Introduction

Looking at the massive variety of different genres and sub-genres within the music industry today, the chances are that the wide variety of genres will also feature a huge directory of music videos and albums.

Music videos today can range from anything such as; your basic love - story narrative with Taylor Swift music videos such as 'You Belong With Me' to highly original and wacky videos such as Coldplay's 'The Scientist' which sees the whole video in rewind.

As technology has advanced over the years, cds have become less popular with the likes of iTunes and MP3 downloads as high competitors, therefore the importance of cd's may be of less significance today than perhaps 10 years ago.

However, cds are still purchased, for example; I would still prefer to have a physical copy of my favourite artist's new album or single than just an iTunes copy, therefore I still purchase cd's. Meaning that I have quite a big collection on my bedroom shelf and it is interesting to observe the different cd disk and booklet designs dependant on the genre of music. For example; a pop band or artist will usually have a brightly coloured album featuring maybe conventions of pop such as silly poses or sometimes serious poses which help to reinforce the important of the artists' fan base, and the artist will more often than not, be featured on the front cover of the album. Whereas indie or punk-rock artists will tend to stick to a more bland album cover and can often be metaphorically presented with an image on the front, which is usually not of the artist themselves but of something that will connote with the album title.

The a2 coursework which I will be creating this year consists of the main body of creating a music video and then two of the three of the following: Creating a digipak for your chosen artist, creating an album advert for your chosen artist or creating a website for your chosen artist. I have chosen the first two; a digipak and an album advert.

I will be looking deeper into the world of music videos, digipaks and album adverts throughout the coursework, thus helping me to grasp a greater understanding and knowledge of the importance of music videos and digipaks in relation to helping sell the artist