Coverart: The conceptual art of CD-wrapping.

[odder@post2.tele.dk@tele.dk]

From: od...@post2.tele.dk

I'm interested in different ways of packing CD's.
If the subject is beyond the scope of this newsgroup,
you are welcome to suggest me another.
References to relevant home-pages welcome as well.

The subject.
============

LP-covers had almost perfect dimensions for coverart.
During several decades thousand of painters and designers
have contributed with thousands of beautiful covers and
cover-concepts. But LP's are hardly produced anymore.
Instead we now have CD's.

My question is: How to wrap a CD, in an original way?
The 99 % mainstream-sollution (used by big companies)
is to pack the CD in a standard plastic-box, having
the front-booklet and the back-print of the CD decorated
by professional graphic designers.

Occasionally you will find CD-plastic-box'es in coloured
vinyl. A fine idea, but be carefull - never drop them on
the floor. They are hard to replace.

Personally I prefer the CD-covers made of carton, although
they are almost impossible to repair, (if the CD-plastic-
holder breaks - it is glued to the carton-cover).

A very good example of a high quality carton-cover is the
Pink Floyd CD-release "Pulse": Heavy booklet, perfect print,
carton instead of plastic, and - as the climax - a red
bulb constantly blinking.

This is close to the ultimate cover-concept, you could
expect from a BIG company - they have to restrict their
cover-concepts to something that could be mass produced.

But small independent record-labels have further
possibilities. Occasionally they release CD's in very limited
editions with handmade-CD-covers. And of course nothing
can compete to such hand-made covers - if done in a
tasteful/original way.

If you have knowledge of such original CD-covers
(or if you have good ideas for some), please tell about it.

Give a description, if you think it's worth it.
Is it practical? Is it original? Is it beautiful?
Why do you consider it to be unique? Is it safe for
the CD itself? What material is used? Can you store it
along with the rest of your CD-collection, or do you have
to keep it in the bookcase? The name of the group/artist etc etc.

Best wishes - Odder

[Rcarlberg]

The reissue of Negativland's first album was shipped in a 4x4
cardboard box, each individually decorated with 4x4 color
xeroexes, no two alike (I'm told). This struck me as a cheap,
clever marketing gimmick.
-RGC-

[A. Cimino]

quoth rcar...@aol.com (Rcarlberg) :

This was in keeping with the LP release, which featured the same
gimmick(with 12x12 color layouts) that looked like they were cut right
out of magazines/newspapers.

While all were different, somehow I have always recognized one when
coming across it...

[Richard Barnes]

In article <5abfgc$1v9a$1...@news-feed.inet.tele.dk>, od...@post2.tele.dk
writes

>From: od...@post2.tele.dk
>
>I'm interested in different ways of packing CD's.
>If the subject is beyond the scope of this newsgroup,
>you are welcome to suggest me another.
>References to relevant home-pages welcome as well.
>

Well, Odder, I am glad someone is interested in this. The CD has been a
godsend for me, removing all the rumbles and clicks from my favourite
music but the packaging is a pain. The words in most CD Covers are now
virtually unreadable for anyone without perfect vision, not helped by
the record producing industry's long held contempt for its customers
which manifests itself in filling CDs with extra bits of useless crap
and printing silver text on red backgrounds etc.

What prompts me to respond though is that your thread made me make a
comparison with games and other software producers. The packaging for
these is often enough to fit 30 CDS in let alone the usual one or two
that are supplied. For example, I recently bought a graphics artpack
double CD which came in an outer display box measuring 19x6x1.5 inches
and contained just the 2 CDs in a normal CD box plus an advertising
flysheet. What was astonishing though was that the printed guide to the
contents of the CDs did not take advantage of the outer packaging space
but was compressed onto 24 pages of tiny text to fit inside the far
smaller CD case!

I'm not sure I want my CDs supplied in boxes the size of the artpack but
it demonstrates that in other areas of CD manufacture than music it is
quite common to supply them with a much wider variety of packaging. Why
can't they just put the CD inside a 'normal' 12 inch record cover?

A bit of cross industry benchmarking and lateral thinking might help.

Happy New Year.
--
Richard Barnes (ric...@sandyrig.demon.co.uk)
'Close to the Edge'