Advert

An advert is a form of communication to persuade the audience to buy a certain something whether it be food, a kitchen or in this case a digipak. An advert is usual designed to promote the product that is trying to be sold and a good way of letting people know that this product is soon to be or is now on the market for them to buy. I will be comparing two adverts that relate to Ellie Goulding as they are also popular aritsts. For the music industry adverts are used to let the consumer's know when the artist's CD or digipak is coming out, or they can be about dates for up and coming tours. I will compare these two adverts and see what conventions are recognisable between the two before working on my own advert.

Katy Perry: One of the Boys 2008

This advert is very clear and easy to read. The background is a an old fashioned garden with a picket fence and flowers with a contrasting paddling pool with rubber ducks in. This is something that Katy Perry is known for doing within her work, challenging conventions in a way that makes her look cheeky along with a slightly different style. Katy Perry, one the left of this advert takes up half the page, her outfit relates to the decade that the picket fences are also related too. However, her clothing are bright with strawberries, this creates a sense of innocence about her but the fact that her long slender legs are showing, again creates a contrast in what she is trying to convey. The use of the bare legs attracts a male audience, this is something she did when I looked at her digipak.

When thinking about the colours within the text that are used they are very much the same as her album which we can see on this advert. This means that within my advert I will use the same colour and style fonts that I used throughout my digipak. The text fills up the right side of this advert and is centred all the way down. The text is clear, explaining the basic facts that are needed. The background has been darkened to make her and the text stand out I feel this is something that I will consider and already have within the inside of my digipak by blurring it. When looking at these I realise that all I need to have on my advert is just clear, simple information for the audience which explains when the digipak is out.

Gwen Steffani: Love. Angel. Music. Baby. 2004


This is very different to the one above, yes it has the CD cover showing in the corner, the name of the album they are trying to sell, the artist's name, the featured songs that have already been released and the artist's website. This difference between this and the previous advert that I just looked at is that this is all squashed into the bottom third. The picture is taking up most the room.

Look at this picture is has been edited to make it look like an oil painting, this is something that I could decide to do within my own work. The way she is sitting/laying is quite masculine along with the crown in her hand, I believe that this advert is trying to break the stereotype that men rule women. I feel that even though her posture is poor in this image she still looks seductive. One eye is showing and looking into the camera and her lips are a deep red which match the red material on the chair behind her. The same sort of image that we can see in her CD cover in the corner.

The text is very similar to the CD cover, this is the same as Katy Perry so I feel this is definitely something that I need to do with my own advert. This advert tells us the featuring songs on the CD that have already been released, we can see Katy Perry has also done this with the song that she had released. I feel I should show that the music video is the exclusive thing that is featured on this digipak as this is something that would not be given on Ellie Goulding's CD. Both Adverts have got their website in smaller text so again, I will take this into consideration.

When thinking about which aspects to take from both adverts I feel that the Katy Perry one is more to my taste, I like the way that the text and the picture take up half the space each, the Gwen Steffani one doesn't leave enough room for it to be easily readable to a passing audience. I will put the website on the bottom of the advert in smaller text but big enough for the audience to see as this is common of the adverts that I have looked at. Altogether these adverts have helped me for when I design my flat plans.

Designs for my own advert: 3 flat plans.


Number One -

This first advert is designed in a portrait format. The artist's name is shown clearly at the top with the less important information at the bottom, this is because I feel that people will read an advert such as this one like a book, starting from the top. I like the way that I have placed things either side of the model who is focused in the middle. I have taken this idea from Gwen Steffani's poster above (the model taking up most of the space). However, when having the image of the model so big in this photograph I felt that I could not effectively place all the test needed around the model for everything to be shown clearly. I am going to experiment with landscape style adverts instead to see if it is easier to fit more onto the page. I am going to be using similar colours to the digipak to make them look connected so people know what they are looking for after seeing this advert and trying to buy the digipak.

Number Two -

Here is my second attempt at an advert design, I kept the model in the middle of this advert as this is something that the audience will see straight away. I decided to draw attention to the exclusive new music video by putting this text in the middle at the top. This meant that I had to put the artists name and the name of the digipak at the bottom of this advert - I feel that this is still affective but doesn't show it so boldly as the one before. I feel that again, using the star ratings either side of the image look quite affective as well as making it quite symmetrical. I feel that this advert works a lot better than the previous as it is a lot easier to fit the text either side of the image. Still using a photograph where the model is facing straight into the camera - again connecting with her audience when they look at it, just like the digipak.

Number Three -

Here is my third and final advert flat plan. I feel that this has given the best results when thinking about space and the layout of the text along with the picture. This is because we have the model taking over one side of the page and the text taking over the other side. This was inspired by Katy Perry's advert design which I really liked. The artists name really stands out with the name of the digipak underneath it. I feel that the text is really clear to read, again, read like a book would be read. The most important information at the top and the music video which is the main reason to by this product in a colour which is clear between the rest of the writing. This means that people can clearly see, without spending too much time looking at this advert what it is trying to put across and what is trying to be sold to them. This is something that is an important part of the advertising area as these will be on posters and billboards - people do not have enough time to stop and read a long story - this is short, sweet and to the point. I like the way that the star rating breaks down the text a little and gives the audience information that they might want to know. The smaller things on this page are less relevant but are there for the public if they want to know anything in more detail, they have the website to visit and know the record label that Ellie Goulding is signed to.

Final Edited Advert.

Here you can see the finished product, as you can see I have used the idea from my third flat plan. When editing the photograph that I took of myself for this front cover it was against a cream wall in my house, I used a hair dryer to make my hair blow back. When thinking about how to deal with this image I decided to make the background black. This meant that I could make the photograph stand out and it would also be a lot easier to put the text on there, making the colours stand out still. I really like the fact that there is white around the picture of me, this makes me stand out and creates this magical vibe that we are trying to get across in our video as well. When editing this picture I also used the clone tool to get rid of any spots or blemishes on the skin, this is something that is very common for any photos of celebrities. I have not taken this to the extreme with any airbrushing or anything like that though.

I obviously used the same font that I used in my digipak, this is something that is necessary when advertising something, this makes the audience see the connections between the advert and the digipak, making it easier for them to find. I have used white as this is the colour on the digipak and another reason why I used black as my background colour. I have used a purple/blue colour which is on the digipak for the name of the song that we have created a music video to. I felt that there was quite a lot of white on the page and so this needed to stand out from everything else as this is one of the reasons someone is likely to buy the product. As you can see I have used some of the star ratings from the inside of the digipak, I think that this makes the advert and the digipak work well together in letting the target audience know a little bit about the artist and what she has been getting up to in relation to how well she is doing.

From this advert you can see that I have not stuck with the straight lines that I used within my flat plan, when looking at this on my work I felt that it made it too formal. I thought that this is quite a young artist, she is quite quirky, I do not want her advert to be plain and blocky with the writing. I experimented with the use of using a tilt for the text to make the "I'll Hold my Breath" text stand out from the rest. I did this by moving this more right than all the other text on this advert. I felt that this worked quite well and it doesn't make it more difficult for the viewer to be able to read what it is saying. You can see that I have used words such as 'Exclusive' and 'Extended', words like these will attract the readers of this poster as these words make this digipak feel as though it will be special/different from all the others. It makes the reader feel part of something and this is something that is used throughout the media, through television, adverts and magazines.

I really like the style of this advert the way that it is half model and half text, this makes it feel as though they are both as important as each other. The use of moving the text around in this advert makes it look a lot better and less formal, this is something that is not wanted when trying to sell an artists music as they want to be on the same level as the audience they are targeting the product at. I feel as though the colours really work and flow well from the digipak that I have created previously. All in all I think this looks really good.

Feedback from Facebook.

I posted my advert on Facebook and tagged quite a few people. This meant that I would get a selection of people letting me know there thoughts about this advert and how they think it relates to something that Ellie Goulding herself would actually do. I got mostly useful feedback back which was a relief but some which just complimented the work that I had done.

The only concerns that I got were that I had two Polydor logos, this was quickly changed as soon as I noticed. The other comment was that it should all be central and straight. As I have said above, I tried doing this but I felt that it looked too formal for an advert which was selling this type of product and that the music video song that we have created didn't stand out enough for me. This meant that I experimented with where I put things and came out with the advert above. I feel that this works really well and is still really readable. I think that I have understood the criticism as I tried and tested it myself.

I am really pleased that people like the things that I took into consideration and this has given a positive affect onto the audience that I have shown it to. I feel that for obvious reasons that these comments are valid as they the age group that Ellie Goulding is targeted at. But it also doesn't give a wide variety of comments as they are all my friends.