Digipak Research

Whilst I have been researching different styles of digipak and album covers from artist within the singer songwriter and indie music genre. Using google allowed me to see a range of different covers and I came accross Joshua Radin's album cover, and I thought it would be perfectly suited for our artist; well something similar.

Another artist exremely similar to our artist is Ed Sheeran, we have researched him throughout the whole of our course and have found him as an artist a great influence upon our work. The idea of hidden artist and old fashioned shows that he differs from the ordinary, but the idea of fashion and genre makes him flow within the mainstream of music. These contexts work well together for our artist.


Another element of our digipak which is important to consider is 'who' the artist is signed to, who they represent and what comes with it; deciding the record label has a great influence upon the sucess of the artist, and we have to consider these things whilst planning out music video suitably. For our artist we have decided to use the record labels:

• CUSTARD records -  Custard Records is an American record label, best known for its success with English singer-songwriter and Number 1 recording artist James Blunt. The label is run by former 4 Non Blondes member Linda Perry and has a partnership with Warner Music Group's Atlantic Records division.
• Atlantic Records - is an American record label best known for its many recordings of rhythm and blues, rock and roll, and jazz.[1] Over its first 20 years of operation Atlantic earned a reputation as one of the most important American independent recording labels, specializing in jazz, R&B and soul recordings by African-American artists, a position greatly enhanced by its distribution deal with Stax Records.

These two record labels would be good labels for our artist to be signed with, as these two companies are not the biggest and are not involved in mainstream, they are used in the transition from upcoming artist to mass audience, which is what our artist aims to do. Using these two record labels is exactly what out artist needs, and we will place their logos on our digipaks.

Digipack Conventions

When creating and producing a Digipack it is important to notice all elements involved within the production, the 2 main parts of the digipack are the front cover and the back cover. These are the first things that the audience member sees. Below are 3 front covers of albums, all male artists in the genre of singer songwriter and one back cover of a singer songwriter female artist.

The 3 covers have one main thing in common, the artist is clearly taking over the majority of the frame, making the artist itself clear and prominent being the first thing that is looked at. The font of the artists name and album name is placed together, the name of the artist above album name as the most important element of the album is 'who' is the artist. The font is clear, using creative stypes and colours to make the text look more interesting. Each artist has a different theme occuring in the cover, some effective use of editing is used to lower all colours except from red, repeat the layer of image of the artist in different locations and colours, and to blut out the background of the image, making the artist itself more prominent.

The back cover is equally as important as the front cover, this is used mainly for song titles nd any bonus features, this use of space is used to  draw attention to established songs and advertise any special features to persuade the audience to buy the album. For Adele's back cover, everything is in black and white except from the green to show the numbers and special features. The image of her face, showing a clear eye line towards the camera creates a link between the audience and the artist. At the bottom of the back cover is the barcode, allowing the audience to buy the album. The use of small print at the bottom of the back cover is to advertise any copyright laws and represent the music and record label, here there is legal details and any websites linking to more information of the artist. Finally it is important to notice the spine of the album, this is very simple, it uses the same font and colour scheme as the rest of the album and has a code at the bottom, for recognition of the product.

Ideas from this research which can be applied to our digipak planning are:

• colour schemes
• bar codes
• effective use of editing
• small print and legal jargon
• labels and logos of the record and music companies
• remember the spine!
• font and placement of the name of artist and album name.

Conventions of a Digipak

 Some important elements to consider when creating our own digipak are certain elements which are essential to be included within the digipak. Some of these features are always found, others are ones which I plan to involve in ours:

-The name of the Artist

- The name of the Album
- Tracklist
- bonus features and use of extra's such as 'behind the scenes' and/or 'making of'
- Website and Myspace addresses
- Record Label branding
- Bonus Video
- Discount if you buy with... vouchers to advertise the product more
- Pictures of the artist and relevant visual imagery to sell the band- Website
- Credits
- ratings and opinions
- any potential titles recieved ' artist of the year'
- Recording information, producer,
- Composer
- Logo
- Barcode
- DVD logo
- CD logo
- Website banner
- Blackberry tags
- Editing of some form
- Colour schemes and themes occuring throughout the digipak

These features are essential, and we will make sure that these are included within our digipak.

Digipack Analysis

Digipak Analysis

When considering digipacks it is important to notice the differences between a CD, Album and a digipak. Each digipak has to have a USP that makes the digipak worth buying instead of downloading the music online; through this it is important to frequently analyse the elements that make the USP's in digipaks. 

Rihanna is known for her album covers and originality; this digipak is different to her others as they are less racey than others before; even though her other famous covers are CD's instead of Digipaks,all of her others seem to show a theme, and an element of intertextuality, Cry, Good Girl Gone Bad and Russian Roulette are very sexual, these main photo covers consist of shots of Rihanna wearing minimal clothing, or focusing on her position and eye line towards the camera. In all these covers she is looking towards the camera, seeming to create a clear contact with the audience member; although when looking closely it is clear that it is just an illusion, she is looking just off the camera, for instance slightly above, or hiding her pupils so it is unclear. Similarly in Russian Roulette she is wearing no formal clothes, instead she is wearing layers of what seems to be Barbed wire, which is very painful and dangerous' this idea of no clothing and only the wire follows the 'bad boy' look she is trying to create.