The Making Of My CD Spine_

Looking at my design layout for the production of my CD spine and with the researching into the similar codes and conventions of a few CD spines i analyzed, i was confident in beginning the designing phase due to knowing exactly what i wanted and why. To begin with i created a blank document on Photoshop CS3 with the dimensions of (width) 11.8cm (height) 0.8cm. These were the guideline dimensions that a CD spine represents. 

With having the correct dimensions to begin the process of designing my CD spine, i went about the layout of the product. I used the paint-bucket 

tool within photoshop to create a simplistic black la

yout to cover all of the space within the CD

 spine. Having done so i then needed to think about text form and placement. Havi

ng chosen "The Bravery" to be depicted in the top right of the spine as th

is being the main element of an album- the artist. With this i used a simple arial font, featured in regular with a size of 12. The color i opted for was a simplistic white to provide contrast to the black layout to make it easily visible.

With having the simplistic text form produced i then had to find an effect tool within photoshop that would allow for me to produce the effect that i longed for. By clicking on the text layer within Photoshop it comes up with a toolbox option that allows for you to define the layer style of the text. By providing a check list of all th

e different effects that can be put in place through the blending options. I opted for the outer glow tool, the effect is pictured within the next screen shot seen below.

Having produced my artists name i then had to move on to create the layout in order to produce the albums title, the second key feature within

 a CD spine as this tells the consumer what they're buying. Having a black background throughout i decided to stick with the white text form as it allowed it to contrast to the black to provide for easier visualization. Although simplistic it proves extremely effective due to most CD spines dealing with simple block colors in order for their spines to be easily visible on products such as CD shelfs. This time round i opted for the same handwriting effect seen

 within the CD front cover and also Back Cover to allow for the same text combination to allow for consumers to recognize the product. 

The last thing on my list of things to include within the CD spine was to produce a record label company to go alongside the artists name and the album title. This was a key featured that was produced within the CD spines that i viewed. Having 

already created it on Photoshop, a simple black and white image using simplistic text and a curved arrow tool using the custom shapes tool within Photoshop i was able to create the image to the standard in which i wanted it to be produced. With the image i created all i needed to do was to place the image within the white space to allow for the product to be completed and finalized, which is seen by the following steps:

CD SPINE - FINAL PRODUCT