Digipak and Adverts Research

Lana Del Rey: Ultraviolence.The front cover is a black and white vintage photo of Lana Del Rey. It is a medium long shot on the artist dragging our gaze on her. She wears all white contrasting with the dark background, thus we indicate the dark themes of the album. The genre is alternative pop, so the editing of the pick is simple, also its title is written with big white letters, quite simple but still stands out from the dark background. The inside of the digipak is a medium close up of the artist lying on some flowers and smocking. Again Lana Del Rey is the main subject of the digipak. She is smocking and looking devastated, again indicating dark themes of the songs. However she is surrounded by colourful flowers, which highly contrast with the rest of the images on the digipak and it looks like she is dreaming, indication of escapism and denial of reality. The back cover is similar to the front cover, black and white screen filters, Lana wearing all white and being the main subject of the image and the song titles on white.

All in all, the main symbolism of the digipak is the following: As the first song of the album title is “is a cruel world”, so everything looks grim . However, the inside image contains the CD with her music , so its like she is relaxing and everything becomes more colourful when she listens to music ( the CD itself is colourful ), however by the end when the songs are finished and we see the back image is like she woke up from her dream and the lack of music brings her back to the grim reality. The digipak was made for an alternative pop artist, so the editing is quite simple and make uses of “vintage” filters that fits with the artist’s style and is also made to look simple, darker and dream-like, not intense and edited in order to look glossy or fake, so it really fits in with the genre.

Riahna: Loud.Riahna is the main subject in her digipak. The front and the back cover is a close up on her face. Whereas, the cover in the middle is a medium long shot of her lying on roses. The title of the album is in thin white letters and it doesn’t attract the eye. What is really dominant is the red colour signifying passion and it relates with the red roses in the middle cover, indicating Riahna is passionate and her white outfit indicates innocence, creating an image of a passionate person growing ( she relates herself with a growing rose). The fact that she is the main object in each picture indicates stardom and is a means to self promotion and since she is an attractive woman the photo hasn’t undergone any major Photoshop or changing in the colours.

The entire cover carries the same colour scheme of red, blue and feminine pinks. The soft images of flowers and the long flowing dress plays a large contrast with the album title ‘LOUD’. The inside spread sticks to the conventions of a typical digipak, and gives a good eye catching effect due to the contrast. The choice of red could connote two things- one being anger and aggression which would work with the album title but the seductive images suggest otherwise. Another connotation is likely to be love and seduction which would also match the images given, as well as working with the red roses and passion.

The albums main images catches the viewers eye with the beauty of a full frontal close-up of the artists face. The soft images is made bolder with the bright red lipstick and the bold red hair, which pull together the colours from the roses. Again, connotations towards love and passion are evident. It promotes a representation of love which is typical for a pop genre digipak.

The image on the actual CD is of a light pink rose which suggest femininity and will appeal to a younger teen girl audience. The use of a flower is becoming largely popular with artists, especially on the CD itself so we can call it an image convention.

The bold and simple font of the album contrasts with the title of the album, whilst it also represents it as well. Whilst the title is bold, it doesn’t scream out6 at the audience, which is contradicting the title ‘LOUD’ the soft font can suggest that it will be a softer album. The fact that the letters are spaced out heavily, could suggest the loud sounds of the track would fill a room

the layout itself, sticks to the conventional digipak layout. Album cover at the front, two discs, and the album sleeve is one large photo of the artist with listings of the songs and credits, which is very conventional.

AdvertsThis is a poster advertising the album “suddenly I see” by After Midnight. The band is squashed together in the poster and are doing grimaces. They are represented as cool girls, not caring about heir image and not hesitating making fun of their selves. Also the fact that they are close to each other represents the “togetherness” and team spirit of their band. They are dressed in a simple manner, indicating that they are simple and laid-back persons, which is a new fashion in music industry, neglecting the well established representation of a starlet persona. Moreover, the fact that the picture is not heavily photoshoped and there is no special background, adds a new layer in the pop-alternative genre.

This is the advert for album “Loud” by Riahna, which is a binary opposite in comparison with the previous advert. There is a close up on Riahana, reinforcing the stardom archetype. She wears a fur coat and expensive sunglasses indicating glamour and status. Unlike the girls in the previous poster she looks less approachable. Again the red is a dominant colour, attributing to Riahna’s image as a passionate woman and she also hold a rose as in the digipak. Last but not least, the lighting is well adjusted so the notions of voyeurism are applied on the cover ( Riahna is literally all what the audience can see).