My analysis of Rihanna's Loud Digipak A-Level Media

1. Red is stereotypically a sexual colour and
symbloises the emotions or mood of love.
The use of red becomes a theme within the
digipack, Rihanna’s hair is died red which is
complimised with the red lip stick. This
draws your attention to her lips which
appears to emphasises sensuality. Love and
desire is expressed through this colour
having a reflection on the lyrics of the song
which is being advertised. The additional red
blush in her checks attracts the male gaze as
well as attention of others. The contrast
between her skin tone and her hair creates a
flawless eye catching effect.
The close up of the artists follows the theory of
Goodwin as the audiences likes to receive close
ups of the artists to feel like they are closer to
them as well as making them looking more
physically attractive, this creates the star image.
As her face is the center of attention the
audience automatically knows who the artists,
this makes Rihanna her own trademark her a
close up of her face is seen continuously
through her albums. Her beauty is emphasised
because it attracts her target audience, whilst it
attracts the audience male gaze, her female
audience will be inspired by her fashion and
appearance.
The text is very simple, the
white colour against the red
theme and Rihanna’s skin tone
stands out and it is clearly
visible to the buyer. The
typography is quite spaced out,
creating the effect of being free
and having a lot of space to
think and breath.
The lighting on across the image is a rose pink colour. This
artificial lighting complimises the red theme across the album
cover because it enhances the redness of the lips and hair but
due to this chrome effect the shadows have a blue tinge to
them, blue and red are complimentary colours which work
really well together. This effect also creates a soft feminine
effect, giving the impression that the single has relaxing and
calm rhythm.
The front of the album on has the title of the
single on and not the name of the artist. This
again follows Goodwin’s theory. Rihanna’s face is
her trade mark, instead of stating her name her
face is what the audience recongises. This is
beneficial to the record label as it crosses off
two elements on one, both advertising and
allowing the audience to understand the artists.
Rihanna’s eye line is very low, so much
so that her eyes looked almost shut. This
eye line looks like she is hiding
something and looks as if she is trying to
shut out the rest of the world. Her lips
are opened firmly with a slight pout, this
ruby red pose looks quite submissive,
regardless to her eyes looking shy her
lips create an impact that she is trying to
flatter someone, perhaps she is flirting
and trying to subdued someone. This
engages the audience as it pulls them in
giving them suspense on what the secret
could be.
Even though Rihanna’s colour scheme is red
resulting in her skin tone having a chrome
wash across it, her make-up is quite subtle.
Her eyebrows are smoothly brushed but not
much make-up is put on top. Her eye lashes
are long and however fake eye lashes are
added with mascara to make them thicker as
well as emphasis her eye line. Highlighter is
added on her cheek bones and her nose
bridge to show glamour and give a pretty
shimmering look. Enhancing the male gaze
and making her younger female audience
want to be her.
The tattoo on Rihanna’s neck isn’t fully
visible however the slight glance of the
tattoo makes her look more fierce and a
stronger as tattoo’s are stereotypically
meant to hurt, therefore for her to have
one on her neck makes her look stronger.

2. The colour scheme of red follows within the
digipak. The CD is pink, despite this being a
slightly lighter colour it still falls within the red
colour family. The dark pinks and white allow
the words and logos to stand out as well as
blend in with the colour scheme. The
typography is the same on the CD disc as well
as the front cover. This is to keep the
continuous theme throughout the digipak.
The image on the disc is a rose. The rose
could represent love and passion. Also
roses are a symbolic present given to
those who you love. With roses being
pink in the image and not red will link
with the theme without washing the
whole product in red. The inside of the
digipak is of Rihanna lying in a bed of
roses therefore giving a linking element
for the cd and images to match.
On the rose image there are water
droplets of several petals. The water
droplets could represent tears of her as
she has made a mistake, however
because we are going with the theme
that she has emotional shot him down
then the water droplets could be his
tears, as if he is crying over the rose he
was going to give to her.
The text on the repeats the title, however
unlike the front cover the artists name Is
added. You can’t see Rihanna’s face
therefore to continuously advertise the
artist and make sure her audience knows
that the single is by her.
On the CD there are 3 logo’s. This is
to advertise the companies which
have come together to help create
this single. Here you have these
logo’s again in a hot pink colour,
regardless to the original colour of
the logo. The 3 logos are Def Jam
which is Rihanna’s record label; the
disc company to represent and
acknowledge the audience that it is
a CD disc. To emphesis what these
logo’s are below is the logo’s titles.
Round the rim of the disc are titles of
Rihanna’s other singles, such as Man down,
California and Only Girl in the World, this to
advertise to the audience other songs she
has created as well as promote them. For
example if they like this singe then they
might look at other singles she has created,
or if they have already heard of the other
singles and liked them you might already
know it is going to be something you’ll like
to listen to.

3. The focus point of the centre of this digipak is image. Again the trade
mark of Rihanna’s body features are using to fill the space. Despite
not being able to see her full body completion she has her more
sexualised objects on show which attracts the male gaze as well as
making her look very beautiful. A mid- shot is used of Rihanna’s body
to capture her face and her breast which are quite a strong image at
this stage.
As pointed out before the theme of
red is used throughout, obviously her
hair colour is red which is
compromised with her red lipstick,
which is also an re-enactment of the
front cover. The red continues to
symbolise love and affection.
The inside cover also has
connection to the image on
the disk. As before mentioned
the disk is an image of a rose,
here you see Rihanna lying on
a bed of roses. Roses are
stereotypically symbolise love
and usual mean a male giving
them to a female. Here lying in
a whole bed of them can
create the message that she
get roses all the time for either
the same or a numerous
amount of boys. This
emphasise her easy use of her
looks. In her hand she hold’s a
punch of additional red roses.
12 roses are the cute gesture
used across the world to
represent love. As the
audience you can only see 10
roses however where the
image cuts off it could suggest
that the other are on the cut
off point of the page. This
shows she is loved or she is
giving the roses to the
audience so could juxtapose
the meaning and Rihanna
could be showing her love to
her audience and/or fans.
The dress Rihanna is
wearing is of a pale pink,
the same pale pink as the
CD itself. Due to the
positioning of the CD the
dress and CD have to be of
similar colour to make the
CD a little bit less obvious.
The CD slot is on the dress
therefore if the dress is the
similar colour the CD would
blend and not stand out to
much. The dress has a
natural flow to it, this
juxtaposes the title of the
single ‘loud’. ‘Loud’ is quite
a harsh word quite is
aggressive which is
complete opposite to the
dress, both colour and
textures are subtle which
creates different messages
and meanings to the song
which would lead to the
audience listening to the
lyrics more.
Rihanna’s body figure is very sleek. The use
of make-up (highlighter) helps increase the
skinnies. The make-up is added to the jaw
line and the title in her head helps
emphases the sharpness of it, it’s also
added to the collar bone to look skinnier.
Also a slight highlight is added to the boob,
the additional make-up draws attention to
these key parts, allowing her target
audience to want these body parts and
attract the male girls. The idea of the
‘perfect’ body is massive, especially in
todays society therefore, with Rihanna
having this ‘perfect’ figure, it gives hope to
her target audience.
Rihanna’s pose I would say looks
a little bit like ‘Sleeping Beauty’.
This is a fairy tale story creating
the idea that her song is of the
fantasy idea of romance and has
the fairy tale dream to it. The
majority of songs especially in
R’n’B have the common theme of
love and sex, with the other hints
from both the images and colour,
a strong idea is made that this
single is about love and sex.

4. The pink theme is used
again within the back
cover therefore as a
whole the digipak has a
pink theme.
A long shot is used think this
image, this means the whole
digipak as a whole range of
angles of the artist. Again the
image is only of Rihanna
emphasising that she is the
trademark image for herself.
Even though she is sat down a
long angle is still applied as you
can see her whole image. This
gives the digipak length and
depth. As so did the front cover
in this image Rihanna has her
head down, we never see a full
image of her eyes therefore
creating a mystery on why this
is the case. The looking down
shows the shyness and
insecurity of the character
within the single. Despite being
confident and flattering in the
middle picture she seems to be
keeping a secret and keeping
herself away from everyone.
Maybe despite having all these
admirers she still hasn’t found
the right one which makes her
upset.
As this an item which is to be sold the barcode is on the bottom
right. I know that the digipak needs to have a barcode however this
looks really out of place and stands out to much. I suppose if you
work at a checkout it’ll be easier to find and scan the barcode but it
doesn’t fit in with the theme. Maybe the barcode could have been
pink to fit in, however this could effect the scanning process.
The writing on the back isn’t very
bold, it looks as if it is in the same
font as the title on the front. The
context of the writing are a list of
different artists she has worked
with. After looking into research
these artists are all under the
same record label, concluding for
this to be a advertisement
campaign for the record label,
suggesting if the audience liked
Rihanna single then there’s a high
chance that they’ll like the other
artists as well. The writing of the
artists are in pink to keep with the
theme and like the CD is the main
focus of righting therefore for it to
be in colour makes it more
interesting and stand out. Below
the pink writing of the artists are
the logos and in the small print
the details of the record label
used for Rihanna. This is
important to advertise the record
label because it creates a higher
profile for the record label. The
writing is in white because it’s not
as obvious as the pink writing and
blends slightly in with the
background, I feel that the writing
is slightly faded. This writing
makes the back cover look busy
and despite being a pink washed
colour is has character.
Round her neck is a ball pattern scarf/ necklace. This is a fashion
accessory and could become a fashion icon for the target
audience. The scarf is a weird design which you don’t see
therefore making her style more retro and unique. Her netted
dress again is unique and pretty, with the holes on the outfit it
makes her look like she is showing a lot of flesh. Even though she
is quite exposed her body language is very timid.