Costume and Styling Ideas

The theme behind the song that I am using for my music video is about growing up and so I wanted to create a sense of childhood and innocence through my use of costumes. When styling my model for both my video and my ancillary texts, I strictly followed conventions and stereotypes to ensure that the message I was trying to portray was definitely understood by the audience.
I dressed my model in a pink and white striped jumper, jeans which were ripped at the knee and pink converse boots which paired well with the jumper. In addition to this outfit which suggested innocence and childhood, I styled her hair in plaits as I felt this was a cute hair style and had strong connotations childhood and innocence as well as also being very girly which worked well with the dominating colour of the clothing which was pink.

Pink and White Striped Jumper:












Ripped Jeans:

Pink Converse Boots:













Plaited Hair:

Because of the connotations of childhood and innocence, I chose not to use any make up on my model as I thought not only would it be inappropriate to use make up on an 8 year-old, in my opinion, but it would also be unrealistic and models in music videos within the indie genre are not usually wearing a full face of make up so even if my model had of been at a suitable age to wear make up, I would've chosen to a natural look anyway.

Use of Moftif's / Logo's

Motif: "a dominant, reoccurring idea in an artistic work."
Logo: "a symbol or another small design adopted by an artist to identify it's products"

Artists and bands use motifs as a way of branding and commercialising themselves as well as using it as mechanism for them to become recognised globally  and build a loyal fan base because audiences are able to recognise a logo no matter where in the world they are or what language they speak. These logos are used on almost everything to do with the band, it can be seen on things like:

• merchandise, e.g. t-shirts, wristbands, hoodies
• new-release posters
• albums
• drum kits
• music videos

One example of band that uses their logo as a motif is 'The XX'. The way that this band use their logo as a motif is effective because it creates continuity and fluidity throughout all of their albums, songs and merchandise which allows the band to become a product that their fans can buy into thus commercialising the band.



Throughout their music video for the song 'Islands' their logo, which is the letter 'X' as this a direct link to the name of the band, is used differently a total of 5 times. It is used effectively in this music video because it is prominent however it doesn't distract from the main focus of the video which is the choreography which is performed by the dancers. They use it creatively though because when they want to make it the main image in the shot they are able to do so like in picture 5 where they have added the flames so that it looks like their logo is on fire and draws the audiences eye immediately to it.

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The Effect of Fonts on Album Covers

The font that is an important convention of a digipak whether it is a bold font that has been used or they have chosen a more subtle one.

On this album cover for Beyonce's self-titled album 'Beyonce' the text is the primary focus of the album cover. This works as an effective album cover for an artist that is as famous as Beyonce because her name is well-known globally so people only need to hear her name to know who she is. After conducting research and a detailed analysis on existing digipak's, I recognise that this album cover is very unconventional however it is still successful because of how famous and well-known Beyonce is therefore an image of the artist which is usually used to help the audience recognise whose album it is, is not needed for this album. the way in which Beyonce released this album also caused uproar on social media because announced it through a single tweet which came as a complete surprise to those fans who had been wondering when her next album would be released. The fact that so many people were talking about it acted as free promotion in a way and this also contributed to how well known this album has become.
The font on this album cover is bold and simple and follows a minimalistic style. the black background allows the writing to stand bold and prominent so that it is eye-catching to the audience and the light pink colour that the text is in stereotypically connotes femininity which is a topic that Beyonce empowers and promotes to her audience and fans.

In contrast to album covers like this one, some also have no text on their front cover like the album below from the band Alt-J. on this album the band and album name are placed along the spine of the album and so, from a sales point of view, the fact that there is no text on the front cover may not be so much of a disadvantage to them depending on the way in which the CD's are stacked and presented in stores.
The cover of this album is more of a piece of artwork which is likely to be more appreciated by the audience of music from an indie genre compared to those who listen to pop music. In artwork, the message is often much deeper than it first appears and the same applies to the lyrics and meaning behind indie music - the audience are much more willing to seek out the deeper meaning whereas in pop music the message is much more obvious. As a result of the lack of information on the album cover this means that more promotion could be needed in order to make the album successful as possible, this could also help promote the band at the same time which would expand their audience as they are currently an indie-rock band and so they only have a niche audience because they are signed to an independent record label, Infectious Records.

Digipak Analysis (2)

Digipak Analysis