My Album Artwork design

For my first idea of our album artwork I decided to star our female singer, as she is the one singing all the songs on the album and therefore to reach her target audience which is young females we want her to be focused, so people see the album front cover and look at a sexy, young female striking a stunning pose showing young girls, females have power and can do anything.

The style I have gone for is a powerful yet mysterious vibe. I want the album cover as an entirety to represent female empowerment, but for the album to sell and be visually attractive on the shelf of a shop, or online I think it needs to stand out and be interesting. That’s why I have incorporated the snakes on one side of the album. I think not only does it link with her hit song; snakes typically connote danger and the unknown therefore it shows a more out their image of our ‘bad girl’ artist making the consumer more interested in buying the album.

In terms of colour I wanted to stick with the colour scheme of her hit song’s music video. The colours of light blue and pink, not only do they really work together it will also help portray the conventions of the genre R&B as these our stereotypically very female colours therefore it all links in. I would also want white font, as white connotes purity and this will be a good contrast. Like a snake our female artist has two sides/sheds of skin. The ideology she is representing to girls all around the world is that we can have dual personalities and be free to express ourselves however we like whether that by mysterious and sexy or pure and confident.

In terms of their being a link between the artwork and my music video I think they share overall known similarities to the genre of R&B. For example, the colour scheme as I have previously mentioned is similar. But more importantly our female artist plays a crucial role in both, as I am focusing her on striking poses and owning the front cover as well as the video, showing she is unstoppable. For the front cover I want her in the same outfit as she wore for one of the scenes in our video, this is because I believe it’s important for there to be a specific link between the two. Our target audience need to be familiar with what they see, and if we were to develop her image and brand, in terms of creating further albums there needs to be some sort of look so our artist becomes a recognised female. For example, one of the most successful female artists Adele, up to her last album has previously always names her albums after her age (a number). The front cover is also always a close up intimate photo of her face, she is now known globally for this album look and everyday consumers associate this type of look with Adele. Therefore, I think you want to keep a link between the two. One of the things that is different would be incorporating the snake on the artwork, however I think it’s important to add something different and unique so the two products are not identical, and the snake gives an exciting mystery to the album cover which should help sell albums.

Throughout the four pages of my album artwork I think our artist is both desired, looked up to and considered a ‘friend’ like figure to the audience. She represents everything young females wish to be. She is sexy, naturally beautiful, empowering, brave and mysterious. The design shows this through her whole body being focused on the front cover, the snakes in the middle and the silky material flowing around the song names and lastly her silhouette of her head and hair.

I have used both technical and symbolic conventions to express the genre of R&B. In terms of shot use and composition my female artist is central using a medium long shot to show her whole body in the frame, revealing the confident pose which she is striking. In terms of symbolic conventions looking into mise-en-scene my album artwork I have used costume to show bare skin, this shows a sexiness to the female artist, using this and the fierce facial expression matches the overall campaign. For me the most important part of my first album artwork is that it all links with each other, the music video, album and website all need to portray the same look to match with the genre conventions and fit in with the appropriate target audience that shows the right ideology of our R&B artist.