A

1.  

2. These are some examples of album
covers from the band One Direction.
Throughout the years you can see the
band has grown in maturity both in
terms of their personality and music.
This has been reflected through their
album covers. Their first album ‘Up All
Night’ features a rather immature
album cover that reflects the younger
age of the band members. Their
second album ‘Take Me Home’ is also
rather immature and makes the boys
look mischievous and fun loving. Their
third album ‘Midnight Memories’ in
more mature than their previous two
and signals a change in their music
directions to more serious music. Their
fourth album ‘Four’ again features a
more mature album cover continuing
on with their more mature music
directions.

3. I like all of these artworks for various
reasons. I like the look of Taylor Swift’s
‘1989’ artwork because of way it
appears to be an old polaroid picture
fitting in with the theme of the album
being reminiscence of the 1980s.
Ariana Grande’s cover for ‘My
Everything’ is good because of its
simplicity and the way it shows her off
as the artist through the full shot of her
body. Nicki Minaj’s album cover is
good because of the way it fits her
personality as well as the wackiness of
the album the artwork is for. Also the
album fits in with Nicki Minaj’s pink
theme that is prominent throughout all
her albums. Beyoncé's cover for
‘Beyoncé’ is also good because of the
confidence it shows off one Beyoncé's
part, only featuring her name written
along the box.

4. As I am featuring a male artist on my music video I
thought I’d look to album covers produced by other
male artists for inspiration when creating my cover.
I like Ed Sheeran’s album cover for his album ‘+’
because it features his face and nothing else. It is
simple and I would consider producing something
like this for my music video. I also like the tinted
orange colour on the cover and would like to also
consider featuring this in my video. Gavin DeGraw’s
album cover for ‘Chariot’ is similar to Sheeran’s in
that it only features a close-up shot of his face but
without the tint. Again I like this because of its
simplicity. Sam Smith’s album cover for ‘In the
Lonely Hour’ is again quiet simple only featuring
Smith sat on a box. I like the longer perspective we
get through this type of cover because it shows off
the artist more making it easier for the audience to
know who the artist is. George Ezra’s album cover
is more complicated than the others featuring Ezra
in the middle of a crowd. I like that there is more
going on, on this album cover but it does make it
harder to identify Ezra if you don’t know who he is.
Looking to these album covers has helped me to
understand that when producing an album cover for
a male artist it is probably best to make it more
simple compared to producing one for a female
artist that would feature a more eccentric cover.

5. These disc’s are ones I could take inspiration
from for various reasons. Taylor Swift’s ‘1989’
disc is good because of the way it fits in with
the album cover of the CD making it
consistent. I also really like the artwork that
has been chosen with the birds flying through
the air, making the disc look unique compared
to others which are quite plain. Nicki Minaj’s
‘Pink Friday Roman Reloaded’ disc is also
good because of the way it fits in with the
album artwork. I also like that it’s a faded
image of the artist rather than a full on image
that may have looked a bit much for the disc.
Both Ariana Grande’s disc for ‘Yours Truly’
and Sam Smith’s disc for ‘In the Lonely Hour’
are plain but this may not be a bad thing as it
allows for easier production for the institution
and also lets the music speak for itself
instead of having the disc say to much. I
would however say the disc for Yours Truly
does not reflect the rest of the album enough
because it is pink as opposed to the grey
featured on album cover meaning it doesn’t
keep a consistency between the whole
product.

6. These backs of artists albums are ones that
I like the look of and think could help me
when I am creating my own. The back of
Ariana Grande ‘My Everything’ and Ed
Sheeran ‘+’ are both relatively plain, only
featuring the list of the albums songs but I
believe this is a good way to do it as it
keeps the focus on the songs and also
makes the back of the album easy to read
and follow. Both Nicki Minaj’s ‘Pink Friday’
and Ella Henderson’s ‘Chapter One’ feature
the artist appearing on the back of the
cover. Nicki appears sticking out more on
the back which fits with her personality and
she is positioned like a Barbie doll which is
something common with her earlier albums.
Ella’s is more subtly done as she appears
more as part of the background than Nicki
does making her pull less of the focus. I like
both of these and believe they show more
creativity than just listing the tracks meaning
I will most likely want to do something like
this for my album.