Non - Narrative Illustration - Vinyl Packaging

I found a website online where it tells me all of the measurements needed for 12" Vinyl Packaging. This is going to be really helpful when I come to create my packaging. http://www.piratespress.com/cms/12-inch

The image above is an example of the templates you can download from that website I linked. It is a screen shot of the PC screen because the image size was too big to upload.

I have also been looking at different way of creating vinyl packaging, I found a few interpretations of a vinyl cover, the first being just the simple one side slit sleeve with a hole cut out of the front, a single slit sleeve with no hole (most common), a one where is a top slit sleeve at the back and a book at the front, I really like this idea, I feel like you could write song lyrics on the different pages like you do in CD inserts. There was also a concertina style cover where it was able to hold 3 vinyls and it opens out in a zigzag shape which I thought looked really cool and lastly I found one in a box which I think is a cool idea. After looking at these designs I feel like it would be really awesome to create something a little bit different rather than create the simple side / top slit sleeve, I think, depending on the illustration I do for the album, I will consider which style would be best for what I design. I would rather create the design then work it around a vinyl sleeve than pick a vinyl sleeve and work an illustration around that, this is just in case I change my mind on the style of packaging I want to produce.

I also looked at some of the most famous album art works which I like the style of. The purpose of this was to just grab some inspiration of simplistic album artwork and to analyse and think about how the artist has created the design. 

The front cover of this consisted of a photograph of The Clash's bassist smashing his bass on stage at The Palladium in New York. The photographer of the image, Pennie Smith, refused to let them use this image as she wasn't fully happy with the result with it being out of focus but that was until graphic designer Ray Lowry said it would make a good album cover and then the photograph was named the best rock and roll photograph of all time. The album cover was designed by Ray and is a homage of Elvis Presley's self titled album. I have mixed feelings about this because I like the photograph but the fact that this is a homage puts me off a little. 

The artwork for The Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd was designed by George Hardie. They had a few different designs to choose from but they decided that the prism was the best to choose. There were 3 aspects the band wanted to be shown through the album art and that was stage lighting, the lyrics to the album and the fact they wanted it ''simple and bold''. This is probably one of the most famous album covers of all time and I like it because it is in fact simple and bold and I really like the black background. 

This is also one of the most well known albu covers in music. It was designed by Peter Saville who has history of designing posters. The image is radio waves from The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Astronomy. Saville simply inverted the colours of the sound wave and printede it onto textured card for the album. And since then this art work has been iconic even outside of the music industry. I really like this because of the contrast between the black and white. I also really like the line, it has a texture and it looks really nice.

 (Apologies for explicit text)
This obscene title came from 2 Sex Pistols fans who would always say it to each other and it means to stop talking rubbish. They had to start removing or toning down their public posters because of the cover. The cover was designed by Jamie Reid. He states that he sees punk as an art form therefore the pop phenomenon was not what interested hi. His designed were mostly anti-establishment and complicated and after the release of this album punk bands started using the ransom-not lettering a lot more. When I see a design like this I immediately think Punk. I associate this type of art with punk music and bands and I really like it. I'm not too keen on the colours of this cover but the text is what draws me in.

This has to be Nirvana's most famous album, mostly due to it's album cover. When watching a show about water births Kurt Cobain said that's when he came up with the idea of this. Robert Fishers hired a photographer to go to a pool for babies and take pictures. The baby on the cover is called Spencer Elden and he was the son of the photographers friend. There was some concern about this image as you can see the boys circumcised penis and an alternative cover was mentioned where there wouldn't be a penis visible but Kurt said no and said that he would accept if there was a sticker covering the penis saying "if you're offended by this, you must be a closest pedophile.'' I think the imagery is awesome for this album but I don't think it is as good as some of the rest. I don't get much inspiration from this.

This is Blur's 'best of' album and it was created by Juian Opie and the original painting can be found in the National Portrait Gallery in London and this album has some similarities to Queens Hot Space.

I really like this album cover, the colours that have been used are really effective and resemble pop art. The stencil like portraits also resemble pop art and it gives the album a real simple look but it is also really effective and has became one of the most famous album artworks.