Christina (SciFiSol) recently asked me to help with her new EP released by Fangoria Magazine, 303’s and Brides. She had created an initial sketch (below) based on an image from a recent photo shoot, and some ideas on how to incorporate the 303. I could see many opportunities to add interest and build on her direction, so I jumped on board to help.
I liked the dark witchy look to the photo, and the triangular composition of the image, so I wanted to play off of those elements and focus on emphasizing the triangular aspects in the overall design. I made several additions to the original photo to increase definition. I slightly increased the key facial features, and added highlights to add dimension to the arms. The background was replaced with an image of the moon and clouds I had taken from a previous photo shoot, then I focused on the typography and the hand drawn elements.
I referenced several old alchemical and masonic images to get a direction on the style of illustration I wanted to use. Once I had some decent reference points, I illustrated and scanned the majority of the detail art such as the stars and symbols and used them on all of the panels.
It began to be clear that making a booklet with a lyric sheet would be necessary, so the people who choose to purchase a digital download could experience the same graphics found on the physical CD. I decided to use similar imagery on the lyric sheet that appears on the CD so the images will appear in both types of media.
This is how the CD will appear, the waveform zodiac and the Ouroboros have been re-arranged so the text can go on the outside instead of the inside of the circle.
The back of the insert, and the tray card incorporate the track titles, artist info and the main controls from the 303 into a diagram based on an exceptionally old alchemical illustration.
If you are interested in previewing and purchasing Christina’s music, you can find it on the Fangoria Musick website as downloadable files, you can find more information and preview tracks at Christina’s website SciFiSol.net.