Digi pack research and conventions

Digipaks are a type of CD packaging made out of cardboard other heavy paper/cardboard material. Digipacks can flipped open like a booklet with different images and cardboard sleeves, or it can have three parts, so that one portion of the packaging opens to the right and one to the left, with the CD in the centre portion. digipaks can also be made from eight parts. Most of the time the disk is held in by a plastic tray attached to the digipak but can also be inside sleeves or held in by other areas of the pack. 

To find out the sort of digi paks on the market we went out and purchased some albums from a wide variety of genres and artists. The Dgi packs we found have given us some really good ideas for the one that we are going to make. The ones that we researched had a large variety and differences.  


The convention that are most commonly found on a digi pak are: 
- The name of the Artist
- The name of the Album
- Track listing (include bonus extra's)
- Website, facebook and twitter
- Record Label branding
- Pictures of the band members or relevant visual imagery to sell the band 
- Price
- Website
- Credits
- Recording information, producer, where it was recorded and when
- Who wrote the songs
- Logo
- Bar-code  


The good and bad about digi-paks:

• They look nice, and many bands and labels like to use them for aesthetic reasons. The three section digipack sleeves opens up more design options because there is more room. However, they're more expensive than traditional liner notes and jewel cases. 
• Digipacks don't crack like jewel cases do, but they will rip and eventually the paper begins to peel apart and separate.
• The trays in digipacks break much more often then in jewel cases. There's not as much protection since the outer portion of made of paper, so the teeth that hold the CD in place crack and fall out easily.
• When the teeth of the tray does break in a digipack, the CD falls out of the bottom of the digipack, because unlike jewel cases, there is nothing to hold it in.
• Digipacks can be more environmentally friendly than jewel cases because they can be made of recycled paper - however, they aren't always in fact made in this way.
• Digipacks look great, but if you're just starting out and money is tight, looking for ways to cut your manufacturing costs is important. Stretching your budget to because you like digipacks aesthetically is not a good investment.