The Art of Record Covers: Illustration Meets Lettering

Do you sometimes get frustrated by the endless choice of fonts that never quite complement your illustration? Would you like to create your own typographical elements that perfectly match your illustration style? In the days before digital, illustrators and designers were often the same person. Steve Simpson embodies this philosophy in his award-winning work, where he controls every aspect of creation and production for clients such as Cerveza Modelo, Jameson, and Disney, as well as his own personal projects.

In this course, using a traditional approach, you will learn how to combine illustration and hand-drawn letters into a single seamless design piece: an illustrated record sleeve and label for a 7" vinyl.

The course starts with an overview of how Steve Simpson has been influenced by his past experiences and you'll take a look at a collection of artists and designers who have influenced his traditional approach to illustration.

Included in the brief for this project you'll be given a well-known song title to create a cover for. However, you're the band so your name will go on the cover. Steve will supply you with templates for the record sleeve and label.

You'll start by finding references and making quick sketches in your sketchbook that will help you explore ideas and get a greater understanding of the subject.

With that initial research done, you'll create thumbnail sketch ideas for the cover. This is a fast and efficient approach for exploring as many options as possible and choosing the best option.

The next stage is creating more resolved sketches for both the cover and the label. Here you’ll think about shape relationships and creating good silhouettes to maximize the message without going into great detail.

Finally, you’ll make resolved drawings by adding details and checking references. You’ll transfer those final drawings to your computer or tablet for rough coloring. Steve will be using Affinity Designer on the iPad Pro, but you can use whichever app you normally use for digital coloring.

Steve will show you how to create a limited color palette for your design.

You will print the final color designs (A4) and the template (A3), and then glue to the assembled sleeve and the label fixed to the vinyl record.

Create an illustrated record sleeve and label, which will be attached to an actual 7” vinyl.

This course is for both illustrators who want to bring hand lettering into their projects seamlessly, and designers looking to incorporate illustrative elements to their work.

It's for both students and professionals who want to take more control of projects by adding typographical elements and expanding the reach of their work to posters, covers, and packaging.

The drawing stages of this course are analog, while the coloring is digital. You'll need a 7” vinyl record with a small hole, a sketchbook, pencils, scissors or scalpel, glue stick, ruler, a computer or tablet with your preferred app for coloring, a sheet of A3 heavyweight cartridge paper, and a color printer.