Weekly Blog Friday 4th November
Introduction
This week's blog is my first blog and is the start of my project, This week I have decided on an image and story of what my album/EP is going to be about, I have decided that This EP is going to be about someone that's had a tough time,
but has a new start at life, I want it to be relatable to most people
that hear it by writing lyrics that can easily be transferred to many
life situations.
I want it to be nature based in the imagery of the EP (Music videos,
album artwork) and focused on rediscovering oneself. I have also designed 4 potential album artwork ideas and 3 different logo designs for my artist name, I have decided on the final logo design, and a cover for the EP.
To do this I have used photoshop and serif affinity designer. This will fit in with my long-term career aspiration of becoming a freelance music producer/acoustician as learning and knowing how to design album artwork and come up with logos will really help, especially starting out before I am signed to a label that will be able to professional hire someone to make an album artwork or logo design.
· I have come up with a few potential album artwork designs for this
project.
· I have designed three logos for my artist name “xphorik”
· I have started writing the lyrics to my first track
I used a mixture of Serif Affinity and Adobe Photoshop to design potential album artwork ideas, I watched tutorials on YouTube to help me create the designs I want, and I have come up with 3 designs for the potential album artwork.
I started off with the logo below, I searched for different fonts on fontspace, and downloaded my favourite, I wanted my logo to be a sort of typography, where you make the entire logo out of all the letters in the name, which is "Xphorik" So I layered an "X" "P" "H" O"R" I"K: and experimented with different colours until I ended up with this
I ended up not liking this logo very much it just looks too messy so I had a second attempt. This design uses just the X and K I found out on serif affinity designer you can use lots of different effects on text, so I used outer shadow, inner shadow, outer glow, inner glow, and bevel and emboss to create a sort of 3d effect I feel like throughout using serif affinity designer to design a logo and watching a few tutorials, I've learnt a lot about the software and how to use it, this skill will come in handy for my future career as a freelance producer, I will be using software like this a lot, and it is always good to know how to design logo's plus although someone else can design you a logo, only you know exactly what you want.
I then decided I wanted to use the logo as the main X for Xphorik and write "phorik" along the side of the X I tried a few different fonts for this and came up with this.
I decided the bevel and emboss and bright colours made the logo look unprofessional, and I wanted to make it simpler so I tried lighter colours, a different font and took off some of the effects. I think if you look at most professional logo's they are simple but effective, grasp the audience's attention and get the main points across.
This looked good and the colours are more faded which looks more professional overall. But i wasn'r completely happy with it, i think the X and K looked too messy, so i decided to scrap the typography idea completely and just use an "X" but I didn't like the effects and the colour.
I decided that if you look at most posters for festivals or venues etc when they list the artist's logo it's easy to read, and also usually looks good in white so it can be used in many different scenarios, it also usually a vector image so it can be exported and stretched to any resolution without looking pixelated, so would look good and a massive poster or a billboard. So baring this in mind, I completely changed the logo design and ended up with this, my final logo design.
Which I think is much more professional looking it could be used on an event or festivals poster, in a YouTube video, on an album cover, and still be read, I think it is simple yet effective and people will be able to easily identify my brand. I then created another version of this logo with "remix" written in it for when I make a remix.
And I also made a coloured design version, to do this I used an AI art generator to generate a surreal euphoric space scene, which can be used commercially so is perfect for what I needed, I then had to watch a tutorial on YouTube because I had a square image, and I wanted to fill in the triangles inside the X with the space design but have none on the outside, this so it still looks good on the majority of posters and is still white. To do this I had to use the marquee tool in photoshop to draw around the logo and select the image only on the parts outside the logo, then deleted it. I had to change the layer into a smart layer which took multiple attempts, and more reading online to do, but I managed it, and I have learnt a new skill, the possibilities with this skill are endless and will come in handy in the future. This is the final result of this
Overall I am happy with the final logo designs. These may change over time, but i think they look very professional and fit with my brand/style of music.
As with the album artwork I used an AI art generator to come up with designs related to what my project is about, I then took my favourite image and wrote the album title and my artist name on it, and exported it at 3000x3000 pixels, which I have learnt is the standard size for album artwork ( so it doesn't pixelate at larger sizes) these are the designs I have come up with.
The first one I really like the design, it's abstract colourful, spacey, and has trees and a waterfall which fits with my image completely.
I really like this design and will maybe use this for a future album cover, but I have chosen the last one to be for this EP
I have chosen this one for my EP artwork design as it has a waterfall in nature is colourful and has stars which cover many themes from this EP I have added the Xphorik logo and the EP name " A Soul Rediscovered"
Conclusion
I have learnt how to use photoshop and a serif affinity designer to design logos and album artwork, and have also learnt about AI Art. I've learnt to use the marquee tool in photoshop how to edit out some of the images , and how to make the background transparent in both programs, I have learnt about which images can be used commercially and how to make sure you can use them commercially. this is essential to know, as you don't want to have a copyright claim or lawsuit later on for using something you don't have the required license to use. I have also learnt about using effects on text and how a simple logo is sometimes better so it can be easily read, and showcased on posters for events. I found using YouTube to watch tutorials on how to use photoshop and serif affinity very useful, you can search for how to do anything on this software and there will usually be a tutorial on how to do it. I feel like I will continue to build on these skills, and use photoshop to completely design album artwork in the future as this will be a good skill to have.
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