Importance of a CD cover
Your cover is your calling card to the record industry and to the consumer. how well you design it and the other graphics for your release could well determine your success or failure as a musician.
A well designed and attractive cover, along with other detailed information you have included in the packaging, may well determine if your audience even bother to listen to the music contained on the record, and if your decoder takes the dominant or aberrant reading from your graphics. It is the best advertisement for your music.
Your standing in a music shop with millions of CD's in front of you, a successful CD cover will stand out from the crowd and grab your attention even if you weren't looking for that CD, Whereas an unsuccessful CD will simply be ignored time and time again. This can make or break an artist because if people don't buy their music then they will just stop making it.
This is why a good, well designed CD cover is of the highest importance.
Analysis Of Owl City’S Cd Covers
View more presentations from guest96de4d.
3 possible designs for my CD cover
1st Design:
This is my first idea for my CD cover,seeing as I used the magnetic letters throughout my video to spell out specific lyrics, I thought it would look good if I tried this out for my CD cover. I really like this idea but It doesn't stick to the common forms and conventions of Owl City's previous music videos at all.
2nd Design:
I really like this idea of using the toy racetrack on my CD cover, this was a main toy throughout my video so is intertextualy linked to my main media product, although I like the concept i don't think it looks as good as the other two designs. However this design is the most similar to Owl City's previous CD covers and follows their forms and conventions closely.
3rd Design:
I think this design looks the best out of all three, but only because it is really colourful image, but when I actually take the photos I don't think it will look as dynamic as the other two designs. Plus I don't think it has a clear relationship with the music video, not as much as the other two designs do.
After looking at all three designs, I like the idea of using my 1st design the most, but I am going to take pictures for all three and see if this design still works best as an image rather than a drawing.
Photos for possible designs:
1st design photos:
2nd Design photos:
3rd Design photos:
After taking my photos for each design I have changed my mind completly. My first choice for my CD cover was initialy my 1st design but seeing it as an image I think it would turn out looking unrealistic as a real CD cover. I like the balloon photo in my 3rd Design but I think it would be a bit boring to use as a CD cover, it looks like designs already on the market. The 2nd design was my least favourite when I designed it as it didn't look as colourful as the other two designs but now I see it as an image I think it looks really dynamic. I am going to use 2 out of the 3 photo's of the racetrack one for the front cover and one for the back
chosen CD cover
After looking at my 3 possible designs for my CD cover I decided upon using my 2nd design as my final CD cover. I chose this design for a few reasons:
1. I felt that it followed the common forms and conventions of Owl City's previous CD covers much better than my other 2 designs as the font used for the title was similar and the use of a bright white background with a focus image is often used in Owl City's work.
2. It appeared the most dynamtic, by continuing the racetrack onto the back cover looked really professional and much more interesting to look at.
3. Although the picture of a toy racetrack doesn't refer directly to the title of the song, if fits perfectly with the video as this was one of the main toys used within the video and also from the angle the photo will be taken from it appears like a hot air balloon is flying over a town.
4. I liked the stylised image in the centre of the page rather than the other designs which featured the whole image as the background rather than white with an image in the centre.
How the CD cover will attract my target audience
Designing a CD cover that looks effective and links well with the genre, artist and video are important but another important factor is will if it attract the target audience? The CD cover has to attract its main target audience otherwise if wouldn't fulfil its purpose as a successful CD cover. I have designed this CD cover to suit my target audience. My target audience are mostly female, between 14-25 years of age and mainly white,Europian or American ethnicity. Here is how I attracted this particular group:
* Curvy, feminine font style - providing a feminine approach to the text
* Using the racetrack as my image - this is a young, childlike paradigm providing a youthful approach to my CD cover
* It's a very simple and innocent image - this gives a fresh approach and looks more innocent and childlike
* I have used bright colours of yellow and green within my text and the colours of the cars - providing the audience with a youthful vibe to my CD cover
* On the back of my CD cover I have also put Owl City's website and myspace webpage - Mostly the younger generation of my target audience use myspace providing my young audience with a social way of researching the band through ways they are used to.
How the CD cover follows forms and conventions:
After analysising 4 of Owl City's previous CD covers, I found some common characteristics, here are some of the conventions I adhered to:
* The artist is never on the front cover - Owl City only ever have images of objects, never the band. This is rare in the music industry as they are trying to sell a brand image. This was good news to me, as my video was concept based and had no people in it, I didn't need to put the artist on the front
* Their CD covers are always colourful and I have stuck to this convention as I have used toy cars in bright yellow and green, the font of the main text is also in bright green.
* Most of their covers have a bright white background, with an image within the page - normally with enhanced brightness and contrast - this is what I did with my image, I used photoshop to enhance the brightness and contrast to make more of a stylised image.
* The Artists name is ALWAYS bigger than the track name, which I also stuck to and the track name is normally underneath the artists name which I have also done on my front cover.
* Their images always convey a sense of happiness and youth - My image definatly portrays this by using the toys and using bright colours.
Analysis of existing magazine cd adverts
View more presentations from guest96de4d.
3 possible designs for my magazine advert:
1st design: I really like the sytle of this design, but I don't think it intertextualy links as well with my CD cover and my video.
2nd design: This is my favourite design I think it will look the most dynamic when using real images, and it looks most like existing adverts at the moment.
3rd design: I really like this design but I think it will look to empty when it comes to actually constructing it.
Chosen advert:
I chose to use my 2nd design as I felt it most resembled exisiting magazine adverts at this time, I also thought that it linked best with my CD cover and video.
How the magazine advert was aimed at my target audience
Here is how I attracted my target audience to my advert:
* I have used the a similar image of the toy racetrack within my advert as well as placing the CD in the advert to provide an intertextual link between the two so my audience know they are related.
* Curvy, feminine font style - providing a feminine approach to the text is used on the CD cover and on the quotes
* Using the racetrack as my image - this is a young, childlike paradigm providing a youthful approach to my magazine advert - this is also quite unique so will stand out within a magazine
* It's a very simple and innocent image - this gives a fresh approach and looks more innocent and childlike
* I have used bright colours of yellow and green within my text and the colours of the cars - providing the audience with a youthful vibe to my CD cover - this will also stand out within a magazine.
* I have also put Owl City's website and myspace webpage - Mostly the younger generation of my target audience use myspace providing my young audience with a social way of researching the band through ways they are used to.
Finished CD cover and magazine advert
Audience feedback on ancillary texts
I used the same focus group that I used for my video to show them the video again to refresh their memory and then I showed them my CD cover and my magazine advert, I then handed out this questionnaire to gain feedback from my target audience about how they felt all three linked together and if they thought my ancillary tasks were successful
1.Do you think my CD cover and magazine advert fulfil their purpose as successful media products?
Yes completely [ ]
Mostly yes [ ]
Only slightly [ ]
Not at all [ ]
2.What is your favourite part of the CD cover?
Images [ ]
Colours [ ]
Text font and colour [ ]
General layout [ ]
How the front and back link together [ ]
Other [ ] (please state).................................................
3.What is your favourite part of the magazine advert?
Images [ ]
Colours [ ]
Use of CD cover within advert [ ]
Text font and colours [ ]
General layout [ ]
Other [ ] (please state).................................................
4.If you were in a music shop looking at CD’s do you think my CD cover would stand out?(If Yes state why)
No [ ]
Yes [ ] .......................................................
5.After watching my video of ‘Hot Air Balloon’ by Owl city and then seeing my CD cover and magazine advert, how well do you think all three go together as a combination?
Really well [ ]
Quite well [ ]
Only a little bit [ ]
Not at all [ ]
Audience feedback results
My results from my audience feedback were really positive on my ancillary tasks,100% thought that my CD cover and my magazine advert fulfilled their purpose as successful media products. 100% also said that all three media texts go together 'really well' as a combination. From these two questions I put the answers as ways of taking the different readings from the encoder/decoder model. These results show that all of my focus group took the dominant reading from my media texts.
This graph shows what different people chose as their favourite part of my CD cover. This shows that the most popular answer was 'the combination of the front and back cover', 40% of my focus group chose this answer, closely followed by 'general layout' - 30% and 'images' - 20%. These were the results I was expected as this shows that the overall combination of the CD cover and its layout were seen as great parts of the CD cover.
This graph shows the same as the above graph but for the magazine advert instead. 50% of my focus group liked the use of the CD cover within the advert. with 20% liking the images and 20% liking the general layout. This shows that generally what attracts people to a CD cover or advert selling the CD is the overall layout and strong images.100% of my target audience said they think my CD cover would stand out in a shop, when asked why the most common answer was to do with unique style and good images.
