Popular electric indie rock beat combo The New Cassettes approached me about a year ago to create the art for their new album on N13 Records and of course I agreed. we met in The Charles Bradlaugh and discussed what they were looking for. They wanted something reflective of their ideas behind the music, less abstract than perhaps some people might approach this, and with a little bit of Roxy Music sexiness thrown in.
My first idea was to find out what the band actually thought the music was about, so I asked them to each put together around 5-10 images for each song that represented it's origins, they did this and I created this montage:
My first idea was to find out what the band actually thought the music was about, so I asked them to each put together around 5-10 images for each song that represented it's origins, they did this and I created this montage:
This gave me a texture with which to fill my illustration, I wanted to use this with shading to create a layered affect across skin tones and body shapes, so the next stage was to create the model for the montage to sit within, this was done with this illustration, that kept the limbs and chair separate so that could be selected and different parts of the montage layered in:
Next step was to drop parts of the montage into the areas of the illustration, then apply the shading and draw the hair, the end result was a 1000mmx1000mm illustration that I could crop into to make different covers and pages for the booklet, and never reveal the full piece of work;
And that's how it was done, simple but effective and a beautiful piece of work that captures the spirit of the band, and the ideas behind the music.
The album is out this March on N13 Records.
Please get in touch is you'd like Citizen to develop album or single artwork for you, or if you have any questions on how this artwork was created.
Get in touch ben@citizenstudios.co.uk
Visit www.citizenstudios.co.uk
Or call 07738 175 614
2 comments:
Excellent work - I'm beside myself with jealousy, well done!
Purely out of interest; regarding the images that the band members chose which eventually became the montage. How did you approach copyright here? I would imagine the band would be quite impulsive about selection and would just attach themselves to whatever they could find. Did this present any issues at all?
Thanks very much, amazing comment.
With regards to copyright, it was quite tricky but I've got a large bank of royalty free imagery, somethings I had to buy some of it was Dover Press samples that I've accumulated over the years and other bits were distorted and redrawn until they were unrecognisable.
That was the challenge to represent the things they'd found in another image that was usable, some things didn't make it in.
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