CD cover

This week, we had a brief to design a CD cover using a photographic image and our knowledge of composition, colour and typography. Knowing that I couldn’t use any old image off flickr or google due to copyright infringement i decided to create a CD using my own photography. Since I don’t really have experience taking photos of bands or people i decided to take a photo of a product or object that would represent the message of the soundtrack on my CD. I thought this was a good idea because there has been many successful CD covers made up of photography not involving the bands – for example:

 

(CD covers use – BloodhoundGang – Hooray, Glee – Showstoppers and Fall Out Boy – Infinity on high)

These albums consist of relevent photography to what they want to portray, e.g. the glee album has the iconic loser hand which has become a staple of their show and their promotional advertising. So looking at these I decided to take several photos and pick what image I think would work best on a CD cover.

My image:

I chose this image because of the strong focus point of the flame and the candle against the dark background. The dark background would work well has a back drop to both the image and my typography so I liked that aspect. Upon picking this photo I also decided to look at the connotations of the image and the object it shows. For me anyway, candles traditionally represents hope, spirit, optimism and community. With these descriptions in mind I decided the best route my CD cover would be a charity single because the connotations lend well to the messages a charity single would want to promote to its audience.

Established charity albums

I decided to do some background research into some more recent and popular CD albums – primarily the X Factor singles. I did this so I could see how my CD would fit in with the market but also to see what layouts on the cover – i.e. placement of photos and charity logos – are traditionally popular and effective.

Main image for comparison:

This image was from the 2009 charity single. The background works well which is a good thing for my charity album, also the photographs are central to the image along with the song title. As well as this the logo for the charity stands out in colour and positioning making the single and the charity into one cohesive design. The monochrome colour scheme works well to make the logos of both the X factor and the charity stand out – which is what I want to achieve. 

My CD cover – Design.

This is my initial CD cover design inspired by my research. The black background alongside the colourful candle and contrasting logo make those the two focus points of the photo. Also the name of my charity single and charity are in readable fonts and colours to compliment the rest of the CD

Colour: I wanted to stick with the black background for impact and also replicate the colours in the candle in the typography by using an off-white/cream colour. However, I wanted the charity to stand out as well because the logo doesn’t incorporate the title of my made up charity. I decided to put the charity title in blue to connote optimism and calmness which links in with the connotations of the image I’ve used so the connotations of hope and optimism are intertwined.

Composition: Similarly to the X Factor single I’ve put the photograph almost central and the logo in the bottom left of the cover. I decided however to put my text at the top and at the bottom of the CD to frame the logo and the photo and also generate other interesting points of focus on the CD.

Typography: I’ve decided to use a lot of serif and script fonts to add to the whimsical and optimistic nature of the CD, I think if i used a Sans Serif font it would of been too un-emotive and ineffective.

Overall I’m quite happy with my CD, altough I think fine tuning my InDesign skills may have helped. I think the image is effective with the meaning and purpose of the CD, but I would also like to try a CD cover using  an image of a band to generate two contrasting CD’s to see which I prefer. The imaging used has no copyright infringements because they are either my own or without copyright which means the CD wouldn’t be problematic.