Digipak inside cover 2

When using social media for audience feedback, I asked some friends which genre they believed my inside cover (below) was representing. To my disappointment, neither one guessed that it had any electronic connection, which is James Blake's main thing - really. Although they were able to work out that it was alternative music.

This led me into thinking how I could improve my digipak to make it more representative of James Blake's music. Before, I used the grey to blue gradient across both sides in the hope that it would shine through on James Blake's heavy use of blue in his promotional works and productions - perhaps to denote emotions.

I also tried to use the fact that blue is often representative of electricity. But nevertheless, it didn't really work. 

Above is my newer inside cover design. I removed the gradient in favour of a starker, more noticeable and eye-catching grey. It seems to hold a greater, more attractive contrast with the shapes on the canvas - especially with the shadow effects that I was able to add through Adobe InDesign. The shadows and gradients of the shapes now gave the impression of there being depth on the canvas, and gives more to the idea that the different elements of the digipak are interacting with one another.

I also changed the way that the dripping liquid falls from the top of the left digipak side. Instead of two seperate drips coming down the canvas, one has been turned into droplets, falling from the drip on the front cover:

I have also changed the way that the liquid interacts with the 3D shapes. The gooey drip falls onto several of the shapes, with the dripping continuing according to the shape's dimensions and angles.

As you may be able to see, when the droplets land against new surfaces I have introduced splatter effects by creating smaller shapes to simulate the actions of real droplets and splatters.

In my research of dubstep/house/electro themed genres and their album covers, I found that they often use either lightening-like imagery or font styles - or combinations of dark and then brighter reactionary colours to denote electronic flows of current.

I wanted to use some of this knowledge in my own digipak, which is why the shapes which are 'touched' by the dripping green solution seem to react and turn into blue-grey gradients (dependant on where the touch occurs). This was supposed to communicate electronic current and flows towards the audience without explicitly showing lightening bolts or bright neon colours. That most definitely wouldn't be representing what James Blake's music is all about.