Early Ideas For Digipack

From research, I have gathered together some interesting ideas that I think would work and be appropriate for our chosen artist and genre for our Digipak. Considering our genre is generally Indie, we should look into the vintage feel and look for these products, therefore giving the digipak for example a filter over the image on the front cover.

Focusing on the Digipak, from basic research I have discovered that general Indie albums tend to not show the appearance of themselves on their front covers but show a pattern, natural scenery or objects relating to their music. As Indie music is quite different, strange and alternative, most digipaks of that genre are designed around the music. Some digipaks only feature the band name and do not have a title such as the Arctic Monkeys and Franz Ferdinand. Also Indie album are sometimes known to have the text on the front cover commonly written in a strange style which help make the digipak stand out and catch a potential customer's eye. Personally I think the digipak would look good with a faded image of the artist on the front cover, in order to do this we have to provide the camera with some filters and use the shift focus effect to make the photograph and artist less recognisable. Perhaps the artist could fade into the sun? -See Daughter's album.

Digipack

To go with our artists music video and help promote his music, we will make a digipack for Mike Dignam's music which will be an important factor when connecting the artist to their audience. This will provide the target audience with an idea of the singer's image (along with his other media texts) and convey a style/genre of the artist through the presentation. In order for our digipack to be appropriate for our chosen artist, we need to facilitate some research into various digipacks from various genres to how the inlays are projected. Our digipack needs to include a front cover, back cover, spine, disc cover, inlays and all the appropriate text and images that are required.

Daughter

Daughter are an indie folk rock band originating from London. The band consist of the main singer Elena Tonra, guitarist Igor Haefeli and drummer Remi Aguilella. The trio are a very recent Indie band which only released EPs in 2010 and 2011, but in March this year (2013), they released their first full album 'If You Leave'. Their image is like other Indie artists' images, for example they use positive, light and natural colours in their album covers but make sure they seem personal to the target audiences. Their music is soft and slow yet has the natural beat of the drum with the acoustics of the guitarists. The target audience would be from teenagers aged 15 to adults that want to be relaxed with the soft vocals of Elena.

The trio tend present themselves as a solo artist with Elena Tonra (the main vocal artist) as the face of the band. In my opinion I think this because the name 'Daughter' is more feminine than masculine and from the listeners point of view you guess that the band consists of a feminine vocal which is apparent in the songs. As the face of the band, Elena presents herself in an old fashion but natural way, with her short black hair and innocent face; this attracts the young and old.

To the right shows the EP cover for 'The Wild Youth' which features only a few songs compared to an album. When this was released in 2011, the trio decided to link the title of the EP to the cover of the digipack, therefore they chose to include some children in the cover. This portrayed their indie style as by not placing themselves as a band or Elena on the cover shows that they want to hide their image in some way and be original in their artwork.

However when looking at their recent full album called 'If You Leave', it features more of a natural and light coloured style to the front cover. They have also used an effect that looks youthful as it looks like a young girl is running in the woods due to the fading of the cream clothing. But if you look closely at the album you can see under the trees on the left, it seems like there are two men standing which indicates that they are part of the band.

This music video by Daughter called 'Still' was released from the album 'If You Leave' and is generally about how two people falling out of love of one another, but still clinging onto the ghosts of the love they once shared. Daughter show this through a narrative in the evening making it more depressing and can relate for the audiences.
-Diegetic sound is used at the beginning to emphasise the use of heels walking up some stairs to a flat, the non diegetic sound also starts at the same time. This helps to draw the audiences into the narrative of the music video.
- Low angle of the camera at start of the stairs and the girl walking up, underlines the late night and the clothing of the girl and how provocative she comes across as. The low angle of the camera also shows that a cat is there and emphasises how late at night it is.
- Having the tv on in the bedroom with Daughter performing highlights the use of non diegetic sound and that those images on the tv are the band.
- Aerial shot near the end shows two emotions and creates a longing effect for the audience.
- Behind the shoulder shot of the girl as she undresses shows how the pain of the relationship is hurting her as through the camera you can see how thin she is. Also showing the tattoo on her back supports this.

Album Cover Analysis

Florence + The Machine - LUNGS

 I decided to analyse the band, Florence + the Machine's album to help broaden my mind to other styles and designs for digi pack covers. This band is famous for their unique style and their indie rock/pop genre they create which varies from song to song. In this particular band, Florence Welsh is seen on the face of the album cover and plays the role of the main singer within the band itself. This helps contribute to the genre, indie rock as it resemblances how its not only male artists that can be named indie, it can be female artists also.

One of the first things I noticed about the front cover of their album was the font and how they have included a border line around the digipack. The font demonstrates the feminine side to the album with the wavy/curly and floral style and having placed the wording above the background full of flowers also identifies and attracts the female listeners. However when looking further down the album, I noticed the font changes to all capitals saying 'LUNGS' which definitely helps draw the listener to the album cover. Also the fact that the wording is shown over the top of a pair of lungs emphasises the album even more.
The singers image plays an important role on the front of the album cover as it helps identify the genre and the style of the music featuring on the album as well as the personal appearance of the artist. Florence is shown quite innocent with the background creating a floral and feminine effect although the mise en scene presents a more sex appeal to the artist. For example the clothing she wears shows a lot of flesh with the see-through blouse and with the pair of lungs just covering her breasts it comes across to the audience as young but fun, especially towards the male listeners. Also the way she is laid out and the body language plays up the sex appeal with the relaxed arms & hands and also with the head tilted to one side showing the eyes looking down representing the innocence as well as showing the wavy, brown hair demonstrating a contrast against the pale skin.

On the back cover of the DigiPack, showing the titles of songs, bar code, websites and producers of the album, is another very important part of the album especially when it comes to the placement of the songs. I found the back of this album cover very interesting with the anatomical model being placed in the centre of attraction which corresponds to the titles of songs. This particularly demonstrates an individual way of portraying the song names which links the the originality of the Indie genre. By placing an anatomical model gives a more personal feel to the listener and also emphasises the name of the album again.
When looking at the font and style of the back cover, I noticed that they have chosen a white font against a black background which comes across as quite striking to the audience which helps draw them in. The black also gives out a dark feel to the album and without the feminine font, personally I think the album would look quite Gothic and not representing the intended genre.

Below also shows my class analysis of the album cover done individually.

Album Cover Analysis

The Killers -Day & Age


This album cover uses a very limited pallet for the majority of the cover. For example the colours involved including some purples and whites creates a calm, soft representation in which reflects their upbeat, laid back music style.
One of the aspects that particularly caught my eye was the appearance of the cover, presented in a mosaic style as it looks segmented in a simplistic way. Also instead of showing an image of the band, they have created the impression that they want to be judged purely on their music not their style and the way they look.
The colours involved also play a big part in this design, for instance the warm colours such as the red and orange hues at the bottom of the cover help identify the style of the songs within the album which come across as calm and cheerful music. The font is simplistic especially with it being situated in the centre of the album which helps the album to stand out on shelves in shop and draw attention in. The font is very subtle as well so that it is unthreatening unlike some cover designs by heavy metal genres such as the band Slipknot. The soft placid colours tells us that the music is unlikely to be heavy or offensive and the image of the moon and landscape is almost relaxing and soothing which may have the same effect on the listener.