Digipak

The three creative elements of my coursework (the video, digipak and advert) will all be coherent and part of a promotional packfor my chosen artist. All three parts of the coursework will appear like part of a whole package tocreate the same image for the artist and reflect thegenre of the song. To make this link I will use elements of the mise-en-scene such as costume, make up and location/setting to help create this coherence. A digipak is a patented style of CD or DVD packaging, and is a registered trademark of AGI Media. Artists use them for their records and for the music DVDs they sell often of live shows and concerts.

Two examples of Digipaks from the same 'pop' genre as Ellie Goulding are those below that are from Girls Aloud and Madonna.

The first Digipak is Girls Aloud: Tangled Up Live Digipak

The Girls Aloud digipak is colour themed black, white and purple. The background is solid black and the photographs are tainted with purple and have a purple mist effect on them. The colour purple will appeal to the target audience because it is mostly aimed at females and purple is a feminine colour.

The font used is the same on both the front and back as well as the spine. This is to create a continuous effect throughout the digipak and make it easierand neater to read. They have used a serif font all over the digipak for simplistic and sophisticated look.

The digipak shows two photos - both of the group - one on the cover and one on the back. The photo on the front shows all five members of the group from the front and they all are holding microphones and singing, which suggests they're shots taken fromthe concert within the DVD. The photo of the reverse is all five members of the group again, this time a lot smaller (to make room for more writing on the reverse) and instead is a long shot photograph of them standing from behind in dance poses.

Information you will find on the front of the digipak includes the title and the artist featured within, for example on this digipak: Girls Aloud, Tangled Up Live from the O2 2008. On the spine of the digipak information includes again title and artist, as well as the DVD Video logo which tells the audience which format the disc is. On the reverse, there is a lot more information. They again repeat the title underneath the photo, then underneath that they list a contents of the DVD which is a list of songs the artist sang at the concert. There is also a list of extras which include music videos and behind the scenes footage. Atthe bottom of the reverse is the information that is legally required such as barcode, copyright information and logos of companies involved in the making of the DVD. It is important all this information is here in order for the DVDs to sell correctly.

The second Digipak is Madonna - Music.

The Madonna digipak involves a lot of colour. The bottom of the front and the spine is a rainbow pattern and includes colours such as red, orange, yellow, pink and blue. There are gems scattered on the cover and the reverse of the digipak.

The theme for this particular promotional pack is evidently Cowboy, this is distinctively shown in the photos and the font used. On the front is a photograph of Madonna with a pink cowboy hat on looking asif she is asleep with the hat over her face. The back of the digipak is a photo of just the hat on some hay. Also, underneath the title on the front ofthe digipak, there is a picture of a bucking bronco which is another reference to the cowboy theme

The font used on the digipak is a serif font that is associated often with cowboy and western themed movies etc. This is to create a strong, visible theme that can be continued throughout the promotional package.

The information on the front of this digipak, similar to that on the front of the Girls Aloud one includes the title and the artist: Madonna - 'Music'. There is alsoa parental advisory explicit content logo on the front which lets the audience know that there is some content not suitable for certain aged people. On the spine of the digipak information includes again title and artist, as well as the DVD Video logo which tells the audience which format the disc is. The reverse of the digipak contains necessary information that is legally required such as barcode, copyright information and logos of companies involved in the making of the DVD. It is important all this information is here in order for the DVDs to sell correctly. The back of this digipak is mainly occupied by the photo but there is a small contents on the back in a box.

These are the three flat plans Icreated for my Digipak:

I created produced three flat plans for my digipak using ideas and conventions I learned about from analysing the two flat plans earlier in this blog.

A common theme on all three of my flat plans is stars. This is because it is already a common theme used by Ellie Goulding and I thought it would be authentic and appealing to my target audience if I carried on with this theme. I chose the name of my Digipak to be 'Ultraviolet'. This is because Ellie's album is called 'Lights', with a rereleased version called 'Bright Lights' and an EP called 'Run In To The Light'. I thought as ultraviolet was a type of light, it would be a good name for my digipak as it fits with the theme already created by my chosen artist.

On all three flat plans I used two photos - one on the coverand one on the back - both of the artist, for easy recognition of the product.

1.

The first flat plan I put the title of the album at the top and the artists name at the bottom. This is different to most normal digipak covers, however I didn't like it and so I didn't use this as my final digipak.

I put the track listing aligned to the left hand side of the page on the back cover which is quite conformist and seen on the Girls Aloud digipak.

The photo was a mid shot of the artist on both the front and the back.

2.

The second digipak flat plan I created had a long shot of my artist on the back cover and a medium shot on the front cover.

I experimented a different font on the second digipak but did not put the artist's surname on the cover which I feel could be misleading to people buying the product so for this reason I rejected this digipak design.

I also went on to use the photo on the front cover of this digipak as the photo used in my advert.

3.

This is the flat plan I used to design my final digipak. I used a mid shot photo of the artist on the front and an extreme long shot on the back. I centralised the text on the back cover which I think makes it look neater.

This is my final Digipak product:

Evaluation

For my final digipak, I used flat plan three. I used photos taken on location and in the costume my artist is wearing in the video. This is so that all three parts of my promotional pack are matching and relate to each other which creates a strong link between them all.

I stuck to a colour theme of yellow and white as I feel it is quite girly which is an image Ellie Goulding usually portrays. I also thought it stood out well to the audience and caught the eye. I chose fonts that were easy to read and attractive so that it would allure the reader to the product.

I made sure I had the necessary information on my digipak such as a barcode and legal information such as copyright information.

I used language such as "brand new exclusive" so that the audience would believe they are getting something they cannot find any where else and make them more inclined to buy it.

For the inside of my digipak, I used one photo across both sides and then put some song lyrics on the left hand side (the disc will be on theother side). I wanted to keep it simple as the inside is not really involved in the selling of the product and it's not looked at in great detail.

During the productionof my digipak I learnt a lot of new skills. Firstly, within the planning stage where I began by analysing existing Digipak covers of a similar genre to get an idea of what is already on the market. I then drew three flat plan ideas for my digipak so that I could experiment with different methods and ideas in order to get a good style that would appeal to my target audience.

Most of my newly developed skills came from using Adobe Photoshop to create my final product. I knew some things on Photoshop from my AS coursework but extended my knowledge by using different brushes and tools. This time I could not download fonts from www.dafont.com - instead I had to using snipping tool to cut it out and then use the eraser tool to remove the background and change the colour of the font and place it on my digipak.

Feedback

I created a Facebook group where I posted pictures of my Digipak and asked friends, family and anyone who is interested to comment on what they liked/didn't like about it.