Soul Mates - Making a CD Cover

SOUL MATES

Making a CD Cover

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I love music. It motivates and inspires me. So when I was asked to design a cover for a song writer's EP I got stuck in.

I analysed the lyrics to his songs and found a common theme - attachment and letting go. it reminded me of a Greek Legend I'd heard once. Zeus was afraid that humans were becoming too powerful. Humans had two heads, four arms and four legs. To put the humans at bay Zeus split the humans into two. As a result every person had only one head, two arms and two legs. 

For the rest of eternity these humans ran around like headless chickens trying to find their other half. And this is where the idea of soul mates comes from. 

“I was still on this side, here. But another me, maybe half of me, had gone to the other side…I've felt like this for the longest time – that in a ferris wheel in a small Swiss town, for a reason I cant explain, I was split in two for ever” (Sputnick by Kazuo Ishiguro, p172).

Another old Greek story I took inspiration from is from Metamorphosis. It is about a couple called Baucis and Philemon. Zeus and Hermes wanted to test man kind. They dressed like weary travelers and went to a small city. They knocked on many doors and were turned away every single time. The last house they came to belonged to Baucis and Philemon. They welcomed the two men gladly into their homes. Although they were poor and had next to nothing to eat themselves they prepared a big feast for their guests. The Gods revealed themselves just as Baucis was about to kill his last cock. They told them they had come to test man and had decided to flood the city because of mans insolence. But they would save Baucis and Philemon. As well as this they would grant them one pleasure or wish, whatever they wanted. Baucis and Philemon thought long and hard. They could have had riches, immortality, strength - anything they could dream up. Instead they asked the Gods that when it was time for one of them to die that the other should die also. 

The two lived happily into old age in a monastery the Gods gave them and when the day finally came for one of them to die the other did too. They merged and grew together into a tree.

"As their bodies sprouted leaves, the crowns of trees grew over their heads." (Ovid, Metamorphosis) With their branches intertwined, they remain forever together.

I did some research and found some images I wanted to work with:

I worked with this last one here primarily. I wanted to change it slightly though so, again I did some research:

Looking at a photo shoot from Love Magazine. Togetherness and unity.

Looking at a photo shoot from Love Magazine. Togetherness and unity.

Looking at a photo shoot from Love Magazine. Togetherness and unity.

I sketched and manipulated some of the images I had found:

I worked on various layouts but decided I wanted to to create a CD cover that could fold out to reveal the entire picture. So I taught myself how to use Photoshop. I needed to layer my images so I chose this image of a tree and the one of Baucis and Philemon. I also chose a font called 'Birth of a Hero'

The CD cover folds in half so the right half is the front cover and the left half side is the back cover.