This document discusses and analyzes several music album digipaks, including those for Red Hot Chili Peppers, Gorillaz, and Katy Perry. For the Red Hot Chili Peppers digipak, it notes the use of contrasting colors and close-up band images. The Gorillaz digipak features the band's cartoon characters against a simple white background. Finally, the Katy Perry digipak ties into her California Dreams tour through its candy-inspired visuals and inclusion of the artist herself.

1. Analysing DigiPaks Jess Pardoe

2. Red Hot Chilli Peppers As previously mentioned the colour scheme is very contrasting and makes each panel stand out individually; there is no simplistic colour palette for this digipak as it consists of: white, black, blue, green, red, orange and pink. I am particularly inspired by the use of close up images of the band and I think these work really well to represent who they are. There is a repeated image of a goat or sheep on some of the panels, I really like the quirky edge that this gives to the band; this is often found among Alternative Rock bands. This digipak is one I found among my remaining small collection of CDs, I really like this digipak as it is a considerably large one with many panels to it. The photoraphs of the band members individually are all really effective as they show what the band members look like to fans who have not seen them before. I have taken two pictures of the digipak, one of the front shown in the top image, and one of the reverse, shown beneath. I really like how the colours all contrast each other and none of the patterns particularly blend together; as they have used black and white as well as bright colours, this digipak is well constructed and reflects the bands ‘Alternative Rock’ personality. The CD itself is a copied image from one of the panels on the reverse side of the digipak, this works well as the continuity recognises that this digipak has not just been thrown together with every bit of colour they can fit in, but that there are some linking panels and designs. The album name ‘By The Way’ is not printed on the front cover which I think is effective as the buyer has to look further into the CD Case to find out what they are looking at. On the front of the hard CD case there are two stickers, one showing that they won a Brit Award in 2003, and another with ratings from multiple well known organisations.

3. Gorillaz This Gorrilazdigipak is incredible simple yet effective as it links directly to their video by using the same animated cartoon characters. The white background makes the images stand out really well, which is ideal as they are cartoons and have smooth edges, whereas with a real person this could be more difficult to cut around unless the photograph was taken against a white background originally. The colour scheme is different depending on the panel as the characters have their own colours. Overall the colours are dull with white backgrounds, this works well if the digipak is portraying a clean, studio look. This is suitable for Gorillaz as a band as they are an alternative rock band. The front cover of this digipak is very effective and I really like the style of the black border surrounding the images; this layout could work for my album cover of The Skeleton Boys as there are four band members. I really like the idea of using small white writing against the black background as it means the main focus is on the image of the cover rather than using a decorative font as it could take attention away from the iconography of the band itself. The CD uses the same image as the album cover, this shows continuity throughout the design and that the designer has thought out the simplicity of their digipak rather than developing it into a very busy use of images.

4. Pink is a common themed colour throughout Katy Perry’s branding and merchandising, it reflects the tone of the music; I would like to try and show the genre/style of music through my colour scheme and images used within my digipak also. I think it is a really good way of showing iconography of the band without stating the audience or genre type directly. Katy Perry is featured on her digipak, this adds a personal touch to it so that the audience can see what the artist looks like if they have never seen them before. It looks better when the artist is on the cover or within the digipak as it shows their style and visual features which could reflect the band or artist themselves. Katy Perry The idea for Katy Perry’s album was to feature it around her California Dream Tour, the album digipak and tour linked into her first single from the album, California Gurls. The video for the single was set in a made-up world built of sweets and chocolate, like the traditional fairytale of Hansel and Gretel. So the theme of sweets continues through to her album, on the CD’s. The patterns used link in with the colour scheme used throughout the digipak and CDs, as well as Katy Perry’s music videos and tours and other products she sells as merchandise. I picked this digipak to look at because although it is not related to the indie/alternative genre it is an iconic product to look at; it shows the artist, iconography and a personal touch through a small number of pages. The fonts used are simple and tie in with the whole girly, pop-style theme that the digipak shows, this is a really good example of how a digipak should reflect on the artists individuality and i will use this as inspiration when I create my digipak.