During my work experience at Winchester based design studio CandCo http://candco.co.uk, I was assigned the task of designing a CD cover for the recording of an Opera by Donizetti called Les Martyrs, run by Opera Rara; a non profit company who specialise in reviving rare or forgotten operas.  

To begin with I started exploring relevant typography for the opera, which had a key theme of Christianity, so I also explored how to add christian iconography into the design.

I looked into what patterns and designs would go with the symbol of the cross so as to give the image more depth.

I then started thinking about how to incorporate these designs into the constraints of a Cd cover, also I thought about how to add the relevant information needed for the cover, onto the design.

I then further explored the typography that could be used in the price, looking at how perhaps the text could form the central images of the design.

Further exploration of typography.

I then focused on what the back of the CD cover would look like, again incorporating the relevant information onto the design.

Further back designs incorporating the central images of the design

The designs started to come together further and all of the relevant information has been added.

I then transferred the design into digital form using Illustrator and Indesign, this gave me more flexibility regarding position and arrangement.

I then added some colour, red to reflect the blood of the martyrs in the opera. This created a bolder more stylised image.

Dom Caroll, the design studio head, Liked the central design of the Cd so asked me to take it out and add it onto a poster, creating, what I thought was a very bold effective design.

After a lot of experimentation and redesign, the final poster took this form, with the minimalist clean future offsetting and balancing the chaotic design

We then decided that the final CD should match the poster and so used the white backgrounded one, Once I finally constrained the design into the CD net I printed and cut it out

In the end I printed and assembled all three designs of the CD cover. I feel that this was a very successful project and ended up in a very effective CD cover and Poster which expressed accurately the themes and energy of the opera. I learned a massive amount doing this project most of all from the wonderful people at CandCo studios, so I think them very much.

Final Poster