Digipack first daft feedback

George has created a prezzie  showing the feedback that we got on the first draft of the digipack  that i created. I am very pleased with the feedback that was given as we got a nice mix of constructive criticism and praise. I have taken the criticism on board and have taken action accordingly

FINAL DIGIPACK

This is the final digipack outcome. As you can see we have gone with the the "cosmos" as a theme throughout the design process. After getting a lot of feedback from others  about the digipack i found that everybody loved my design ideas and  the direction I was taking it in. I have changed the digipack according to the constructive criticism that was given.  People fed back to me saying that they could hardly see the text on the track list because the text was translucent. I changed this by making the background darker and the text much lighter, the contrast helping to show off the text much more clearly.

I also changed one of the photo panels by replacing it with a much clearer picture of cosmo. This  was created by George when he made a trial digipack in order to show a different take on the digipack. Luckily the colours went very well with the rest of the digipack  because of the use of fucia and purple. I changed this because people said  that they couldn't distinctively see cosmo within the picture.

track list

This is the improved track list. i had to change this because people were finding hard to read  the text. For this reason is changed the background as well as white highlights throughout the text. This has cleared up any confusion and also ties in better with the rest of the digipack

diary

We have come up with a new album title. After a large discussion we have decided to change the name from happy to Spectacle.This is because Happy is already a famous album by  Pharrel Williams therefor we have come up with a new name. We chose the name spectacle because it means large and flamboyant.This is how we want Cosmo to be perceived by the public. This is also cosmos first major album so having it called spectacle will be appropriate.

website

After getting feedback from our website Ben decided to change the website to fit with our digipack. So far we are very content with our website however Ben is still in the process of making the website look more professional.
                                         
http://thycosmo.wix.com/cosmo

UPDATE DIGIPACK

I have redone the front cover and the cd cover, all i have left to do now is the song list an the digipack will be completed.

CD for cosmo digipack

Updated digipack

I have updated the digipack after considering changing the name and song list. I have finished a part of the album art. All that needs to be done now is the songlist and front cover which will be done very soon. I feel that this new album art ties in better with the rest of the album than the other peice did. The colours tie together better and you can see that this is all part of the album.

spectacle

Replacement for "Happy" after looking into things we deicded it would be the best decision to change the name of the album and the songs. We can up with the name spectacle. Spectacle means something to be big and flamboint. This is how we want Cosmo to be represented. This is not the front cover however this will replace some album art that says the word happy.

digipack rough draft

This is a rough draft of our digipack. Since creating the digipack we have decided to change the name and the song list for this reason all we have to change is the front cover and the song list. We were origionally going to use the cover with happy on it however after a group meeting we decided the hand picture looked much nicer.

Production Diary #7 (Group Post)

Production Diary #7 (Group Post)

i been busy sketching and labelling, drafting up the storyboard, while ben been constructing a website and social media presence, and George has been carrying out research into magazine interview layouts, as well as digipak influences.

We are now prepared to start filming some elements of the production such as the performance, although the storyboard is not yet complete; after identifying availability of the school drama studio (spacious setting) and creating a rough shooting schedule, we will be able to film the performance sequences which will act as the base layer of footage for inter-cutting shots to layer above.

blog marking.

Grace starr

While the website is exciting and colourful with amazing imagery i feel that they haven't put enough effort into their merchandise. In my opinion i feel that they need to become a little more creative with the merchandise i suggest websites like  http://www.streetshirts.co.uk. I like how they have followed their "starr" in the media and the press i also love how they have arranged their photos. While the website is amazing i think they need to tie up a few loose ends such as merch. They have also added links to all of her social media accounts which allows you to keep up to date with grace. In all i think i would give with website 8/10. Even though the website is extremely well thought out and done well, it needs a few more tweaks to turn it into a 10.




Nicholas Alexander

The website as a whole is very good and well thought out however i feel that a little more work could have been taken into the photographs. In my opinion i feel that they should retake the photoshoot pictures and get someone who is able to take photos. Unfortunately they are all out of focus and are not clear in the slightest therefor this takes away from the professionalism of the page. I like how they have conducted interviews and looked into the more business side of the music industry including booking and things to do with his manager. They do not seem to have any merchandise at all on the site. I feel that this would be a good idea for them because it will make their site more appealing to fans that want to buy their merchandise to wear at their concert.




Encoded

The website is quite standard. Without being mean nothing really stands out at me. When it comes to their website i feel that they need to look into different designs and layouts for their photographs etc. This website does not include any merchandise of any kind. This makes the website look very unfinished and unprofessional. Even though these problems need to be addressed i do however like the contrast of white on black for the themes of the website.This makes the writing stand out and is very eye catching  i also love the count down they have put onto the site. I think this is a great idea for them . In conclusion all they need to do is play with the design and  make some merch.





Hybrid beauty

The Home page of the website is quite basic however i feel this adds to it because you are much more focused on the band than the stuff around it. I like how they have used the Facebook and twitter symbols to get to their social networking so that you can stay up to date with the band. I feel that the website could use a little more substance. i think that if you could add more pictures and maybe updates on the band then it will tell us more about them. I think that if you added a bio page about each of the girls along with a picture of each of them it will create much more appeal due to the fact we will know more about the girls we are listening to.

Alleyways

The home page of this website looks extremely professional. The lighting is very beautiful while the layout and design has been thought out extremely well. They have added a twiter, instagram, Facebook and even a you tube. They have also added an I tunes for you to buy the album once it is out. This is a very good example of a descent blog. In my opinion i feel they need some more photos. I have seen some of their other photos and they are amazing. If they put these on the website it will add so much to how it looks and how professional it is. I also think they need to add to their merchandise, while they do have a lot of cool and eye catching merch they could have some more, play around with designs etc.


Alex echo

Alex echos website is well done. I like the unique idea of the pictures on the home page. The home page is very pretty and to me looks quite professional. When looking through the website i noticed that they had very little merchandise so i believe they need to work on this aspect of the website. The info page is quite plane and boring, it would be nice to see a wider variety of photos much like the homepage. Although the website is quite simple it isn't in anyway boring. I dont think they need to have loads going on for it look good and i think adding lots more will make the website look too busy and messy. This could ruin the simple beauty that it has. They have also added all their social networks to keep you up to date .








James couleur

Although this website has alot of images and merchandise it is extremely unfinished. What they have so far seems okay but there is so much that has not been done that it is very hard to analyse what isn't there. I do like the layout on the homepage and also the twitter feed down the side. This means people do not have to actually go on their twitter to keep up to date with him, I think it would look nice if they had a few edited photographs that are made to look like a professional photoshoot. They have also added a direct link to the blog which helps show the influence behind everything.

Production Diary #6 (Group Post)

We have now summed up our general visual ideas for the video and the artist profile. Today we split three tasks between the each of us; I started to create some mood boards, Kaitlyn began drawing out a storyboard and Ben started to build and customise a website for COSMO.

The mood boards will gather influences together from other artists, for us then to identify what resources such as make-up and clothing we already have available or could get a hold of. The storyboard will obviously provide an indication of the shots we will take, and how they could be brought together in editing, while the website will help to boost COSMO's presence, to correlate with the Facebook page, a Twitter profile, various interviews and a digipak. 

A special thanks from cosmo

Here is a special thanks from cosmo to the people who are close to him. This is to go on the 3rd page of our digi pack, the front cover and the back is done so now all i have left to do is a bit more album art. As you can see the album has a very galaxy inspired theme to it. We decided that this would be a good theme to have because of cosmos psychedelic and "odd" qualities being out of this world the galaxy theme is meant to represent something you may hallucinate with the use of narcotics. Due to Cosmo being more appealing to that of people who grew up in the 60's or are now influenced by the hippy style we felt like this was extremely appropriate

changes

We have made many changes to our ideas about our music video for different reasons. Some things were a little too complicated and unrealistic whilst other idea’s just didn’t fit in with the concept as a whole. To start with we wanted the music video to be more gothic and serious were as now we went for the more light hearted psychedelic approach. We still wanted to make it strange and different but with a more traditional approach. We wanted to stick with the themes of the actual song and we didn’t want to get too far away from it as it would result in a music video that doesn’t make sense and also wouldn’t work.

There are some ideas that we have kept from the start and are still working on such as the many objects that we want to show in the video. We were going to have many more objects with little performance but soon realised that this would get very boring and would lead to people getting bored and also this wouldn’t be a good opportunity for Cosmo to get recognised. 

WEBSITE INSPIRATION

Cosmo Website Inspiration from bthflatt96


Ben is in charge of the cosmo website. He has put a slide together showing the influences behind his work on the website. 

GEORGES MOOD BOARD

our digipack inspiration and ideas

CD Cover Inspirations from bthflatt

together we have come up with ideas for inspiration for our digipack. Ben put a slide together to show what direction we are roughly going in  

Cosmo and the social media

We have added cosmos fan page on facebook and have also created him a twitter, before the photoshoot the page was quite bland and plain. After the photoshoot we uploaded a variety of colourful and eye catching photographs that show cosmos energy and positivity.

 

PHOTOSHOOT COLLAGE

photos taken and edited by me

smusic video preview

Production Diary #5 (Group Post)

Today we started to consider our artists' name, image, profile etc. After searching through many quirky, psychedelic-sounding and 60's resonant names; we came across COSMO which really stuck, due to its bold impact and reminiscence to psychedelic and glam music of the 60's and 70's -KISS, QUEEN and T-REX to name a few.

We then began to come up with some logo designs, and design ideas for a digipak and website, influenced by similar artists such as The Doors and Pink Floyd.

After drafting some designs, we searched for some similar (and royalty free) typography to use and play around with in Photoshop.

Bold, simplistic, minimalist

Quirky, Psychedelic, Grungy

Modern, Stylised, Subtly Dark / Gothic

Donovan and similar artists; Pink Floyd, The Doors, T-Rex

Production Diary #2 (Group Post)

Today we discussed our music video concept in greater detail with our teacher, identifying the logistics, potential locations and scenes, potential difficulties and so on.

After discussing the concept, we have a clearer idea of the performance element of the video - the performer will have to move slowly with the beat of the track, and be dressed to suit the tone in a subtle way, i.e. not quite as Gothic as we originally intended.

As a group we are now ready to go forward and prepare a timeline and storyboard along with the lyrics, lists of props and clothing and a vague timetable for when we are available to film.

DIGI PACK FRONT AND BACK

These are my front and back designs for the digipack so far, i was very undecided about the back therefor i made two versions of what i wanted, one matches the front more accurately while the other is very simple with colour links to the front. While i do like the first design i feel the second is better because you are able to clearly read the names of the songs on the album much more clearly.

COSMO INTERVIEW

George has made an interview featuring cosmo in vynl magazine.

letter

#

George wrote a letter to epic records to  notify them about the use of the song.

Survey and results

George has collected some feedback from people taking a survey

bens research

Ben has done some research into music institutions i.e. record labels, evaluating which institutions would or wouldn't be interested in signing cosmo to their record label.

National Anthem are  partnered with a few Indie artists, this may suggest that they would be interested in someone like cosmo. The label however seems to sign fairly general Indie music makers, so COSMO's blend of Rock, Folk, Psychedelic and Pop may not be of interest to them. 

Videos that use the same effects as we want.

these videos although they are not the same genre of music as our song, they do however use the same kind of filters as we want. W e want to create a 1960's grainy feel to our video. Lana del ray uses this alot in her videos therefor i went out of my way to research her videos and look into some of the themes behind her videos. Lana del ray is obsessed with the 1940's- 60's era and presents this a lot in her videos with the use of costume and video effects. for this reason i felt she was a particularly good artist to research when it comes to modern artists taking the past and bringing it into the present.

playing with filters and editing

While we have been working george has been working hard to play and experiment with different filters, we want to create a 60's hippy vibe and the only way we feel we will do with is through filters that can create an old grainy look.

vynl ( our record label)

We had decided that we wanted to call our record label vynl, We came together to come up with the name we feel that the modern quirky way of spelling it goes well with cosmos general look.

story board

Digipack ideas

Here is our digipak idea that ben hasdrawn up. Ben wanted to draw it out instead of using a computer as he thought he could draw his ideas more clearly. He wanted there to be a couple of pictures of Cosmo and and also some strange psychedelic imagery. He thought this will help to establish the artist and the genre. we think that it is important for Cosmo to be on the digipak as he is a new artist which we want to promote and also get his image recognized.

Production Diary #4 (Group Post)

Yesterday we filmed a few recee shots, some to test lip syncing, and others to try out some artistic shots with unusual items. As soon as this has been edited, we will be able to get a general overview of how the final production might look.

Following on, today we continued with pre-production by locking down some final ideas and drafting a rough storyboard; although there are a number of shots set for specific points in the timeline, some are not so set in stone, and are likely to be moved around and tried in different places in post-production editing. 

Ben noting down some final ideas

MERCH

https://www.flickr.com/photos/127384594@N05/

http://www.streetshirts.co.uk/



On the website street shirts i created a variety of shirt and bag designs to sell to the public. The origional designs(vinyl record) were created by ben however i added a few ideas of my own. The colours of yellow and black link well with the website while the black and white links well with everything else.

audience

George created a survey which we could use to gain useful information about how people consume music. We think this information will help us reach our target audience and also help us gain more knowledge about the music industry. George created this survey using Survey Monkey.

Changes we have made

Throughout our planning we have changed quite a few things, we changed alot of stuff to see what we could make better. For instance when it comes to the make up  we only decided to do this last minuite. We thought this would be a good idea because it gave the video a 60's glam rock feel. Alhough we chose a quite psycadelic song we managed to mix it with a very modern theme. We also changed our minds a few times on the objects that we would choose. Origionally in the video I was going to wear a red cloak and a micky mouse mask in order to  represent the industry being shrouded in lies like a massive cult.

We changed this because we wanted to focus more on the symbolism of the micky mouse mask and how the actual symbol itself is the representation of what is wrong with the industry, i then pull my mask away to reveal mascara smeared down my face in a crying fashion. We changed a few shots. Origionally the majority of the shots were extreme close ups only showing mouth and eyes, this was to show the intimacy between the singer and the audience.However this was also quite inpersonal due to the fact you were unable to see the full singers face. For this reason we  showed a variety of shots with the singer clearly focusing on him while not making it too over the top. The simple white background that we chose takes away any busyness from the shot and helps focus on the singer. With the objects edited in between the performance shots we thought that this would allow the subject of the song to be apparent while also making the performer clear.

We also changed our idea of props. Origionally george was going to wear a hat however we thought that this would distract from the performer himself, Instead we used a bandanna and a pair of sun glasses.I was completely unsure about what to do with the makeup but in the end george gave me the idea to film the progression of him makeup starting of as simple and then finishing as quite vibrant and detailed. I added green eyeshaddow origionally to his eyes, then purple, then blue, then glitter, then diamonds. By the end of it he looked like he had a clear influence from glam rock  which was popular around 1970's.

We were origionally going to take some shots outside but we felt in the end that the shots taken inside the set we made fit better with the theme of the song. this helped us stick to the  type of music video we were going for and therefore didnt make us go off route.  We havnt finished the other half of the song yet so therefor there may be further changes to what we want to do we may decidede we don't want some propps or want even more.

diary

I have finished the story board with colour and have listed all the shots. We have a range of shots for our story board such as close ups, pans, tilts, longshots etc.  I coloured it to show the use of makeup and key use of colour within the video. The video is now half filmed with all the performance based stuff out of the way. Now we have left to film our objects that tie in with the theme of the song such as: Manaquin head
bunny girl
demon horns
pocket watch
cheshire cat
dunny
beatle juice
bens eyes

website plan

Ben sketched out a little plan for the website. we want the website to look like this and ben will hopefully be able to make it. This is a sketch of the master page which is roughly what all of the pages on the website will look like with some small changes depending on the page. For example the 'Get Social' page will feature Cosmo's twitter feed. bensays he would like there to be a bar that stays at the top of the page which the user will be able to use for navigation and social tools such as liking and following

Production Diary #3 (Group Post)

Today, we divided a number of tasks between us; drafting a lyric timeline and storyboard, research into similar music videos, and research into similar artists' websites and digipaks.

We have found that the videos, websites, album covers etc. of similar artists are very different to what we visualise; we plan to modernise the vibe of the 60's psychedelic track, and have explored modern artists such as Jack White and their videos and digipaks.

merch sketches

Here is a sketch of some of the merchandise that we would like to sell on the website. The merchandise that ben has sketched is quite strange as we have included a scarf and a bandanna as we thought this would fit Cosmo's target audience. Ben has discussed some more merchandise ideas with the group and we have said we would also like a Cosmo mug and coaster which include the logo and maybe a picture of Cosmo.

playing with album art