Creating the Gatefold.

Creating the gatefold:

The gatefold is the booklet which goes at the front of a CD case, the front of the gatefold is the front cover of the CD and the back is what is on the left of the CD and the CD holder. It normally has an image with a small amount of writing.

From my research i discovered the colour scheme and image relates to the CD and CD holder design.

Our main research which will influence our own design:

The image and colour scheme of this will influence the design of our pamphlet despite it being a front cover. We chose this as it will relate to our tone and mood of our music video and will fit with the design we had planned for our CD and CD holder. 

Creating our own gatefold:

From my research our group decided on a candle, nevertheless, I chose to photograph 3 candles at different levels to develop our own idea and make it clear how we had changed our idea to incorporate our research without completely copying it.

I chose to photograph 3 candles as it would take up more room and create bigger feature that would catch the audiences attention.

The 3 candles can represent Connor, Lilly and the alcohol as this is the focus of the whole video as these 3 variables are never changed throughout the music video therefore using 3 candles responds to our music videos message.

I chose to photograph the candles at all different lengths to fill more of the space without overcrowding it as the candles at the same length would fill the same space rather than spread the features out over the whole canvas space.

I did photograph a single candle incase the 3 candles were visually unsuccessful.

My images I took:

I took these images on my professional camera and the focus and clarity was very intense which ruined the images as it focused on the orange glow as the black background and dark lighting reacted with the cameras focus. The first image was taken with the flash on which is very unsuccessful.

My second attempt:

These were taken on my IPhone 5 camera, despite the expensive camera my IPhone 5 images are more successful as they focus on the candles without giving the images an orange tint. They are visually more successful as the darkness looks as if it is looming over the candles as the area that is lit is very small. This makes the images successfully eerie to respond to our music videos tone and message.

While photographing the images some of them have overexposed flames which is visible in the reflective circles, it is very clear the ones i have focused on as the flames are a lot clear and the surrounding light is less overpowering.


My single candle images:

The first single candle image is overexposed as the flame is very large compared to the others as the surrounding light is causing the flame to lose focus.

The best images are the bottom two as I focused on the flames to make their quality and clarity better.

I still prefer the 3 candles as they fill more space while still emphasizing the surrounding background.

This single candle does look better in terms of the message as people light one candle at a church in the memory of a dead person, this links to the message of our music video, nevertheless, the image of the 3 candles will fill the space better.


Experimenting with the images:

I photographed some of the candles lit while some where blown out. This is to illustrate the loss of hope and candles can be linked to a 'flicker of hope' therefore the fact some of the images capture the smoke of being blown out and some aren't lit, illustrate how Connor is loosing hope which responds to our tone and music video message.

The smoke was very hard to capture as the camera kept focusing on the candles flame not the smoke, some are successful yet they aren't very clear, therefore they aren't the best images.

I also photographed the candles illuminating the outline of a wine bottle as alcohol is a very large part of our music video's message therefore i tried to incorporate it into our ancillary task. However, the dark lighting didn't photograph well as the bottle is hard to see therefore these aren't the best images.


Our chosen image:

We chose this image as the candles positions are even and the camera angle allows a dark cloud to surround the top of the candles and the area at the bottom of the image.
The area at both sides of the candles is even which is successful as the candles are perfectly positioned in the middle.
The flames clarity is successful as they aren't overexposed and the candle light is illuminating the props in the image professionally.


Creating the gatefold on Photoshop:

We placed the image into Photoshop and filled our canvas size with the image by making it fill the space completely. 

At first the executive producers information was at the bottom yet we changed this after we decided to put the least amount of information at the bottom as we had two lots of text to add to our pamphlet.

The record label information looked better in the bottom corner as the small gap between the end candle and the side of the gatefold was the perfect gap for the record number to go and the length of the sentences started at the beginning of the middle candle and finishes at the end, therefore it fitted better visually in this bottom right hand corner. 

At first we had the parental advisory in the top right hand corner yet when we looked at our research we saw it was in the bottom right hand corner, because some of our text was there we chose to try it in the left hand corner. This looked better than the top corner as the logo and text works together to frame the candles. 

Final Gatefold: