The document provides an analysis of various album packaging designs, including: - The Coldplay album Ghost Stories features angel wings on the cover representing songs, with no title to leverage their brand recognition. - Text on the Coldplay digipak is prominently displayed and uses bold colors to stand out against the dark background. - The OneRepublic album Native features animals representing band members on the cover and CD, with consistent colors and fonts building their brand image. - Imagery, colors, fonts and positioning are carefully designed across all components to represent the music and attract audiences while establishing the artists' brands.

1. Digipak and magazine
analysis
Wojciech Koszynski

2. Coldplay Ghost Stories
The front cover of the Coldplay album Ghost Stories
consists of a pair of angel wings in the middle as the
centre of attention of the cover, which makes it stand out,
also the wings are white and the background is dark and
dull, which connotes the vibe of the lyrics of the songs.
The songs in the album are represented in the cover,
such as A Sky Full of Stars is a song and an image in the
cover as well a Midnight and Oceans.There is no title on
the cover, which is a common convention in Coldplay
album covers, however this shows that the Coldplay
brand is popular enough to not require a title.

3. Text positioning
The first cover of the album has no text on the cover,
however the back cover and the cd do contain text that
is positioned primarily in the centre of the cd and cover.
The text that is used for the digipak for Coldplay’s
album Ghost Stories is basic as the font is bold and
has a bright colour compared to the other colours used
in the digipak, which makes it more attractive to the
audience. The album name is displayed on the CD, the
text is placed at the top centre of the disc as it's an
area audiences would usually focus on, also the
bottom contains small section displaying Copyright
laws. In regards to the back cover, it contains the song
list in the album, it's displayed at the centre of the
cover, therefore it makes the songs the clear focal
point of the cover. Also, some of the song titles are
represented with visuals within the digipak.

4. Typography design
All the texts used in the Coldplay album
are very easy to read, this is due to the
fact that the font is basic and the colour is
gold, which contrasts really well with the
other colours and these factors used
consistently create a spark of brightness
around the cold atmosphere created by
the dark background.

5. Imagery and Colours
Throughout the whole digipak the components used are nearly identical to each other as
all the parts of the digipak contain the midnight ocean design background, therefore they
all create an overall style of a bright spark within darkness. The digipak doesn’t contain
any image of the band, which is highly unusual for a album cover, this may be due the
the fact that Coldplay have a large enough brand image to not require images of them
for customers to recognise its their album, however the components within this digipak
do represent the vibe of the songs and style of the band’s music as the song titles are
represented in the cover. For example, the songs Always In My Head, Magic and
Another’s Arm are represented by the wings as they could project a guardian angel, so
it's a form of magic in some’s head and he is holding onto the arm. The wings could also
represent the title of the album Ghost Stories because it's only angel wings, so it could
mean there's a ghost angel. Additionally, the song Midnight and Oceans are
represented and reflected on the bottom of the digipak and A Sky Full of Stars at the
top.
The colour scheme for this digipak it consistent because the same background image is
used throughout but only the wings and texts change which have different colours,
however the background for the front cover is slightly brighter than the other.

6. Mag poster for Coldplay Mylo Xyloto
Imagery-The background of the poster contains a wall of graffiti with
various vibrant bold colours that contrast with the genre of the pop band
Coldplay. The brightness of the colours makes the poster stand out and
makes it highly more attractive to the audience, therefore this makes it
harder for audiences to not read it because it the whole poster looks
interesting. The graffiti could represent the wild and unexpected nature of
pop because you never know what type of song will be made for the genre,
whether it's slow or fast, so this wall of graffiti shows how different songs in
the industry can be, some being more creative than the other. However,
despite being different, the background is not highly detailed, this is due to
the fact that they want the audience to be focused on the name of the
album and group. In addition to the colours, many big fans of the band
would notice that the colour scheme is a representation of the colourful
piano that Chris Martin uses, this is a method for the big fans to quickly
make connections with the two and recognise this is Coldplay’s album and
it is also a way to create a wider brand, expanding from just the piano,
which is already recognised, to something bigger, so the band is more
recognisable. The overall view of the poster contains enough components
to target any pop audience members as it has a great variety.

7. Text- The album title Mylo Xyloto is Balinese for “The Love. Of Mine”
This would help the band express themselves as more emotional
people their audience because the title reveals they are quite
romantic people and it shows they have passion for what they do
and the people they love, so that could attract people with similar
values. The font of the title is see through with an outline to display
the text, which makes the text slightly more confusing and difficult to
read because the background is visible in the void. The text is
positioned in the middle of the poster with the largest font size so the
audience could recognise the name of the album. However in a
smaller font size, above the album name is the name of the band in
the same font type, which shows that the band is popular enough
that it doesn’t require to focus on marketing their name on the poster
instead they can focus on getting the album greater attention. Also,
underneath the main title is the release date of the album, therefore
the audience can clearly recognise the release of the album and
right at the bottom the poster displays a method to purchase the
album on iTunes and their website, this is presented in a smaller font
and more bold font so it accommodates the smaller font so it's
readable, however the reason why its smaller is because not
everyone uses iTunes or wants to visit their website, but it's a way to
get their audience to interact more with their music and the band.

8. OneRepublic Native
The front cover of the digipak for Onerepublic’s
Native contains 5 unique animals in the centre of
the cover, these represent the 5 members of the
band as each member represents one of the
animals which include a mountain tiger, fox, owl,
gazelle and bison. The wide variety of colours
used in the cover are quite flamboyant as they
express different moods as the red in the middle
bonds the passion of the band, whereas the other
colours coming from the animals such as the blue
that arises shows the personality of the member
that represents the owl. Also, the name of the
band is displayed in the centre with a large tribal
font, with the album name below it in a smaller
font. These are used to help increase the brand
image of the band.

9. The CD for OneRepublic’s album Native has a slightly dull and plain
design because the colour is plain white accompanied by some text
and art designs which possess a orange, this could be a way to reflect
on the word “Native” because an individual’s native place is
somewhere easily known to the person, so it doesn’t require analysis
to get around, which could in terms of the band mean they have gone
back to their roots in music as they want to do something they are
familiar with. The text on the CD is placed at the bottom, similar to the
front cover the name of the band is bigger than the album name, again
an attempt to make the name “OneRepublic” more recognisable and
popular, also the type of font is the same, however the institution
involved have their logos placed at the bottom as well. Finally, similar
to the front cover, the CD has 5 lines at the top to represent the band
members, each line has a different design to represent the personality
or character of the band member, for example, one of the lines has 2
lines crossing each other which could mean that member is close to
his family as it looks like a DNA helix.

10. The design of the back cover differs to the other
components of the digipak, this is due to the fact that the
base colour is primarily cream, however the colour of the
text is consistent as they have kept the orange, which
represents happiness, therefore it shows that they are
happy with their product and want to spread the happiness
of their song onto other people/ their fans. The main text
displays the names of all the songs in the album and this is
placed in the centre of the cover, which makes it the focus
point of the back cover, this was done because they want
to make sure the fans will remember these songs. Also, in
the bottom left corner the copyright laws and institution
logos are displayed as information for the consumer.
Finally, in the bottom right corner the website of the record
label and band are displayed because this can get the fans
more interacted with the band and label, this could also be
used for future informational purposes.

11. Imagery
The main image is a long shot of the band in the centre of the
poster, the poster shows everyone in the band, which gives the
impression that their work is a team effort not an individual’s
works, which represents that everyone’s contribution is equal
and as worthy as anyone else in the band. Also, the lighting of
the shot shows that the spotlight is on them to shine, which
adds to the fact that the album as a whole encourages people
to move into the spotlight and move forward.
Titles
The album title name “Waking Up” gives the impression that
this is the band’s moment to get up of their feet and return their
former glory or this album could be seen as the waking of the
beast, as this could be the band’s breakthrough into the big
world to compete with bands like Coldplay. This could be an
inspiration to audiences as it will encourage people to follow
suit of the band’s attitude of moving forward in life. Also, the
“new hit singles” will attract audiences as it will persuade them
to buy the album as it contains widely recognised songs

12. Additionally, the bottom right corner has the logos
of all the institutions involved for informational and
marketing purposes of the audiences so they can
find what other bands in the genre they work with.
Also, the bottom left corner contains website URLs
for the audiences so they can get more interacted
with the activities and releases of the band.
Typography
The typography used in the poster are pretty basic
and simple in white, orange and blue, which
indicates that they don't produce anything out of
the genres capability, for instance they won’t make
hybrids of genres, they will stick with the core of
pop, which would attract audiences that
specifically like pop genre songs.