers. I had noticed this convention in other digipaks such as Arctic Monkey's Favourite Worst Nightmare, where the image of the house and its graphics continue from covers one through to three. However in order to keep some semantics flowing in my own, I used similar cartoon effected images, as well as keeping the musical notes portrayed across the front cover into the inside ones. I wanted to reinforce the idea of the importance of music to the band. This is shown below:

I further reinforced the importance of music for the band by placing a coloured heart on a white image. This catches the eye of the audience but also highlights the strong love the artist feels for the music. I recieved inspiration of this image from Kanye West's 808's and Heartbreak digipak cover, where Kanye also uses the almost cartoon like heart on his own image. The background itself contrasts the dark purple of the front cover and so when the buyer opens their digipak it will be a shocking surprise.
For the second inside cover, I stuck with the same background again to make it flow, along with the musical notes that have continued from over the page. This gives off the feeling of continuity. The speech bubble that again contains the musical note theme reflects conotations of a comic book, which as mentioned before I wanted to maintain throughout the entire product. The image however, is not a cartoon. I have used the blue effect to create an oddness that fits in with the surreal colour of the background. The female artist is looking straight at the camera, therefore connecting with her audience with her eyes.

Final Draft of Digipak

I contemplated on my second draft and also looked back at questionnaire results and feedback and decided to make significant changes to my digipak's final album cover. Firstly I decided to change the covers main colour to a dark purple. The dark mood colour I felt reflected a more mature album cover, although our product will appeal to an older teenage audience rather than a younger. I felt it would better contrast the band name.
Furthermore I have added rhythm notes that would take up the complete background of the cover. This mimics Paramore's RIOT album cover that I used as inspiration. It also bears connotations to the band's name "Amber Rhythm" , the rhythm notes taking center stage. I removed the speech bubble due to the fact that I felt it took up too much room on the cover, but also it looked too harsh against the purple. I changed the image of the female artist but kept the cartoon effect in hoping to stick with the comic book connotations I used in the first two drafts. She is placed in amongst the rhythm notes. This symbolizes her involvement in the making of the album's music.
I finally used the by-line from my previous draft, but changed the colour of the font to silver to contrast more effectively with the purple. This made the font appear more like handwriting, making it personal but also it is a more stylish colour than the previous black.

Second Draft of Digipak Cover

I created a second draft for my digipak cover after asking for feedback from family and friends. I was told that the scattered font in the first draft looked too messy and not cohesive enough. It also was thought to be too distracting from the band/artist name, which is something that does stand out on famous artists album covers such as Pink.

I have kept the image of the female artist to stick to the results of my questionnaire, where most people felt that an album cover with a female image would be the cover to catch their eye, due to the male gaze. I have used the pencil effect again to show the synergy between the digipak and the music video, sticking to the connotations of comic books.

The speech bubble that holds the name of the band is similar to those shown in comic books too. It contrasts against the orange background, making it stand out. This time i have included a star portraying the album name. The star itself reflects the pop art conventions found in comic books. It too stands out against the orange background, although I was told by my teacher to change the font of the band name as it does not "professional" enough. I will change this in my next draft.

Finally after more feedback, it was highlighted that I should include a by-line or a catch line for the album to draw an audience in even further. I have done this by including a "Featuring the hit single Superman" in black italics, a preferred font, allowing it to be eye catching.

Front Cover of Digipak - First Draft

To create the album cover for my digipak I decided to use "Macromedia Fireworks Photoshop". The Photoshop programme was a new experience to me as I have never used or come across it before and so it took time for myself to get to grips with its techniques. I however understood the advantages my digipak would have in using the programme due to its different styles of effects and colours as well as layout.

I used the Internet to search for images to incorporate onto my cover design and tried out different layouts. This was my first draft:
As this was my first draft, I knew I would only be experimenting with the programme as well as my own ideas. The lettering of the album name I felt however was too jumbled on a second viewing although I was pleased with my placing of the band name, at the top, in large font making it distinguishable from the other text. I wasn't pleased with my image of the band's singer. I used the lasso tool to cut around the image and the final product showed the edges were rough. I thought this would add to the idea of the band's youthful audience in that the rough edges would appeal to teenagers themselves having a "rough edge".

The orange background has connotations with the band's name "amber", the amber colour symbolising to "get ready" at traffic lights. This could also suggest that the audience should "get ready" or prepare themselves for the band's debut album. The image of the band's singer I have used the cartoon effect for. This creates a synergy between itself and the music video of "Superman" due to the connotations of comic books.

I will however develop my ideas further in the coming days.