THE BREIF
This project asked me to design a complete physical music packaging experience for an existing song — digipak, disc label, and liner notes. I chose 'Criminal' by The Elovaters, a reggae track with a laid-back, euphoric quality that I wanted to translate into a fully immersive visual world.
DELIVERABLES
Trifold digipak (exterior and interior), disc label design, and liner notes layout.
THE CONCEPT
Music packaging is one of those rare design problems where you're not just representing a product — you're extending an experience. Someone who puts this CD in and opens the booklet should feel like they've entered the same headspace as the song. That was the target.
The Elovaters have a sound that feels sun-drenched and a little dreamlike — larger than life without being overproduced. I wanted the design to feel euphoric in the same way: color and imagery that gives you a sense of floating, of warmth, of something slightly beyond the everyday. The phrase that kept guiding my decisions was 'reggae dream state.'
The challenge with a trifold digipak is that you're designing across multiple surfaces that have to work both individually and as a whole when unfolded. Typography, image selection, and layout had to be coordinated so the whole thing felt cohesive whether the customer was looking at the front, the back, or the full spread.
KEY DESIGN DECISIONS
MOOD AS BRIEF
The song's emotional tone — euphoric, laid-back, dreamlike — became the primary design direction, not the artist's existing visual brand.
COLOR AND IMAGERY
Warm, saturated tones and photographic choices that evoke the sun-drenched energy of the track.
MULTI-SURFACE LAYOUT
Digipak panels were designed to work independently and as a unified composition when fully opened.
TYPOGRAPHY
Type choices that feel organic and unhurried — matching the pace and feel of reggae without being literal about it.
