Ancillary Text: Website: Complete..(Almost)

Over the last week I have been working on designing our website for one of our ancillary texts. First off I looked back at the research we had done as a group on other bands/artists websites. I concluded that the best type of website for our ancillary text would be a minimalist website with a simple and effective layout. I took inspiration for this idea from Crystal Castles website, which is very minimalistic.

Home:

The homepage for our website is very a homage to the xx's current website with our version of their logo as the main focus point of the homepage.

We have tried to create continuity throughout our website by having "THE xx" written in the bottom left hand corner of each page. This is also interactive; when you click on the band name; the song "Islands" plays. This is the same throughout each page on our website and we hope it brings consistency to our website and makes it more realistic.

Gallery:

The gallery gives the public a chance to see images of the band that they would not have seen during the music video. We have used a slider to make accessing each picture easy and smoothly. We have also chosen to frame each picture with "grungy" ragged-looking edge. We believe that this will fit with the stereotype of other bands, especially in the indie genre.

Bio:

Short for biography, this page gives it's reader a chance to learn about the "history" of the band and how they came together as a group. This biography is fictional and written by Hannah and I. We tried to make the history of the band as realistic as possible, without copying THE xx's real history, by saying they dropped out of university. We did this because many other indie bands have also dropped out of university to form a band, such as "Foals".

Links:

We added a links section to increase the verisimilitude of our website as links to external sources such as "Myspace" and "Facebook" are very conventional things to find on a band website. These links are important as they give the audience a chance to find out more information about the band and support them in different ways (E.g: becoming a fan on Facebook.)

Shop:

Finally, we decided to create a "Shop". Bands usually incorporate this to increase sales in merchandise and give the band free advertising via shirts and posters. This should increase the realism to our website as I designed many "products" such a "Islands" t-shirt, a "xx" poster and a "Islands" Hoodie. We also have put our other ancillary text, our Digipak, in our shop. However, unfortunately I have not yet got a picture of the finished design but will do soon in the coming days.

To visit our website follow the link below:

http://www.wix.com/ruaraidh_j/islands

Band Website Analysis: Crystal Castles

Crystal Castles are a Canadian electronic music duo from Toronto, Ontario. They have released 2 albums and have had a lot of popularity on the indie music scene. They recently released there second self-titled album and have had international success, especially in the UK. Their website has a very simple design consisting of the artwork from their second album and 2 "youtubeHD" links to their songs "Baptism" and "Not in Love ft Robert Smith". The simple layout of the website matches the style of Crystal castles music which itself is repetitive 8-bit songs with a simple melody.


They have links located at the top of the site to many different things like Merchandise, Social Networking links (Facebook, Twitter and Myspace) and Forums. This gives there fans a chance to spend money on merchandise and support them in different ways through there social networking sites. At the bottom there are links to buying there music through Amazon and iTunes for both the U.S and the U.K. This is interesting as Canada is not an option and maybe this shows that they are looking for an international audience. In the top right hand corner of the website there is a bar where fans can subscribe and enter in there email address and receive the "latest news" about Crystal Castles.

This website seems to be very well created and I believe it has been designed very well to suit it's audience. I find it's simplistic style very interesting and this maybe a theme that I may want to include in our own band website.


Website link: www.crystalcastles.com/