Magazine Advert Feedback

For my magazine advert was inspired by the poster of ‘’Scarface’’ as it was a recognisable poster because of the scale of the production with a great actor such as Al Pacino ect. However, from the feedback I got from the audience it was relatively mixed. There was negative feedback and positive feedback, which I am able to act upon for my final cut of the magazine advert.

Positive Feedback

•           Creative idea, using the intertextuality to publicise the product.
•           The blend of colour that was used of the black and the reduced saturation on the face is effective, similar to the original poster.
•           Having the people who contributed on the side, along with the iTunes icon to tell people where to find the artist’s music is exactly what you would expect from a magazine advert.
•           The use of colour flows well with digipak despite using a different context and features.

Negative Feedback

•           The idea of a using Tony Montana’s character of a drug dealer does not fit well with the brand identity of a humble soul singer. This would give a wrong impression to the mass market of the artist.
•           The black and white colours would fail to stand out in a commercial status, there needs to take away the saturation and maintain the natural skin tone colours.
•           The plain text needs to stand out from the rest of the background, screaming at the audience to look at the advertisement.

I definitely used to the positive feedback to give me motivation to maintain some of the good qualities in the advertisement. However the negative feedback made me reconsidered some of the features of the final product. Such as the intertextuality which I was relatively confident with. Taking way the idea of a thug R&B and Soul artist. I concluded I need to maintain the codes and conventions of the genre which I originally began with advertising the image of the artist properly. As seen with artist such as Justin Timberlake and Ne-yo they form a classy look at the same time emphasise their sound of love and emotion. 

Magazine Roughcut

Scarface was the inspiration of the magazine advert for the promotion package for the artist.  Chose to do this because, the poster for the original is relatively recognisable it would be something nice to look at and reminisce this allows you to stop and take notice of what is being advertised. I used similar picture that I was working with during the photo shoot this is to show the consistency between the digipak product and the advertisement in order to sell the artist as a product.

I decided to replicate as much detail as I could to the original poster of ‘’Tony Montana,’’ for the text I chose the red that was the same as the original, however I could not go for a darker tint red to make it look retro. I was also struggling on how to put a yellow border round the writing like the one similar to the original poster. On the right hand side of the poster I put the people who are have helped feature in the album, they have am honourable mention as part of the magazine advert. I used the standard font however I brought laters close together which is one of the special tools that Photoshop has the capability of doing. On the left hand side I had quotation text of one of the producers of the album talking about OTTY. This is a common feature on the front covers of magazine, there is are emphasis of trying to sell the product.

As I am advertising the up and coming album ‘’Light Up’’ on the right hand side I replace some of the writing that are the credits. I replace that with other musical and life style magazines have given the review to the album. This a marketing strategy as these are well magazines and international popular, it fits in perfectly with genre. Billboard are based on a every single genre of music. Rolling Stones were once previous a popular rock band, however they made a brand of the Rolling Stones Album. The main idea is to sell the product to the mass market. Lastly the use of the GQ life style magazine is to emphasis the standards that ‘’Otty’’ has set, the recognition from fashion magazine (a portion of the full magazine brand).

At the bottom of the magazine, is the icons ‘’Download on iTunes.’’  As iTunes have become a large portion of musical supply that the world gets it is a good place to advertise the music in order to compete in a larger and more prestige industry. I have also put the artist website ‘’www.Ottymusic.com’’ this is to promote whom he is, on the website you get a lot more details than just his music. 

Final Digipak

Audience feedback Digipak

After showing my audience the rough cut of the digipak there was some critics and some positive feedback that I took from the information they gave me.

I went for the black house style for the final digipak cover. This was definitely admired by the audience because of the simplicity of it. ‘’It shows simplicity however it still manages to draw you eye, with the colour of the rose.’’ They also liked the idea of ‘’the model, flowing into the background of the album which shows that he is a part of it and the connection between the album and himself.’’ However the criticism that they gave the front of the album is that it doesn’t have an album name. I was going for the self-titled name for the album to introduce the album to the target market, however the audience recommended that I should relate the album name to the name of the music video song. ‘’Light up the dark’’ and they also passed a few suggestions such as, ‘’light, illuminate, shine’’ I thought it would be a good way forward to have a name for the album. 

In the inside there was no insert for the digipak where I was able to show the people who are involved in the album or any special feature I would like to include in the album. They picked up on that and they strongly recommended that I should do so, so that the audience would know who the artist is and what they are about, selling themselves to the new market. The next part of that was the CD, the liked the idea of the silhouette  which I took inspiration form Chris Brown’s Album, graffiti and the idea of using a side profile and putting more attention on the artist. However the there was a suggestion that I should use the majority of the space rather than half the CD to emphasis the brand identity of the artist.

The back cover was also kept simple, my attempts was to relate the main music video to the digipak by using another silhouette of the dance in a position and spreading it across the back of the digipak. Some of the comments for the feedback was it was working with the rest of the digipak, at some stage there should be a picture of the artist wearing casual clothes rather than consistently suited up, however I thought that I would use that for the insert of the digipak, showing a more sociable artist in which the aspiration audience can relate to. 

Fonts and Images

I asked my audience which text style would be suitable for the final product of the digipak and this is relative response I got from each different type of font. The main objective for this was to see which font style would suit the genre, some of the fonts I have taken I out inspiration of similar ideas that have been done before. This would be the constant product that would be through the digipak to create the specific brand identity.

AR destine - 1
MT extra - 2
Gunshuche -1
Mistroel - 0
Popular std - 3
Narkisim - 2
Ar bonnie -5
Ar christy -2

After a poll from my fellow peers it seemed that the AR Bonnie was the one that was going to be the most subtable for the final digipak product. I agree with it as well there was a level of art deco, which was  popular movement and it brought of the artistry of music into a lot more. the others seemed to be more of a ''wacky or classical'' album packs.

Digipak Rough Cut

Front cover.

After looking at different successful digipak in the similar music genre, there were ideas I took through and ideas that I left. For the front cover I took a simple approach similar to John Legend’s album once again there wasn’t too much complex feature, unlike Chris Brown’s album graffiti. Moreover using outside inspiration such as the poster of the godfather, which bring a level of class which is require for this genre. Having a plain back background and the suit also blended with the background only to see the lighter colours such as the white shirt and the black tight that contrast on the white shit. The skin tone of the model/artist also stand out from the background, using a hair brush, I removed several imperfection on the face of the model, at the same time it made the skin town darker, so that it flows better with the background.

Furthermore on the poster of the godfather, there is a hint of red which is the flower that is on ‘’Vito Corleone’s’’ pocket, I though having a similar reference, a lager flower at the bottom hand right corner of the album cover, I took a picture of google images, and selecting a picture of 1080p to get the best professional finish as possible. The title of the album is ‘’Otty’’ which is a self-titled album, in order for the audience to identify an upcoming artist. And for the font style which would be the continuity brand identity for the artist, I used ‘’AR BONNIE’’ as the font style which has a classic art deco theme.

CD

The CD cover was inspired by Chris Brown’s album graffiti, I used the idea of the silhouette of the artist as the main feature of the cd, with the back layer of paint the contrast is a white silhouette. I took a side profile of my model and increase the saturation of the selected area and created a white outer layer. I used a large soft black brush which would remover the bottom shape of the profile creating a curved edge which would go round on the edge of shape of the CD.

I kept the same style with the text as the front cover keeping that brand identity throughout the whole product. At the bottom of the CD its states ‘’Dedicated to the fantastic music by Otty Freeman, with classic hits such as, “Words and Light up the Dark” 

featuring equally brilliant covers.’’ Where I am giving credit to the actual artist and his contribution to the whole media product of the song. Another feature that airs quite common on CD is the production company/record company that was part of the media product, I selected ‘’Sony Music.’’ I chose a 1080p image using the curve adjustments made the red of the logo, redder so it’s able to stand out on the black Layer of the CD.

Back Cover

With back of the album, I took a feature from the music video of the contemporary dance, after taking a picture of her in an abstract position, I used the similar format as the CD creating a silhouette of the dance. And using a large black soft brush, I coloured next to her, so a blend of black would from the house colour of the digipak in her body and flowing in to the colour white. Instinctively this would draw the eye of the consumer, the contrast of the colours. Using some of the songs that his own songs and the covers that OTTY has produced, I used them as the songs of his latest album, featuring ‘’light Up the dark’’ and ‘’Happy ft Pharrell Williams.’’  Again using the same font of ‘’AR BONNIE’’

‘’EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS: OTTY FREEMAN, KUDA DERA & RICARDO LOSCALZO

www.OTTYMUSIC.com  www.BESTOFBRITISHUNSIGNED.com

© 2014 all trademarks and logos are protected. All rights reserved. Unauthorised duplication is violation of applicable laws.’’

This commonly feature on the bottom of the album, giving shout out to the people who contributed with the manufacture of the album. Also the website that people can find more information. I mentioned that artist website and the website I found him this is giving credit to them as they help me build the media product.  The statement at the bottom is to protect the band identity of the artist and keeping the product trademarked. I also used an alternative barcode, which is becoming more and more popular and can be scanned on phones to find different information about the album.  

Photoshop CC

For creating my digipak, I chose to use one of the most well know graphics editing software in the media industry of Photoshop CC. With the ability of editing simple images into something that is eye catching to the audience. With incredible features which can manipulate the pictures and deceive the viewer in order to get the best standard of finish on the promotion product. Before any type of print media is published, whether it is a magazine, newspaper, or even novel it is likely the case that Photoshop has been used to enhance and clean up the imagery on many if not all of the pages. Magazines use Photoshop and many of its tools in order to enhance the imagery and text in their publications. Many Health and Beauty Magazines employ in-house designers to retouch photos of models to enhance their beauty. They add finishing touches to the imagery by using tools that balance colour and add drop shadows, among other edits.

After watching several tutorials on how to use adobe Photoshop and some of the techniques and effects that can be created, I began playing around with the different effects and familiarising myself with the tools and effects. With several trail and areas showed that there was areas of improvements that where required. However, unlike the big cooperation I was basing my ideas of the final products of the digipak on simplicity.

I started gaining different skills sand knowledge of tools as I went along. Such as

Lasso tool: Males the user make a custom selection by drawing it freehand. Which
is similar tools within this tool such as the marquee tools.

• Quick select: Is exactly what it does, you are able to select parts of an images that have the same colour and contrast, with this you are able to do a lot of things with, I used it to move a picture onto different back ground. Within this tool there are imperfection that are created because of this, to remove some of these imperfection is to ‘’Refine edge’’ Which bring some of the original shape of the picture back without making major alteration.
• Spot healing: This I used to remove the imperfection on the faces of the models. This is used a lot in the media industry to improve the look and make the picture more pleasing to see, I am also able to bring some of the skin tones forward and give atone which would suit the rest of the background.
• Brush tool: this is a standard tool, however you are able to change the shape of the brush, the direction of it, the colours of the brushes and the spread. I  used this tool to bring out some of the colours such as the black and white, to get the pure colour out of the black suite, as in the picture the quality wasn’t as high as the natural colours of the backgrounds.
• Curves Adjustments: I used this tool to bring the colours more compared to the original picture. Making the blacks, darker and the whites brighter, as the original picture shows that the suit had a light tint of grey where, and there white where not pure enough. So raising that would making more definitive. This has similar but a more precise style of editing to the saturation tool. 
• Horizontal type tool, this was required to be one of the main features of the media package as I had to use it to right different text such as the magazine advert, names of the songs for the digipak and the album name. There is a range of techniques that can be done, I can select the font, squeeze the letters together or spread them apart, the direction of the letters. I could make the letters 3 dimensional as well. 

The is a lot of power with adobe Photoshop and different skills that's why it is used a lot in the industry. it bring out different features, creating different and abstract effects. However the complicity of the software is shown due to the lack of abstract effects that i have used which can take a lot of time to pick up the high quality skills however overtime things would start becoming more and more familiar and using some of the tools to great effect.