Jess' Favourite Advert

My favourite album advert is Gabrielle Aplin's advert for her 2013 album English Rain:

Image: The main image on the poster works due to its simplicity. As the artist is the only person on the page it is the complete focus of the advertisement, which works well for this type of folk/pop music which relies heavily on artists being music based and not superficially image centered. This is further emphasised through the lack of focus on the artist's face, other more heavily pop focused music rely a lot on the image of the artist as being perfect, however the audience for folk/pop music prefer the artist to seem imperfect and relatable which comes across in the fun relaxed styling of the photo. We too will aim to create a very down to earth vibe through our photography, perhaps through also using a long shot of the artist and not a close up of their face. I also really liked the use of the prop of the umbrella on the poster as I really think that a strong link can be established between the advert and the album title through the use of a prop, perhaps we will use the key as we already have some great photographs of the key and it is a very symbolic prop.

Fonts: There are two different fonts used on the poster that contrast each other well, one is very clear and almost type writer like, this is used to show the actual information such as the release date. The other is used only for the title of the album, just to really highlight the title of the album to potential audiences. It is also in a handwritten font, suggesting a more personal connection between the artist and the product. We too will try to utilise a umber of fonts as this helps to add a bit of diversity to the advertisement and helps to keep the page interesting. We also love the handwritten fonts but think that it may be better used for the artist's name as then it will look as though it has been signed.

Colours: The colours used are mostly quite dull and dark, showing a connection to the title of the album 'English Rain' by incorporating the two together it creates a more consistent theme throughout the advert. Also by having the artist as the only section of the advert with colour on it, it centralises the viewers focus on the artist showing 'involved' they are in their music and also suggests that the artist's music brings brightness back to a dark world. I think that dark colours actually work quite well especially as it allows the writing to stand out more clearly. The use of contrast between dark and light can also be quite useful for us as this can often be quite metaphorical as it helps with the idea of Levi Stauss' binary opposites.

Information: There isn't a vast amount of information on the advert, sustaining the simplistic style of the image. Furthermore all the information is at the bottom of the page so as not to complicate the whole poster. An aspect that i in particular liked was the use of song titles on the advert as this is a good way of drawing in potential buyers. I think we should also have the majority of our text at the bottom of the advert as this will help to keep the page nice and simple. I also think it would be good to include the names of some singles from our artist's album, in particular Out On My Own as this would be a single as it has a video.