Artist Statement - CD Cover

This is my album cover!

Before I start, just want to clear up something about the band name. I used the name "Sometime in November" for no reason - it was the first name that came to mind and its the name of my uncle's band*! The cover was NOT inspired by their music. Just a name!

So....
I took this photo this past summer in Wasaga beach (Prom after-party weekend) with a pentax k1000 film camera. Film is my favourite to shoot and the pentax k1000 is amazing. I took it during the day but since the sun was behind my three friends, they all became silhouettes. There was nice contrast that really gave the picture a relaxed, youthful mood. This is why I believed it was a good start for a cd cover.

I scanned the image onto photoshop and cropped it to square, so the three guys are pretty much centred. I selected various parts in the image and adjusted (and feathered) colours.  I picked vibrant pastel colours and tried to pick and blend them together as best as possible.

At first I was going to keep the original hue in the sky but I felt it needed something else. I decided to experiment, so I added the colours. I believe the colours give the image a psychadelic mood. The relaxed stance of the 3 guys, the burst of colours in the background, and the white text all contrast with each other and I hope to have positioned them all well. I also tried to play with lines so I added the strip at the bottom. Basically, I hope that overall it is a well-balanced cover.

TARGET AUDIENCE....
I wanted this kind of cover to reflect a band that plays music in the genres of classic, soft, indie rock, perhaps somewhat electronic - kind of like MGMT, who is quite eclectic. Perhaps songs influenced by classic rock songs, just generally older hits from the 70s. The typeface kind of reflects the electronic aspect - there is a 70's vibe in the photo but the typeface also modernizes it a bit.

As mentioned before, the relaxed posture of the silhouettes and the colours give it an overall mood... these are words that come to mind for me: youth, easy going, 70's vibe, psychedelic, party or post-party, summer nights, chill, friends.

In the critique, one of my classmates said that at first she wasn't sure whether she liked the white line across the album cover, but she then changed her mind. I was the same - I tried it out and I wasn't too sure about whether it fit well, but I decided to go with it anyways and I do like it now.


* Check out my uncle's band, "Sometime in November"
http://www.sometimeinnovember.com/
http://www.youtube.com/user/SometimeInNovemberCA

-Karoline
(week 5)