Digipak - Welcome/Thank you page

When the digipak is opened, it will reveal two faces of the card. The next part of the pack we ideally want the audience to see is the 'Thank you" page to almost welcome the audience to our digipak.  Within this, we will greet the audience in a colloquial way and be very talkative as a way of relating to the reader and fan base. Also an exciting feature in this is the QR bar code where it can be scanned and will direct you to a real web page with a poster we created oursleves. I believe this is a good feature to include as alot of music based merchandise is digital recently, and this is our way of being modern and up to date. The back ground is the same as the images we created ourselves which will be maintained throughout the whole of the pack. We decided to use a mossy green colour to fit in with the front cover which is of a very natural, greeny scene with trees, and this fits in well with it. 

This is what the digipack will look like when the first card (on the left) is opened. The thank you message page will then be revealed, and to see the cd and the digipak opened fully, the next step is to life and open the thank you page. This diagram explains it; 

I am happy with the structure of our digipak so far. 

Digipak | Whats inside...

When the digipak is opened there are typically two pieces of card either side of the cd, which is in the middle. To fill the gaps either side of the where the cd will be situated, we decided to be in keeping with Ed Sheeran's theme of doodles and sketches to represent his song lyrics and meanings. To do this, we looked at various different lyrics from his songs and wrote down what stood out most to us that we could then transfer to the page. We decided on the following;

Snowflake : "Maybe you're loveable, maybe you're my snowflake" - Wake me up

Kitten : Taken from the music videos main theme - Drunk

Wings : "Its too cold outside, for angels to fly" - The A Team

Lego : "I'm gonna pick up the pieces, and build a lego house" - Lego House

Bird : " My little bird" - Little bird 

Sofa : "On the sofa, where we lay, I wanna stay inside all day" - Sofa

As '+' is his current album name title, I decided to incorporate this into the doodle to fill in the gaps, and I also played on this idea and included similar symbols for something a bit different. The paw print is another symbol linked with Ed Sheeran, so I decided to include this too.

Story Board

For our music video, a story board is needed to clarify final ideas of what shots to use and what needs to be included when it comes to videoing. 

U.N.I - Ed Sheeran | Lyrics

I found your hairband on my bedroom floor,
The only evidence that you've been here before
And I don't get waves of missing you anymore,
They're more like tsunami tides in my eyes
Never getting dry, so I get high, smoke away the days never sleep with the light on
Weeks pass in the blink of an eye,
And I'm still drunk at the end of the night
I don't drink like everybody else,
I do it to forget things about myself,
Stumble and fall with the head spin I got
My mind's with you but my heart's just not

So am I close to you anymore, if it's over
And there's no chance that we'll work it out

That's why you and I ended over U N I
And I said that's fine, but you're the only one that knows I lied
You and I ended over U N I
And I said that's fine, but you're the only one that knows I lied

Everybody said we'd be together forever but I know that,
I never wanna settle down, come around, break up the love like Lego now,
Never wanna turn into another like you,
Sleep with my thoughts, dance with my views,
Everything's great but not everything's sure,
But you live in your halls and I live in a tour bus,
Now I'm in a position to be another stalker like every thing I say seems to always sound awkward,
Like our last kiss it was perfect, we were nervous,
On the surface,
And I'm always saying everyday that it was worth it,
Pain is only relevant if it still hurts,
I forget like an elephant, or we can use a sedative and go back to the day we fell in love just on our first kiss

So am I close to you anymore, if it's over
And there's no chance that we'll work it out
Ohh you and I ended over U N I
And I said that's fine, but you're the only one that knows I lied
You and I ended over U N I
And I said that's fine, but you're the only one that knows I lied

Wo-ooooahhhh [x2] oohh ohh

Because, if I was gonna go somewhere, I'd be there by now,
And maybe I can let myself down, wo-oahh
And I'm thinking that I'm unaware, I keep my feet on the ground and keep looking around, to make sure I'm not, the only one to feel low,
Because if you want, I'll take you in my arms and keep you sheltered, from all that I've done wrong
And I'll know you'll say, that I'm the only one
But I know god made another one of me to love you better than I ever will

Cause you and I ended over U N I
And I said that's fine, but you're the only one that knows I lied
You and I ended over U N IAnd I said that's fine, but you're the only one that knows I lied

Digipak

A digipak consists of a book style paperboard / card called a 'gatefold'. They hold the artists 

CD (and sometimes DVD) inside. 

Conventions of digipaks include; various shots of the artist which tend to all be from the same photo shoot so it looks very slick and 'flows' as it is opened. Similarly to this,  they also fit to one colour scheme to, again, to be in keeping with the package as a whole. Artists these days tend to have a theme that fits with them, for example, Katy Perry focusses on a candy theme, this means fonts that are fitting with this, light pastel colours and images that fit accordingly. One thing to note is that these Digipaks that have been analysed are for artists of the pop genre. The general idea of digipaks as a whole can be gathered by looking at these, however I will apply conventions of more indie genre artwork to these to make sure it fits more with our artist.


                                 ______________________________________________

Ed Sheeran's EP art work for his current singles all seem to have a theme which is different to what would be expected of the pop artwork I just looked at, and instead follow the conventions of what would be expected from an indie musical artist. 

From this, we can get an idea of what to include in our digipak which is essentially the album artwork. Something that is apparent is the use of a photo of an object, rather than the use of the artists face. They are usually relevant to the song and are perhaps one specific lyric or a feature of whats happened in the music video. For example, the 'Drunk' image has a paw print in it, which is relevant due to the cat which plays a massive part in the video.

They are also simplistic with a rustic looking font, which Ed constantly uses.

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Our Digipak - First Attempt.

After looking at these artworks of Ed Sheeran, we attempted to create something similar without directly copying.

The image that we used, we want to use because it is relevant to our video, and the outdoor scences we have planned.
The fact that it is taken with reference to the video
is in keeping with Ed's conventions of symbolic images.
The back cover is consistent with the front, as it is the same image but from a different angle. I believe this makes it look professional and interesting.
The font also has a sketchy element about it which is similar to Ed's font. 

Actors - Costumes - Props - Location

Actors
For our video, we will first need the main talent in the video, which is the singer and will be the most present in the video. We therefore need someone who is willing to take the role seriously enough to pull off our ideas! We have an idea of who we want to play this. I have decided to play the girl, who also features in the story of the music video, as I played a role in our preliminary task and don't really mind acting again, who better to rely on than yourself! We also need two adults to make small appearances in some scenes.
Costumes
Due to the videos of indie music being quite realistic and 'normal', we wont need any specific costumes. We will, however, need outfit changes for different scenes to signify time differences.
Props

• Laptop
• Beer cans
• Lots of photos of the girl/couple
• empty wall
• 2 phones
• Suitcase (and things to put in it)
• 2 cars
• Guitar
• Notepad & Pen
• Hairband

Location

We are able to film most of the video under one roof, using a boys and girls room. We also need the driveway to shoot scenes of cars driving away. We also can use the surrounding village to film the flashbacks and other little clips we need. A field and the streets of the village will be useful, and are easily available to use. 

After Analysing These Videos....

After analysing these three music videos, and investigating how they were created, it is evident to me that I want to make a music video that is very literal, using a meaningful song and almost creating a 'story' out of it, influenced by Taylor Swift's Ours. My love for Ed Sheeran and his music videos has only grown after analysing drunk, I think his videos are so quirky and clever!!

Saman Keshavarz

Saman Keshavarz is an overtly quirky and different director. His work varies from creating music videos, such as Ed Sheeran's Drunk, to directing adverts for the camera brand Canon.
I found that he was quite hard to research on and seems to be a typically 'indie' director in the sense that he appears to like not being so main stream, implying that he is more passionate about his work than the success which would follow. After analysing Drunk, it appears that he takes a creative and different approach to his work which would make them more memorable and stand out from other typical music videos. He has influenced me to put a creative edge when it comes to creating out own video and we will do our best to make it different.. but still being conventional.

Click here to view his website>>> http://samanftw.com/h0m3-p-ge

Conventions Of An Indie Music Video

After analysing selected music videos in the 'indie' genre, and due to my interest in the genre anyway, I have become aware of the conventions of these music videos.

• A character, often the main singer, is established, and as the audience we are able to gather their emotion and relationship with a specific person through the lyrics and tempo of the song playing. 
• The music video is narrative and tells a story based on the main talent/singer in the video.
• As the music video goes on, the day progresses and usually finishes in the evening, and the 'story' has come to some sort of ending and conclusion. 
• I have noticed that in some videos, evidence of instruments being played isnt always present in music videos as this perhaps breaks away from the narrative element of the videos. However, seeing as playing the guitar for example, is a common interest associated with the 'indie' genre, it wouldn't be breaking conventions to include this. Similar to this, the singer is almost always lip-syncing along to the words at some point. 
• There aren't usually any fancy special effects or fancy editing techniques used. I know I am possibly contradicting myself here as in the Ed Sheeran video there is a talking, alcohol-drinking cat, but it is still obviously fake in some parts and is what gives it it's charm. They aren't trying to break boundaries or show off in terms of how much money they can spend when making a video. They seem to be quite 'normal' and 'down to earth'.