Album Cover Testers

We were tasked with taking photos against a consistent background for album covers in preparation for the digipack task later on in the course. There were a range of different typical album cover shots to choose from, I also added in a few extra as well. For the photos I used a DSLR on a tripod, and I also decided to set up an additional light source to the right of camera to create harsher shadows. 

The light source (two phones attached to a hole punch with blue tac)

'WE ARE A LOT OF FUN' Album Cover:

For this photo I changed the green screen to black on Photoshop so that we stood out against the background. I later de-saturated the image a little, and adjusted the colour balance to give it a red hue. I also used a ball prop to make us look more 'fun'. 

'GANGSTER' Album Cover:

This image was also ran through Photoshop. Again I got rid of the bright green background. For the 'gangster' look I decided to have an out of focus clenched hand coming towards the camera. After looking through the various effects Photoshop had to offer, I found that I liked the look of the posterize effect. Posterizing is essentially using only a small number of tones in an image.

'YOUR MUM WILL LIKE ME' Album Cover:

For this image I tried out an online web application called Pixlr. In the app I completely de-saturated the image, and added a vintage effect to the edges.

'FED-UP' Album Cover

I used Photoshop to edit this photograph. I used the colour inversion tool to make the image more vibrant and stand out. I also used the exposure and brightness setting to make us seem to blend into the white background. I also ran the image through Pixlr to compare the two and see which one is best for photo editing. Pixlr has some really cool filters you can apply to your image, like a kaleidoscope, and is a good alternative to Photoshop if you don't have it. However, I would say that I prefer Photoshop, as it has essential tools, such as the colour replacement. For the pixlr image below I used a combination of effects: solarize, invert and colour balance in order to create the image.

'TORTURED ARTIST' Album Cover:

In Photoshop I changed the background to a grey fill and applied the black and white filter. Overall I am not so happy with the look of the image. I think next time I would have used a more interesting background, perhaps a wall, to give the viewer more to look at.
The image below was also edited in Photoshop. I gave it quite a low exposure, a blue tint, and tried to bring out the shadows, to give it a more somber tone.

'SOULFUL' Album Cover:

I inverted the colours and changed the colour balance in this photograph.

'DOESN'T MAKE SENSE' Album Cover:

For this image I changed the brightness to make my feet look like they are floating.