2. Digipaks.
Lana Del Rey: Ultraviolence.
The front cover is a black and white vintage
photo of Lana Del Rey. It is a medium long
shot on the artist dragging our gaze on her.
She wears all white contrasting with the dark
background, thus we indicate the dark themes
of the album. The genre is alternative pop, so
the editing of the pick is simple, also its title is
written with big white letters, quite simple but
still stands out from the dark background. The
inside of the digipak is a medium close up of
the artist lying on some flowers and smocking.
Again Lana Del Rey is the main subject of the
digipak. She is smocking and looking
devastated, again indicating dark themes of
the songs. However she is surrounded by
colourful flowers, which highly contrast with
the rest of the images on the digipak and it
looks like she is dreaming, indication of
escapism and denial of reality. The back cover
is similar to the front cover, black and white
screen filters, Lana wearing all white and
being the main subj
ect of the image and the song titles on white.
3. All in all, the main symbolism of
the digipak is the following: As the
first song of the album title is “is a
cruel world”, so everything looks
grim . However, the inside image
contains the CD with her music ,
so its like she is relaxing and
everything becomes more
colourful when she listens to music
( the CD itself is colourful ),
however by the end when the songs
are finished and we see the back
image is like she woke up from her
dream and the lack of music brings
her back to the grim reality. The
digipak was made for an alternative
pop artist, so the editing is quite
simple and make uses of “vintage”
filters that fits with the artist’s style
and is also made to look simple,
darker and dream-like, not intense
and edited in order to look glossy
or fake, so it really fits in with the
genre.
4. Riahna: Loud.
Riahna is the main subject in her
digipak. The front and the back
cover is a close up on her face.
Whereas, the cover in the middle is
a medium long shot of her lying on
roses. The title of the album is in
thin white letters and it doesn’t
attract the eye. What is really
dominant is the red colour
signifying passion and it relates
with the red roses in the middle
cover, indicating Riahna is
passionate and her white outfit
indicates innocence, creating an
image of a passionate person
growing ( she relates herself with a
growing rose). The fact that she is
the main object in each picture
indicates stardom and is a means
to self promotion and since she is
an attractive woman the photo
hasn’t undergone any major
Photoshop or changing in the
colours.
5. Adverts For Albums.
This is a poster advertising the album
“suddenly I see” by After Midnight. The
band is squashed together in the poster and
are doing grimaces. They are represented as
cool girls, not caring about heir image and
not hesitating making fun of their selves.
Also the fact that they are close to each
other represents the “togetherness” and
team spirit of their band. They are dressed
in a simple manner, indicating that they are
simple and laid-back persons, which is a
new fashion in music industry, neglecting
the well established representation of a
starlet persona. Moreover, the fact that the
picture is not heavily photoshoped and
there is no special background, adds a new
layer in the pop-alternative genre.
6. This is the advert for album “Loud”
by Riahna, which is a binary
opposite in comparison with the
previous advert. There is a close up
on Riahana, reinforcing the
stardom archetype. She wears a fur
coat and expensive sunglasses
indicating glamour and status.
Unlike the girls in the previous
poster she looks less approachable.
Again the red is a dominant colour,
attributing to Riahna’s image as a
passionate woman and she also
hold a rose as in the digipak. Last
but not least, the lighting is well
adjusted so the notions of
voyeurism are applied on the cover
( Riahna is literally all what the
audience can see).
