Foyle's War - Series 7 packaging

The Brief:

Design DVD & BluRay slicks and discs, slipcase and a 4 panel digipak for Foyle’s War Season 7. To continue the branding set up in the prior six seasons while giving the new season its own distinctive feel within the family.

The Method:

The brand is extremely well established and the biggest challenge was in keeping the same consistent feel and high standard as the other seasons. The key aspect of the central image of the packaging is the main characters; Foyle, Milner and Sam and the season is built around them. With the DVD, for example, the trio remains the same while the background is changed. At the bottom of the image behind the trio on season one, there is a rural landscape. On season 7 we decided to go with a coastline scene, which tied in with the final episodes being about the closing scenes of the series and the war. The sky is also different on each season and as season 6 was heavily clouded, we decided that the clouds should be lifting in the final episodes. Each season has a unifying colour scheme; with season one having a brown cast, season 2 grey, season 3 green, etc. The tones are rich and muted and are used to bring the sky, background scenes and leather effect together into a cohesive whole on the packaging. The rich sky blue was an unused option very in keeping with the coastline and sea images we would be using.

The finished packs for standard DVD, slipcase & bluray

The interiors of the DVD slick and the digipak show the highly iconic coastline of Dover. The long white cliffs were often the first sign of home the troops returning to England would see. The spitfire banking in the sky also enhances the feeling of turning for home. Each season features a different World War II aeroplane. To gain a good level of historical accuracy we researched all the different British planes in service during WWII. The spitfire in particular, being a fighter plane, resonated well with the push to end the war and head back to England. To get the best examples of the spitfire, sky and coastline/beach we extensively searched online stock photography.

The spitfire plane - before and after we made adjustments in photoshop

A short list of 2 spitfire images, were finally selected. The rejected image was of a plane flying towards the viewer and while a good strong choice with a different aspect to the other seasons, it lacked the symbolic, uplifting feeling of turning for home the banking plane conveyed.

The Dover coast images had to be majestic in feel and expansive enough to cover the four panels of the digipak. It was important to keep the background image ‘of the period’, so any features deemed too modern would be cloned out.

The Dover coast with the sky and spitfire added

The sky we decided on was added to the beach scene on the DVD front, the digipak front, interior and discs and the bluray slick front and discs, beautifully unifying the season as a whole. The overall blue cast applied to all of the images, enhanced the season look further and added richness and depth to the colour.

The sky - before and after we made adjustments in photoshop

As much attention was given to the story the interior panels of the digipak had to tell. The background is essentially a plan view of a wooden desktop. Previous seasons used open books or lined pages to act as the framework for carrying the information. For season 7 we chose old style folders and filing cards to give an authentic 1940s look.

The short synopsis and accompanying photo stills for each episode needed to be placed on the table top in a way that looked realistic.

digipak inner left-hand side panel

The 1 or 2 episode stills we picked had to succinctly sum up the episodes they represented. The paper and stills from each episode were coloured and aged.

digipak inner right-hand side panel

Extra elements like the red poppies and the U.S. servicemen’s guide book added very specific WWII atmosphere. Lastly we had to make sure the images lined up across the gutter and made sense across the 2 panels.

The blu ray slick uses the same imagery as the DVD cover. The actual sky is replaced with the blue tone placed over a cloth background used on all of the Foyle’s War Blu rays.

On the Blu ray the 3 key characters are in a different arrangement, but serve the same central visual role. The cloth finish used on the front wraps around to cover the back and spine. The cloth colour is altered to be in line with the rest of Season 7. As on the front, the back of the blu ray slick also uses the downsized DVD elements. One image from the season is used to anchor a quote and the synopses for each episode are stacked under this.

The typographic style for Foyle’s War had already been established for the project and the challenge was to maintain the series look effectively for the last season. The project as a whole is tied effectively together with the use of the repeated key images, stylised colouring and typography. The individual flavour of season 7 has been added by the use of one-off touches like the blue colour cast and the different sky, coastline, plane and WWII memorabilia.