HK - Digipak Research Evaluation

From the examples of Digipaks I have looked at you can see they are all of a similar sort of format though there are some difference between genre's as I have looked of examples from a range of genres and have also looked at digipaks for the metal/ industrial metal genre and seen different codes and conventions between them.

Cover Image/Background
They usually have a cover photo which is known as the albumn artwork, sometimes this is just a plain image of the band for example the ignacio fernadez example I looked at, or can be a slighty more obscure cover image that is edited like the 18 till I die album.
Though for examples of the metal/industrial genre I looked at were all more minimal and didn't have a glossy, eye catching cover photo but seemed to have colours like greys and browns for the AC/ DCand Dragon Tatoo examples these were just textured backgrounds which was very opposite toIgnacio Fernandez which had a very vibrant, clear and colourful photograph as its cover image.

On the Front typically includes text saying the album and artist name.
In a very large font that takes stands out from the rest of the cover.
The band logo is usually included on the front cover this is seen largely in NIN digipaks with the NIN logo taking a large focus on the cover usually positioned in the middle of the cover this is the case with the nine inch nails album WITH_TEETH.

Stickers
The front often includes stickers which are eye catching and usually give a brief idea of what's on the CD for example 'includes number 1 single Metal'
The sticker was a large focus on the AC/DC Back In Black album as the sticker in the bottom right of this cover almost took up a quarter of the front cover. The use of stickers was also included on the cover for Jack Johnson's album.
Which had a shiny 'Special Edition' sticker and a plain black oval shape that looks like a sticker but has actually been printed on the cover rather than a separate layer stuck on.


Inner Panels

A reacurrent feature I saw for the inner covers was the use of photographs of the band, this was seen in the AC/DC back in black album and also a digipak for Take That, these both included photographs of the band.

They sometimes have some sort of connection to the image on the front cover this was shown in the NIN Pretty Hate Machine album, as the image on the inner panel was actually the same image as the front cover just edited differently and changed from a CU to an ECU.

Back On the back I found from research that there is often correlation between the image on the front and on the back, like the photo on the front would be shot front on and the image on the back would be shot from behind.
This was on pretty hate machine, the cover photo just edited differently.

On the back of every Digipak I looked at is text information on the tracks, also sometimes includes the length of tracks, though for Dragon Tatoo there was no information on what tracks there were inside but for
Ignacio Fernandez it had information on the tracks and how long they were.

The backs always included copyright information, company logos/idents and usually the URL of two websites; The artists official website and the production company's website.
Something that every single Digipak shared was that they all had bar codes located on the back.

HK - Codes and Conventions of Digipaks

After looking at a range of different digipaks it was clear that there were codes and conventions that were similar throughout each digipak.

•  Album and Artist Name - Every digipak I looked at had the name of the album and who it was by on the front cover of the album.
• There is always either a picture or a textured background as the front cover.
• The inner panels often include a photograph of some sort and the images of the panels are usually similar, if not the same image but just edited differently.
• The image on the back is usually linked to the image on the front.
• There is always a bar code on the digipak.

KM - Nine Inch Nails magazine advert (The Downward Spiral)

 - Nine Inch Nails band name as well as the band logo, this is something I'm including in our magazine advert.

- Mention of b sides and deluxe edition

- Rusted metal background

- Large black font

- Parental Advisory sticker

- Logo blended into background

- No tour dates

- Website URL

- Record label logo

- "In Stores Now"

KM - Feedback from Mag Ad 2nd draft

Here are some of the main feedback points I received from the 2nd draft of the Magazine Advert:

• The social network (facebook and twitter) icons need to be downsized
• Add itunes info
• Make all the images better blended together (no block images)
• Add tour dates
• Kerrang! and Q logos
• Change some of the text sizes
• Make the name of the album bigger/ clearer
• Include "Best of Nine Inch Nails"

KM - Creating The Magazine Advert (Background)

The first thing I did when starting on the magazine advert was to get a good background of blended images to put the information about the digipak etc. over the top of. For the images I used screenshots from our original sample footage, here are links to the 5 images I used:

Image 1
Image 2
Image 3
Image 4
Image 5

The first 2 images before blending

I used the image of the Graffiti cat and the image of the CCTV sign as the base for the background after first changing the background colour to black.

After inserting the first 2 images into Photo shop I added a 'layer mask' to the image of the cat and then used the gradient tool to blend the 2 images together (after overlapping the images where I wanted them on the advert). I also used the gradient tool to blacken the edges of the advert, so that the writing that I was planning to put at the bottom (URLs) would stand out sufficiently.

After I had the first 2 images looking how I wanted I then added the next two (the puddle and the corridor) in parallel above them and again used the layer mask and gradient tool to blend them on top of the other images. I then did the same with the candle image, placing it in between but slightly above the top two images of the puddle and the corridor. 

Finished background

Blending the first 2 images

KM - Magazine Advert 2nd Draft

Here is our 2nd magazine advert draft: (click here for full size image)

I made a couple of changes after receiving  feedback from the rest of the media group; I first swapped the full URLs of the social networking sites with icons, as this looks better and most people are familiar with these icons. I 'onion skinned' the icons on Adobe flash, and changed the colours before adding them to the ad.  I then used the 'layer mask' and 'gradient tool' on Photoshop to try to better blend the pictures together, in particular the "Beware of the CCTV" image, as we received feedback that the edges of this image were too defined. A problem I came across when doing this was the fact that when trying to blend the middle of the image to the background, the CCTV sign became harder to make out, so I focused on the sides of the image, so that you can still read the sign, but the edges aren't as noticeable. I also tried changing the fonts, but after trying various different ideas, I changed them back to my original fonts of; 'charlemagne standard' for the writing at the top of the ad, and 'myriad pro' for the social networking URLs.

ALL - Feedback received

Mag Ad:

• The Mag Ad feedback received was that it was overall very good. However elements such as the font used seemed unusual and not as varied as it could be.
• Replace the URL's with just icons- they're generally familiar with everyone.
• Good enigma / lack of exposition- it looks obscure and in keeping with the Nine Inch Nails 'tone'.
• The beware CCTV looks good and fits.
• Framing of the candle seems to be good- fits with theme of the genre
• Some of the blending between images (the solid lines between them)

Sample Footage(two):

• The special effects worked
• pace was good
• good variation of shots
• Some shots are on screen too long & are too jarring/ don't mesh well with the editing style.
• Maybe even more enigma!
• More could be done with the fire extinguisher (loop to beat?)
• Shots of just the protagonists eyes would still maintain the enigma, or extreme close-ups.
• Frames slipping would add to the damaged video effect. 

HK: Digipak Inner Draft 1

I have started work on creating the inner panels for the Digipak.
The software I used was Adobe Photoshop Elements 6.0

• I found a photo of a keyboard online and inserted this image into Photoshop
• Then I did the same with an image of CCTV Camera's
• I then experiemented with blending modes and opacity to create a layered photo effect which looked like this ( below ) 

•  After this i found an image of trent reznor the lead man of NIN and used Pin Light blending mode to create a nice layered effect.

HK: Things I Plan to Include in our Digipak

• NIN Logo on the front cover
• Add 'The Best of' 
• Correlation between back and front images
• Create a booklet for the inner
• Scannable Bar Code 
• Edited photos for the inner panels
• Copyright Information
• Logo's 
• Track List

BH- The editing process/sample two

example of editing

The editing process on the video is one that's been through one, the sample footage measuring approx. 34 seconds. 

The editing was more  fast paced than before which meant that we had to cut 10 mins of solid footage into around 34 seconds. The pace was very fast which meant that we had some issues with the amount of footage recorded but obviously with more footage we can afford to do some longer takes. The screen of final cut (left) is a neat example of how we created the video footage effect, combined with total desaturation. Also notice the frame around the footage which we dragged out to tighten the framing on some shots where the framing would detract form the image. Overall to get the 34 seconds- the editing must have taken around 7 hours overall to generate the desired effect. Of course to create the sample footage we exaggerated the special effects somewhat so that the more FX side of the video is on display, in the final video we expect the effects to come in somewhat more gradually rather than seemingly random.

KM - Magazine Advert Draft

Here is our first draft of the magazine advert, after discussing it through as a group, I will then make any changes that we feel are needed. (Click the image for full size)

KM - Green Day magazine advert (Kerrang!)

Green Day Magazine Advert

Things that are included in this magazine advert:

• Screenshot from the video for the single
• Information about the album and single
• Release dates
• Image of album cover
• Use of red and white font
• Band name in large white font
• Information about the included DVD
• Record company logo
• Official website information

This magazine advert is split in two, with the main focus of the top half being an image from the performance section of the video for "Wake Me Up When September Ends", and the band/ song name. The bottom half of the ad features all the information about what is included with the album/single. It's structured in this way so that the viewers attention is caught by the large image and this encourages them to read the details in the bottom half of the advert.

KM - 30 Seconds To Mars Magazine Ad (Kerrang!)

Things included:

• Band Logo in the background of the advert
• Mentions of the singles/ other artists featured (Kanye West)
• Artwork of the album title/ band name
• Fairly plain white background
• Red coloured text
• Simple Serif font
• Record company logo
• "OUT NOW" in large writing
• Mention of the bonus DVD/ features

I plan on using a lot of the features of this digipak in our group's Nine Inch Nails digipak, such as; the band logo, the record company logo and details such as what singles are included and the bonus DVD. Something that doesn't feature in this magazine advert, but does often appear in others (and something we plan on including) is a number of tour dates on the advert. 

KM - Examples of magazine adverts (Q)

These Adverts all came from Q magazine, although they are all adverts for tours, the bands and song writers are aiming at the same target audience and techniques to capture the target audiences are going to be used. Q is a magazine that could include Nine Inch Nails, as they often feature a large variety of Rock/ Metal bands.

This is an advert for the band Noah And The whale. I instantly notice that the writing is black while the background is white, highlighting the contrast between the two which makes the writing stand out more and become more eye catching. The photograph itself is an artistic old fashioned photograph of the band looking deep and thoughtful, the photograph film is the same colour film that they used in the the 1960s, this is the time where great legendary bands such as the Rolling Stones and the Beatles were introduced so the film type has been used to reflect on these legendary bands and imply that this band is also this great. There are tabs of red on the poster which your eye is very quickly drawn to.

This advertisement is much more basic and less eye catching apart from the giant Funeral Party sign. A lot of this advertisement is devoted to the name of the band, this is because when a fan of this band is looking through the magazine the band want to do everything in their power to grab the fans attention and to let him know about the bands activity. I really like this style, its simple and eye catching and does not overwhelm the viewer.

Like the rest of the band advertisements, this Villagers ad features large font for the name of the band and contrasting colours laid on top of each other to catch the readers attention, this contrast of colours is something we plan to use in our NIN magazine advert, using black and white. The picture in the background is the logo of the band so if the fan does not get drawn to the giant “Villagers” letters they will get drawn to the logo. This can be very useful tip when creating our advertisement, if I make the screenshot from our video that we plan to use in the ad large as well as having large lettering for the Nine Inch Nails logo then at least one of them will be eye catching and draw in a viewer. The picture also has to be interesting to draw in the members of the public who are not already fans, like this one. 

Podcast 3 - Research

HK: Digipak Research AC/DC

 This is the front cover of the digipak for the classic metal band AC/DC.
It is good to look at more genre specific examples to see if there is any codes and conventions that the follow.

The front cover is quite simple, no photo but just a brown/grey textured back ground no real use of colour.
It is clear who the album is by and that the artist is AC/DC as it has the band logo taking most of the focus in a large font at the top of the cover.
Below this in a smaller, darker font written all in capitals is the album name 'BACK IN BLACK'
It isn't a very glamorous or glossy cover at all, no use of colours or bright images that are usually on digipaks to attract people to the CD and make it eye catching in shops.

There is a very large sticker which takes up almost a quarter of the front cover, this says information about what is inside the digipak like what singles it includes and how it has been digitally remastered.

The Inside

The inside of the digipak on the inner let panel has photo's of all four band members with the names of them in the photo's these photos have been shot or edited into a colour effect that fits the colour theme of the digipak.

On the right panel is the CD which is similar to the front cover and has the same sort of texture effect on it.

The Back 

Is pretty much the same as the back, it has the same brown texture, no colour or images.

On the back is the list of tracks in the album.

Below this is copyright information, information and credits about who digitally remastered the CD.

The adress for AC/DC's website. There are two logos of the record company and the production company.

A scannable bar code is located in the top right for sales purposes.

KM - David Fincher (Director)

David Fincher

One director who heavily influences Nine Inch Nails videos, as well as actually directing one of their videos - "Only". Fincher has directed such films as; Fight Club, Se7en, Panic Room and The Social Network, and has been nominated for 2 Oscars. He recently collaborated with Nine Inch Nails vocalist Trent Reznor, on the film "The Girl With The Dragon Tatoo", the second film based on the books by Stieg Larsson, on which Reznor created the soundtrack which included a cover of Led Zeppelin's "Immigrant song". Another thing Fincher is well known for is directing many of Madonna's music videos, such as "Express Yourself", "Vogue" and "Oh Father". He has also directed music videos for artists such as; Sting, George Michael, Paula Abdul, and Aerosmith.

HK - DigipakEG 3: Bryan Adams

The third digipak i looked at was by Bryan Adams, this was a quite obscure one.
The cover photo is a piece of metal that has the album name stamped into it, the text doesn't line up and is pretty sketchy giving a cross a more thrashy/low budget look to the album.
Other than this the only other thing on the cover is the name of the artist in a black font that stands out against the silver background image.

The spine is simple with just serial number, album and artist name. In a simple black font.

The back of the digipak has an background image that is a picture of a hand with a ring on and on the ring says '18 Till I Die' so it now becomes apparrent what the image on the front cover was.

There is a close upphoto of Bryan Adams slap bang in the middle of the back cover and above this has information on where the tracks on the cd were recorded with the 18 Till I Die always in a larger font.

There is of course a bar code this is placed in the top right which is different to most as they are usually located in a bottom corner.
There are production company logo's and also copyright information about the CD.

HK - DigipakEG2: Jack Johnson

The second Digipak I looked at was Jack Johnsons's: In Between Dreams album.
The album has a simplistic yet striking feel to it the black and yellow theme makes it stand out.
In the top right hand corner we have the artist and album name the artist name in a black san serif font that stands out against the yellow background making it very easy to identify which artist the album is from.

The tree looks like a real life tree that has been has been edited to have a sort of cartoon style effect.
Below the centre image of the tree in the bottom left of the cover is a SPECIAL EDITION sticker in silver, the sticker is actually a reflective material which would catch your eye if you saw it in a store.
There is another thing in the top right that looks like a sticker but is actually printed on giving information about what tracks are in the albumn.

The Spine is very simple with just the yellow logo and a tiny bit of the image of the tree still on. The album and artist name a serial number and a very small record label logo at the bottom.


The back is very very simple pretty much just a plain yellow cover but with a graphic of a tree trunk.
It has song info on the back but not the times of the songs which often appears in some digipaks.
as standard there is a barcode on the back.
Two production company logos are shown on the back and also there a three websites.
Production company website, Jack Johnsons Website and a website for a charity organisation.

HK - DigipakEG1: Ignacio Fernandez

I have been doing some research into digipaks recently as it a task for our coursework to create a digipak for our track.

The first digipak I looked at was of Ignacio Fernandez.
It had a very simplistic cover photo just a medium long shot photograph of the artist with his guitar leant against a plain orange wall.
It doesn't follow normal conventions of digipaks which usually have more than just an image they usually have stickers or more text on the front such as album or artist name, sometimes have parental guidance warnings or other logos.

The Spine is still quite simplistic with just a white background no effects just the white background and the text that says the artist name in red and the album name in a light orangey yellow.

REAR PANEL (EXTERNAL) The back of the digipak has more on it,  but is still pretty basic, just a creamy white plain background but with a lot of text again we have the artist and album name in red and yellow but these at the top in a larger font stand out more than the rest of the text below that is in smaller writing except from the track names that are in a bold red font as appose to the smaller black font that gives some description about the album written in spanish above.

Below the track list is credits with the names of people who play what instrument, the instrument written in a small font whilst the names of the musicians is in a black bold font to make the names stand out.


At the bottom below the credits are some of the company and production LOGOs we have the logo for CM records in the bottom centre with a brief bit of copyright information.
To the left of this is the technical producers the people who made the cd with the enhanced CD logo.
and below this is the web adress to Ignacio Fernadez's official website.
In the bottom right is a bar code which is usually on every digipak as it is required for when selling them in shops.

KM - Research into magazine advertisements

Example of magazine advert

To prepare for creating our own magazine advert for our Nine Inch Nails digipak, I've been looking at several examples already found in magazines, the main one being Kerrang, due to the fact that this magazine features rock/metal bands and is aimed at the same audience that we are trying to reach with our digipak. One common feature that I found is the combination of tour dates with the advertisement of the album release, which is something that we are going to include with our advert, also mentioning singles that are included on the album, DVD bonus features, a large background image (usually of the band members or something abstract). Another magazine that we thought might be appropriate for Nine Inch Nails to advertise in is Q magazine, this is because the band have appeared in the magazine previously, and have also appeared recently in a tribute CD, made by the magazine, to the band U2.

BH- Mark Romanek

Mark Romanek has worked with Nine Inch Nails on two music videos, such as Closer & The Perfect Drug, both of which where high budget videos and Closer was one of the more prolific videos for Nine Inch Nails courting a fair amount of controversy because of the nudity and the depictions of a monkey on the cross (obviously relating to the religious connotations).
Reznor was also asked to score his film The One Hour Photo however the studio (Fox) believed Reznor to be the wrong choice and subsequently decided that he was the wrong cho canned his soundtrack for the film. 


He also directed the music video to Jonny Cash's music video to his cover of NiN-Hurt, so obviously he has a fair amount of history with the band.
His music video for A Perfect Drug was very gothic with a blue tint to make it feel much darker visually colder too. The gothic one is something shared with the Closer video, both of which featuring abstract visuals, with Closers style helped via the 20's Film reel used for filming the video, giving it a more sepia feel.

KM - Performance filming

This weekend we will be filming our performance scene in Ilkley, we are thinking about filming up near the cow and calf, using basic equipment (2 guitars, amps, microphone and basic drum-kit) to contrast with the technology based narrative of the video. We have several people in mind, however nothing is final and we're still discussing this.

KM - Digipaks

We are about to start research into different digipaks from various bands, this will help provide information on the standard conventions of digipaks for when we create our own digipak. I (Kyle) have several digipaks from bands such as Green Day, Linkin Park, Nightwish and Red Hot Chili Peppers.  And Ben has a few Nine Inch Nails (and other Industrial Metal genre) digipaks, which will help greatly in creating our own NIN digipak.