Making the Traces Deluxe EP Insert

Last Saturday was spent constructing the special insert for the Deluxe Edition of Nine is the Level’s final EP Traces. As with Crumbs and Remnants, Doug Tolley wanted to do something special for a 'deluxe' edition.

Following from my cover design using photos of Doug’s grandparents, the insert is made to look like a missing page from a photo album. To construct the inserts, I ordered new prints from my digital copies of the originals, and then artificially aged them. One in particular (Jack's photo) had more ageing, with rips and edges brutally sanded down to soften them. Even using an electric sander it took longer than I thought it would!

One photo was relatively recent, so for that I just rounded the corners with a special punch to better mimic the style of prints of the time.

The intention was to make all of these look as much like the original photos (in their current condition) as possible. These were then glued into one side of the 12x12” black card.

I then needed to add the liner notes and credits. I looked into the costs of printing white on black card for a small print run, but the cost was prohibitive. Instead I decided to get stickers printed with the text, which worked well.

As a final touch, I wrote the Traces script on the front in white pen, and asked Doug to sign the back. Only 30 of these will be available!

Buy the Traces Deluxe edition on Bandcamp