Valley of the End
Shumatsu no Tani (Valley of the End) is an Epic, Industrial-Psybass extravaganza. The plot is dark and punctuated by sharp stabs and soaring phantom hallucinations on the verge of singularity. There is a crisp griminess to the hints of a remnant civilization on the other side of apocalypse. As one embarks on this deep, 2 Disc journey there is an uncomfortable introduction almost underplayed and purposefully over-produced that leaves the traveler wanting immediately. The experience is analogous to the out-of-placeness of the intermedium between normal reality and the onset of LSD. As Disc One unfolds, the ambience widens and you find yourself dropped into NeoTokyo after the A.I. takeover and subsequent eradication of much of the human race. But Disc 1 merely prepares you for the hard, beat-driven ecstasis delivered on Disc 2. Here is where you will find the classic Nibana crush albeit darker than his earlier “Ask the Universe”. note: Kevin Nibana is from Paris, France
Listen to Shumatsu no Tani Disc 1
Listen to Shumatsu no Tani Disc 2
Buy Shumatsu no Tani Here
https://nibana.bandcamp.com/album/sh-matsu-no-tani
Follow Nibana on Soundcloud Here
How the Cover Came to Be
The Valley of the End image is a massively leveled up composite of 2 much older and less skillful pieces of mine. Nibana had seen some of my other album covers and went searching for a way to bring a couple early and strange works of mine back to life.
Image 1 - Mother and Child
Image 2 - Watery Darkness
The Mash Up
The Final
As you can see, the older images appear sophomoric, messy and incomplete when compared to their new form. Though I enjoyed making both of them immensely, at the time, I am not so proud of them anymore.
Detail Shots
Below you will find plenty of detail cuts. Its really important to me to create each piece in large format in case it is ever displayed in print. It is much easier to cut your files down in size than it is to increase their presence.
I spend many many hours with each of my digital pieces, getting down into the nitty gritty to blend 3D renders, photographic textures and pure painterly pixels. I understand a decent amount about anatomy and form, lighting and depth, composition and color and I push myself to my limits with every piece that I produce. It is important to me to consistently evolve and grow as an artist and I never want to let the viewer down. I take my work very seriously and I mean to saturate a close inspection with humanity and intrigue. I intend to entertain the mind and stimulate the senses at all resolutions. And so, I do hope these closeups will allow you a window into the finer points of Shumatsu no Tani.
The Logo
In addition to the image, I needed to conjure a font that fit both the title of the album and the image itself. I started with a free font from dafont.com called Teknojap and started cutting into it and customizing. I overlaid textures and applied text effects until I was satisfied. I then collapsed my layers and started painting in FX and refinements to bring it to a totally custom space. “Nibana” is only loosely attached to the original font. “Shumatsu no Tani” is closer to the original, though there were many shifts to individual letter size, letting, etc. I also added and removed accoutrements as I felt necessary to create a custom style.
Digipack Layout
After we completely finalized the image we began to block in our layout for the CD case. In this instance we have a dual disc format and so we needed to design 8 printed pages using the detail shots in addition to the full image.
Final Product
I hope you enjoyed this in depth look at "Valley of the End"
You can listen to more of Nibana's Music Here
and Here
You can view more of my works here
https://steemit.com/art/@elohprojects/harbinger-of-the-ascended-troll-with-detail-cuts
and see all of my work at https://elohprojects.com/
Please Follow me @elohprojects and Upvote and Resteem
Thank you for your generous support and I hope to see you soon!!!
Kindest Regards,
Sean
