From the 1950s through to the 1980s, the 12" LP record and the 45 rpm record became the major formats for the distribution of popular music. The LP format remains in use for occasional new releases, though other formats have largely supplanted it. The size of the typical cardboard LP sleeve cover is 12.375 in square (31.43 cm square).
Since the mid-1990s, the compact disc (CD) has become the most common form of physically-distributed music products. Packaging formats vary, including the very common plastic jewel-case, and the cardboard and plastic combination commonly known as a Digipak. Typically the album cover component of these packages is approximately 4.75 in square (12.1 cm square).
Album covers have gradually changed over time. They have adapted to suit what they are packaging. From Vinyl records to online MP3 covers; Digipaks are used to represent the whole album and to attract the eye of the consumer. With the increasing popularity of digital music downloading services and the inflating cost of conducting business, the purpose and prevalence of the album cover is evolving. While the music industry tries to keep up with technological and cultural shifts, the role that packaging (and thus the "album cover") will play in consumer music sales in the near future is uncertain, although its role is certainly changing, and digital forms of packaging will continue to surface, which, to some degree (and to some consumers) take the place of physical packaging. Both MP3 and WMA music files are able to contain embedded digital album artworks (called cover images or simply covers) in jpeg format. As of 2008, physical music products, with a physical "album cover", continue to outsell digital downloads.
The conventions of a front cover are simplistic colour schemes, few or no characters depending of the artist/s, a title that explains what the whole album is about (like a poetic anthology which is recorded), a drawn image with a hidden meaning behind the album/single. Depending on how explicit the content is albums may have the 'parental guidance' logo in the bottom corner of the front cover. My group and I will defiantly have this logo on our cover as our single does have explicit language and we feel it is our duty to let parents know what they are buying if their child happens to be younger than our target audience. The back cover would usually have the names of each songs, a simple or no design accompanying the front cover, the bar code, the brand logos for each part of the recording process, name of artist or band at the top, 
The conventions of an R&B album cover include the main artist who are usually dressed in street wear if it is a male artist so t-shirt, baggy jeans, jewellery; this does resonate to the typical form of an Rap artist but both genres derive from each other so they share similar characteristics. If it were a female on the front cover you would have her typically looking beautifully fierce with big hair, nice make up, slightly revealing clothes (depending on how daring the artist wants to be in order to attract her audience, this does apply to males as well.) Its good to keep in mind the fact that albums covers have changed primarily due to the trend of each era for example vinyl front covers during the 70's would have had a bubble font as that was a conventional, trendy aspect of the 70's whereas today we use block fonts which represent our trend but how much more cynical people have become as times have changed. ANALYSE POSTERS OF CD'S COMING OUT!
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