Photoshop; Creating The Back

My back cover idea has changed from my initial idea as the idea of big checkers and pictures being in them looked to cluttered, and therefore I thought I would change it to a small section. To start the back I decided to continue the checker idea that I started on the spine and decided to be in a small section that wasn't perfectly shaped as I wanted it to follow the way the length of the songs words would be, which I would alter when I put in the wording on.

I then went on to do the institutional information, which included a bar-code and the record label 'Island' that I had chosen.

I then went onto add the song list, starting with 'Welcome to the MadHouse' which i had also named the album. I then chose songs that seemed fun and upbeat which would appeal to a young generation of people and an older generation as it would remind them of when they were younger and the Ska bands they used to listen to, such as Madness who had songs on their album called; 'Rainbows' and 'Bingo'.

I also added the the crowd in a smaller form in comparison to the front cover, to keep the connection between the front and back cover.

I then added a picture of Stacey the other band member on the back as she isn't on the front, this is because with the crowd on the front cover it can become to cluttered, and I am seen as the main band member and am seen in the music video more, and on Ska albums there is generally more then 4 members in a band, with the main singer in the middle at the front, so that is why I decided to focus on the main one.

Photoshop; Finished Outside Cover

This is my finished DVD cover, which combined the back cover, spine and front cover for 'The Madettes' album Welcome to the MadHouse.

Photoshop; Creating the Spine

To create the spine i opened up a new canvas with a width of 1.3 and height of 18.3. First I started with a blank black background and then took the band title font that I used on the front album over which I copied and the pasted onto the spine canvas. I then had to rotate the writing and shrink it down to a suitable size and put it just off the centre.

I then used a checkered pattern (which I found on a royalty free website) and put it on the top of the spine canvas and then continued this pattern towards the writing. I then used the magic wand to alter the colours of the checkers from white and black to white, with a few pink and purple random squares.

I then added a crowd onto the spine under the band name, which I kept on the same line as the previous the front cover ones, just a smaller version of it. I then put on the institutional information such as the dvd logo.

UPLOAD PICTURES

Photoshop; Creating The Front Cover

To create my front cover I started with the artist name and put it at the top. I decided to use a similar font to 'The Specials' ..

I then put in the crowd silhouettes that I created and just changed the outer glow between blue and a purple.

I then added a picture of the main singer form the band as there is already alot going on the cover so i decided to focus on the main singer from the band. it also goes against the conventions of Ska genre as the whole bad in normally shown on the album covers.

I then finished by adding the album title and for this used a different font as the first one i used ... is boring and thereofre doesnt get the idea across, so i chose a swiggly looking font for the ablum title called ...

Photoshop; Creating The Crowd

To create the background for my front and back cover of the DVD, I first took pictures of someone and used the magic wand and altered the tolerance, so that I could get rid of the background. I also used magnetic lasso to get a closer edge to the person to help create the prefect silhouette.

I then used a colour overlay effect, at a opacity of 100% and changed the colour to black to create a silhouette.

I then repeated this for a number of pictures, then free transformed them to be smaller and then copied them all onto a new sheet and then arranged the pictures to look like a crowd.

To finish it off I added a glow individually around each picture using the outer glow effect, on screen at 49% spread, I used a glow to make the crowd stand out as I wanted it to go on a black background to look like it was night and dark. I also chose a black background and dark blue's and purple was so that I can put a contrasting bright colour around the band. The bright colour is to resemble the madness of 'The Madettes'.

Research; Ska Covers; No Doubt

No Doubt is a modern version of Ska, they started in 1986 - present and during their career the band has won two Grammy Awards and has had sold 28 million records worldwide. The band broke traditional conventions of Ska as they entered the Ska Pop genre making they version of Ska more commercial. No Doubt also went against the checkered theme that Ska bands such as The Specials and The Selector, even the Ska ..albums used checkers on them.

This single cover that No Doubt has done places its main focus on Gwen Stefani the lad vocalist but they still hold on to the random element of Ska genre as Gwen is holding an orange, which doesn't link in with anything.

The other people on the cover are used to reinforce the song name 'Don't Speak'. However the people are shown speaking which can also relate to them going against the conventions.

The album cover also doesn't include checkers, and doesn't show any of the band members on the cover.

Also looking at a few other of their album covers you can see that the album covers have been influenced by the style of music they have been inspired by for the songs within the album, such as New wave, Dance Pop, Reggae and Dancehall.

Research; Ska Covers

The album cover that i am going to textually analyse is The Speicals 1st album, as i am doing a debut compliation album for my band the madettes. This albu follows all conventions of Ska which are the black and white theme, a simple front cover as it only consists of just a white background and a picture of the band taken fom birds eye, which i plan to incorporate within my album. The band is also wearning sunglasses as the form of Ska came under New Wave and incorporated forms of mob-subculture, The band had begun wearing mod/rude boy/skinhead style two-tone tonic suits, along with other elements of late 1960s teen fashions.

The album however dosesn't follow album cover convetnions such as the song titles being on the back cover, as they are on the front as well as the record label. The album also includes simple font, and the song list suggests that it is amied at a more mature auience that the style of audience that i am going for with my band.