Poster Research - Alice in Chains

This poster is taken from another very popular grunge band that is still around today and has a huge fan base. I believe there are many elements in this poster that are very similar to both Nirvana’s and Anthrax’s posters. Again there is an image of the band together, and interestingly all 3 posters don’t have any instruments. This may be because they believe it’s not necessary as their fans already know what they play. Although we don’t have a fan base it is likely we won’t do this either, this is because our poster is linked to our music video.  This image has also been edited to look older, an aspect I have seen with grunge posters, music videos and album art. All the posters have their band name which I believe is crucial, it’s something that I will be doing. I also believe it looks effective with an image of the band members because it allows audiences to remember who the band members are and what they look like. It also makes a great connection to the bands other media products. I also like the way the text matches the sepia style effect of the image itself, I believe it looks effective and is something I will take into consideration when designing my own poster.

Poster Research - Anthrax

I looked into other genres related to grunge to see how their style of posters, I found it interesting that there was not much difference. This poster is from an old band that are still very popular today, although they are a heavy metal band I believe this style looks very dark and similar to some of the grunge bands that I have researched. I like the way this poster has the band members together and they are looking down at the camera. The way the poster has been edited makes it look older, an effect that has also been used in the Nirvana poster. This poster looks interesting by the way the picture has been edited and the camera angle. In our poster I believe that having a shot of our band together will look effective, I just need some more inspiration for an interesting background image.

Poster Research - Nirvana

It is valuable to research into other grunge bands posters to help me to develop my own understanding, as well as taking some of these ideas and incorporating them into my own poster. This is a poster from Nirvana that was very one of the top 3 posters voted by fans. It was taken again from a grunge forum and this poster was from at the height of their popularity. I like the way the poster looks very simple, there is just the band members and the name of their band. The lead singer is wearing unusual glasses, which to me connotes the rebellion style I have seen in the grunge genre. I also like the way the band has been framed and then the picture has been edited to look older, something I have seen in other grunge music videos and album art. No instruments can be seen in the poster but I believe because Nirvana have such a huge fan base their audience know who plays what. Because our digi-pack is linked with our music video we may also be able to do this.

The Antique, Stained, Washed-Out Look

I really liked the look of the vintage, antique look to many of the digipacks I have seen, I looked up tutorials on how to create this effect and found an excellent one which help with images in how to make some looked like antique and has experienced some wear and tear. in the image we can also see that there are faded images in the background, this is something I would like to do with my digipack. My research tells me that many grunge bands use this method to create abstract looking images and create symbolism. For example, in my digipack I could have faded images of the other band members or the instruments, this would be relevant and make it look more interesting.

The Grunge Style

There are some key elements that I am going to need to use with my digipack, after researching into the grunge genre and different style of art I have made a list of key aspects that seems to appear in most of these styles.

• Dirty, old look to backgrounds and objects
• Abstract, simple images which has a lot symbolism on a lot of different things 
• Irregular, nasty looking visual elements 
• Vintage frames to create a washed up feel to the images
• Sometimes shots of the band together with serious expression and body language

These key features create an unconventional but yet a very creative look which will not be seen in any other genre of music. This style of either album art, posters, exclusive art or digipacks as a whole are very unique, when designing my own digipack I will incorporate these ideas. For example, i could have a shot of the band with abstract images behind us and plain background, I can then use effects and make it look more darker and grittier so its fits the styles and traditions of the grunge genre. Even a background image such as the one below could be an effective background, when placed with images of the band and other images it could look creative and grungy. 

Grunge Photoshop Ideas

From my research I have seen that many similar genres to mine use abstract simple images with a lot of symbolism, especially when looking at ones like sound garden. I have also established that many of these bands look older and have a vintage look to them, it also seems that there isn't much picture of the band itself and this is possibly the style of grunge. There were some shots with the band as a whole and I have noticed that they look very serious and are not smiling. They have also clearly been darkened and do not seem to be in good light. As many of these are like this it seems to be there is a particular style and tradition of this genre. It seems that most of the art I have seen has made to look older and washed out. I researched into this and found a blog describing how this is done and the effect it has. For example, they have a detailed tutorial in order to make something look more gritty, this is a style i have seen with many grunge art and something I could use with my own. This effect is mainly done by changing the contrast of certain parts of his face and using different layers and the "curve" tool.

Grunge Digi-Pack

I have been researching digipacks similar to my genre. I have bee looking through forums, blogs, images and wikipedia on different fan arts and exclusive digipacks from many different bands. Some including Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Dream Theatre, The Beatles, Tool, Creed, Sound-garden, Riotgod and many more. I want to get a good idea of how many other bands in my genre style and theme their digipacks and the sort of images and text they may use. One similarity I have picked up on on many of the art is that they all have a vintage look to them, they have faded edges or it looks like the image itself is old and starting to fall apart. I have also seen that many of the older bands use abstract images and they have a lot of symbolism behind them. Many of the bands use simple images, this may be because at the peak of their popularity they did not have the technology to create impressive art, with some bands it would have been around 20 years ago, well before Photoshop. Here are some images of fan art and album covers I have found on blogs and search engines. Having many images will give me a better idea and inspiration on how to style my own.

Editing

We have spent a lot of time editing recently and I have been looking back to previous research I have done. We also had a lot of unneeded footage. We got feedback from our teacher who believed that there were some shots that were to long. From this unneeded footage I can find some nice shots and make some sequences more interesting. For example, there was some footage of me driving and I took a section from it, reversed it and sped it up. This gave the impression that time had passed and it looks interesting. As its during a fast bit of the song it matches the pace of the music. From our feedback we also learned that we should put more shots during fast bits of the song, this would help match the pace of the song. From the unneeded footage we took good parts and matched them. For example, during the chorus we added more clips of the vocalist, such as close-ups and long shots of the vocalist and bassist together.

Editing Ideas

While we are in the process of editing out footage I think it will be beneficial if I do some research into other videos similar to our genre. This will help me to give me some ideas on how I could edit mine and some of the special effects they use. Throughout our music video we have decided to mix up the shots and how fast we cut from each scene. For example, with a faster paced part of the song, such as the chorus we are going to make sure we have faster cut shots to represent the energy being portrayed through the music. For slower parts of the song, such as the verses we are going to use slower cut shots and more likely longer shots and slow fades. This represent the speed of the song and help build up to the chorus.



This is a live video of Pink Floyd - The Dark Side of The Moon, i really like the way certain things change as the instruments change speed, for example, the different colours and the their speed with the guitar solo and their opening rifts. This gives me inspiration for the guitar solo in our music video. For example, I could add different colours that flash or slowly transform into each other and the solo progresses and picks up speed. This would be something our audience can relate to as many bands use similiar "psychadelic effects, such as Jimi Hendrix, the Beatles, Pearl Jam and AC/DC. These are bands our audience would know as they were before Nivana and a great inspiration to them.