“Falling Sideways” is an album released by a fictional band called Imperial. Imperial is an indie pop band with a female vocalist who has a sad and pretty voice. The audience I targeted for this album consists of young, artistic adults between the ages of 18-25, as I feel that Imperial’s music would mostly appeal to this demographic.
I chose to use an eye-catching split complementary colour theme for my album, contrasting vibrant orange with blues and purples. The black on the album cover also creates contrast against these bright colours, and provides a base that the bright colourful text of the title can be placed over.
Aside from colour use, I was able to create contrast in my piece by sketching my text to give it a different look than the photographed images used in the rest of the design. Lastly, contrast was created through the disproportionate sizes between the eye and the lips, making the face look very abstract.
I used repetition to bring the album cover together and keep it balanced. By copying and flipping the original image of the sunset on its vertical axis, I was able to create a mirror-like reflection for the background of this design. By isolating the black trees from the colourful sky to its own layer, I was able to duplicate and bring these trees over to the left side of the cover, creating balance and repetition in the design while keeping the viewers eye within the work. Repetition in colour was also utilized, making the falling Xs similar in colour to the orange of the background, and also by making the text for the title: “Falling Sideways” a similar blue to the one used for the lips and the eye.
With proper alignment technique in mind, I made sure to make the black area in my design off center and slightly tilted, as this is where the title would be placed. I felt that the black area would be more aesthetically pleasing if it were to be placed slightly to one side, making the background asymmetrical.
I decided to make my typography kinetic in appearance by making it look as though the letters from the word “falling” were actually falling, and by tilting the word “sideways” sideways. By placing the letters of the words in this way, the meaning behind the words are both visually represented as well as textually, making the viewer see the falling letters before they even get a chance to read the words. I placed the facial features in spots that would utilize the shape of the tree line to create a profile of a face that used the entire sky.
In general, the “Falling Sideways” album cover conveys a girl’s inability to get past something that is causing her too loose control of her life. I associate falling with being out of control. By saying she is falling sideways, it means there’s nothing to hold her to the earth, and there’s nothing to break her fall. Although the tree line mirrors itself in the background, the girl’s face does not, for she is not able to see past the words “falling sideways.” In other words, she is not able to see past the problem that is troubling her. The somber expression on her face conveys these troubled emotions, while the falling Xs represent a crossroads in this girl’s life. Her minimal facial features make it seem as though she is apart of the background, as if she is almost invisible. Her giant closed lips convey just how many things she wants to say and express to the world, but cannot.
I feel that this album would attract young artistic adults between the ages of 18-25 for several reasons. First of all, I feel that the abstract looking, disproportionate face of the girl on the cover catches the viewer’s eye because it is so different and gives the image an overall artistic feel. The vibrant colours that I chose allow the album to stand out as well. I feel that the falling, hand drawn text would also catch the younger viewers eye, as this hand drawn style is currently very popular among younger demographics.
After completing this project, I feel much more comfortable using Photoshop. When I first went in to work on my design, I had a few issues remembering how to apply the things we learned in class to my design, as I was still very new to working with the program. My main issue arouse when I could not remember how to scale images down. Every time I would try to do this, I would accidently change the size of the entire image, rather then just the individual layer that I was working with. I decided to go back and reread the tutorials from the lab class to figure out what I was doing wrong. Once I worked out these sorts of details, I completed my design with relative ease. When I first completed my design, I realized that my image was too cluttered and messy. I then went back and simplified the design by removing images and reorganizing what was left on the page. Finally I was happy with the image I saw, and I can now say that I am pleased with how my design has turned out.
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