CD Cover Analysis

To help with the design and creation of our own CD cover we will look at existing examples to discover what codes and conventions are a necessity in the pop genre. This research will be extremley helpfull to understand what the audience likes in a CD cover and how the conventions can be followed and challenged.

Adam Lambert


This Adam Lambert album cover shows Adam himself on the cover. We see a close up of his face however it gives the oppinion of an extreme close up of his eyes because of his hand covering the rest of his face. He is wearing a hand/finger bracelet as wel as black nail varnish and a lot of heavy dark eye make-up.

The cover as a whole has a very dark feel about it which shows with the dark make-up and clothes together with the darkness of his eyebrows and hair. The cover is also in black and white where the only colour comes from the name at the bottom of tha album. This is in a violet colour with a bold capital font. It stands out well against the black and white background. The other writing on the cover is the title saying 'For Your Entertainment'. The title is in a smaller font than the artist's name which is unusual for an album cover as the title is usually the main focus. I think this is because Adam Lambert wants to show how he is more important than the title as he is the star of the show. The title also follows the style of the rest of the cover being in black and white. It is a white colour but stands out because of the darkness behind.

In the cover Adam shows a modern representation of a male by wearing make-up and jewellery. This is unusual for a male as it makes them seem less dominant and powerfull. however, In the photograph used the effect is the opposite as the pose Adam is showing is stern and in control bringin back the secure dominant feeling. I think it is the use of his eyes being the main focuse within the album helps to bring this out, which would explain the use of heavy eye make-up as it enhances the focus on the eyes.

Kylie Minogue


This Kylie album is similar to the Adam lambert album in that they both have a close up image of them self on the cover. The kylie photoghraph is a close up with her head tilted slightly to the side helping show her sexy side. She also has her hands framing her face with one finger on her lips again showing off her sexy side.

Kylie has her hair pinned out of her face, showing more of her skin. There are no clothes visible yet you still cannot see a lot of skin because of the angle of the photograph. She has red nail varnish and lipstick and as well as an artistic red and black eye pattern around what appears to be both eyes. The pattern is sharp and shows a contrast between the pose she is showing which makes her seem feminine, sweet and inviting, and the pattern which givers off a mysteriously dangerous feel.

The background used is a plain white backdrop however there are red material shapes around kylie which makes it look as if there is some kind of flower or material in the background and surrounding kylie. She is alos holding one of these material shapes in her hand which shapes her face well. The colour matches her make-up colour and also makes her look more feminine. The font of the title and her name are matching, and also match the eyes make-up she is wearing. It is a slashing blod italic font in black which stand out agains the background. The title has a black heart attached to the top which appears to be on Kylie's neck giving the appearance of a tattoo. The font seem to flow across the cover from the name to her eyes to the title in the way that she is signing an autograph.

In the cover Kylie shows a traditional representation of women in that she looks very attractive. She cares about her appearance and how people see her. In contrast she also shows us a tradition representation by looking very in control of her self and inviting to the opposite sex. This also shows because of kylie having her finger in her mouth in a sexual way.

Record Company Logo

The idea of our project was to produce a music video and its accessories as if we were the production company. So, to make the situation more realistic we created the name and logo for our own record company which would then be used in any other creatin and advertisment we were planning to do such as websites and posters.
We first had to think of an appropriate name to call the company and decided on Dark Beat Records, purely because we both liked it and thought it had a professional feel to it. Then we had to design a logo. We started by looking at existing examples of Record company logos. Here are a few that we looked at...



You can see that most of the logos are straight foward with the name of the company and mainly a black and white style or on solid colour. They can have a unique effect such as the Major Label Records with the writing colour the same as the back of a disc.

We Decided to take the same black and white feel but give it a modern kick. We downloaded a font from the internet that we thought would look best in a black and white logo and gave it a simple glow on photoshop, spacing the letters apart appropriatley where needed. Here is out record company logo...

Audience Questionnaire

As we are creating a pop music video our target audience will be teenagers and young adults. This will focus particuarly on females because of how our main artist is a male. It will be important to the making of our video that we find out, through a questionnaire, what our target audience would like to see within a music video. What they like and dislike about the way pop videos are made and what styles they enjoy the most.

We have produced a questionnaire for our audience to fill in asking specific questions which we feel will benefit our planning and over all video. Here our the results from that questionnair where we asked 40 people between the ages of 13 and 21. We made the graphs on Microsoft Excel and uploaded them using scribd.



Questionnaire Graphs

Justin Timberlake Rock your body

Rock your body stars with a room full of colourful electro lights. Through out the video Justin falls in from the ceiling dancing giving the effect of him flying and travelling through the room in the air. He is wearing a white outfit, combats and a jumper which is later combats and a vest. The contrast with the colour of the room and makes him stand out from the rest. Justin comes across as a dominant humorous character through his poses and quirky looks towards the camera while he is dancing. This follows the codes and conventions of a pop video because of the colour and the outfit just in wearing.

There is no narrative in the video which could make the audience un interested towards the end however the extreme high and low angles as well as camera movement and spinning keeps the audience hooked. I think the video could have some narrative to make it mor interesting but it does not necessarily fit into the video well. To break from the lights and then cut back would ruin the flow of the video movement.

The base line of the song kicks in strong from the beginning of the song. These heavy beats are a trade mark for Justin Timberlake as is his style of dancing which is shown in the video.

For our own video I think a dance style would work extremely well. Making a trade mark dance to follow the song like Justin’s however I think there would need to be some narrative within our video to insure the audience are kept entertained and want to watch all the way through.

Alexandra Burke - Bad Boys

The Bad Boys video starts with Alexandra pulling up in a sports car and getting out because she has broken down. She is wearin black leather with a red top showing through. She looks very strong and in control. She shows a modern representation of a woman, not wanting or needing a man in their life which shows through out the video, especially when she throws a man through a brick wall! The only other outfit we see her in is a complete contrast to the first, a silver dress. Although this look makes her come across sexier and more womanly, you still see the strong dominant side to Alexandra. I think this is because not a lot of flesh is showing, unlike in the GaGa video. Alexandra is also the only woman in the video which gives her extra attention.

The product gives off a R&B feel because of the Flo Rida rap in the middle of the song. This is not Alexandra’s part so it does not give her an R&B impression… just for the video. There are only two locations used in the video which makes the audience feel more involved with the situation. The are also not many effects used in the video, only lights to create more of a dancing scene in the car park.

I think this video is a good example of what we want to achieve with our own video because of the focus on one character as well as the dominance and presence of that character. We can not use a lot of effects because of lack of funding and time. We would also like to se a lot of dancing and routines within our video which is the case in the bad boys video.

Lady GaGa - Just Dance

Lady GaGa’s video for Just Dance shows her entering a party which we instantly see is very wild. GaGa strips down to show a lot of flesh which is a slightly challenging to the conventions of a pop video because pop songs are generally aimed at younger teens aswell as elder people. Later in the video we see lots of sexual action between GaGa, objects and others at the party. None of this is extreme but give a shock factor to the audience watching and is a challenge to the pop genre. Party scenes are often used in pop videos such by people such as Britney spears and Miley Cirus. It can give a slight R&B feel to the video as does the glamour and bling worn by GaGa in her performance shots.

The shots used are very quick probably 2 seconds at the most and can be shaky at times which give the audience the effect of being drunk or tipsy, as well as dancing. All of the shots however are performance, the narrative is shown by the location and atmosphere around the performance. This is interesting for our own music video as we plan on having mostly performance shots and are thinking of combining both to have performance whils in the narrative scenes, similar to what GaGa has done here. In most of her shots she is looking straight at the camera in a dominant pose whilst dancing. Ther are a variety of mid shots and close ups with the occasional long body shot. One shot where it is from a high angle shows GaGa entising to the camera. These shots usually make the characted look weak and innocent, but in this case it works in the opposite way.

Some good effects are used on shots to make them blur, as if looking through GaGa’s eyes and everything being blurry. I can imagine it would be hard to ass effects to such a fast pace song and this one works very well with the video.

Micheal Jackson - Billie Jean

We think it is important to analyse a Michael Jackson video as he was known as the King of Pop and inspired pop music through out the world. His music is classically pop and in this Billy Jean video he follows the tradition conventions of a pop video where the main artist (MJ) is the dominant role, looking you handsome and attractive to the audience. He is wearing black trousers, a black leather jacket with a red shirt, suggesting that he is ready for a night out although you do not see him go anywhere. Even though this video was released in 1983 there are good effects used to add to the story.

Michael is walking down the street and everything he touches glows, including the pavement he is walking on. This is not a huge visual effect which shows that something small can be very effective. They have also used freeze shots whilst splitting the screen into three to make the audience feel as if there is a lot going on when in fact there is not. The video does not challenge the pop convention much, it sticks to a basic narrative and is well balanced between performance and narrative. It also shows a traditional representation of a male female relationship, with michal being the 'stalker' preying on a woman whilst the woman is innocent and powerless to even know what is going on.