Book Cover help requested
Chris Dolley
with magic and a little something else' story that's coming out through Book
View Cafe next month.
The full background to the story and the covers are on the BVC blog here:
http://blog.bookviewcafe.com/2009/12/30/book-cover-design-101-unleashing-the-monster/
Chris
Resonance (Baen)
Shift (Baen)
Magical Crimes (BVC)
Ben Crowell
> Anyone got a few minutes to help me decide on a book cover? It's for my
> 'CSI with magic and a little something else' story that's coming out
> through Book View Cafe next month.
>
> The full background to the story and the covers are on the BVC blog
> here:
> http://blog.bookviewcafe.com/2009/12/30/book-cover-design-101-unleashing-the-monster/
I'd go for the solid black title. More readable.
The cover actually did not communicate "giant penis" to me. I didn't
understand it without reading your blog post.
How much are you planning to charge for the e-book, given that it's
only 13k?
Eric Ammadon
"Magical Crimes will be coming to an online bookstore near you in
early January. Price $0.99. Free download available for reviewers."
I agree that the dark solid black is most readable.
It might have been more fortunate if the fellow was carrying that
thingy on his shoulder.
--
arggh, is it priate day again?
Brian M. Scott
<chris....@worldonline.fr> wrote in
<news:4b3b6f17$0$30467$426a...@news.free.fr> in
rec.arts.sf.composition:
> Anyone got a few minutes to help me decide on a book cover?
The solid black title is by far the most readable.
[...]
Brian
James A. Donald
> Anyone got a few minutes to help me decide on a book cover? It's for my 'CSI
> with magic and a little something else' story that's coming out through Book
> View Cafe next month.
>
> The full background to the story and the covers are on the BVC blog here:
> http://blog.bookviewcafe.com/2009/12/30/book-cover-design-101-unleashing-the-monster/
Too much photoshop cleverness with the title makes it difficult to
read. A little bit of photoshop cleverness informs the reader of the
genre.
I would recommend a reddish title with a *slight* shading from red to
yellow, not the rather extreme shading.
Also, the protagonist looks gay, but this may be your intention, or
may be the best you can do given that you are no artist, and are too
cheap to afford someone who is.
J.Pascal
wrote:
> Anyone got a few minutes to help me decide on a book cover? It's for my 'CSI
> with magic and a little something else' story that's coming out through Book
> View Cafe next month.
>
>
> Chris
>
> Resonance (Baen)
> Shift (Baen)
> Magical Crimes (BVC)
Solid, but not overly saturated red, with the dark shadow effect
(contouring) from the sand colored one.
The solid sand colored one isn't too bad, but red is better. Black
is all right, but a difference in saturation between the title and
author would look odd and having them the same isn't quite right
either.
The shading red to something else.... just don't do that.
-Julie
Chris Dolley
> Also, the protagonist looks gay, but this may be your intention, or
> may be the best you can do given that you are no artist, and are too
> cheap to afford someone who is.
Do you come from Eastbourne?
The cover art is by Donald McGill and, being an author who knows where money
should flow, I, of course, paid for the use of his work.
James A. Donald
> > Also, the protagonist looks gay, but this may be your intention, or
> > may be the best you can do given that you are no artist, and are too
> > cheap to afford someone who is.
"Chris Dolley"
> Do you come from Eastbourne?
>
> The cover art is by Donald McGill and, being an author who knows where money
> should flow, I, of course, paid for the use of his work.
The reader will identify with the protagonist. I doubt most readers
will want to identify with the character depicted.
J.Pascal
Perhaps not. It reminded me of Monopoly, though, and of Fallout 3.
I don't know what the book is like, but it's quite possible that the
cover art does what it needs to do, which is faithfully communicate
the tone of the book. Fun and quirky is probably the right tone.
If the story is actually dark and dashing, well, then there is a
problem.
-Julie
James A. Donald
> > The reader will identify with the protagonist. I doubt most readers
> > will want to identify with the character depicted.
"J.Pascal"
> Perhaps not. It reminded me of Monopoly, though, and of Fallout 3.
> I don't know what the book is like, but it's quite possible that the
> cover art does what it needs to do, which is faithfully communicate
> the tone of the book. Fun and quirky is probably the right tone.
It sounds like it is intended to be fun and quirky, the cover art fits
that tone - but it is somewhat unusual for the protagonist of a
detective story to be ridiculous. Of course, the detective often
*seems* to be ridiculous, in order to put the murderer off guard, but
this is just build up to the payoff where the detective drops this
pretence.
Kay Shapero
chris....@worldonline.fr says...
> Anyone got a few minutes to help me decide on a book cover? It's for my 'CSI
> with magic and a little something else' story that's coming out through Book
> View Cafe next month.
>
> The full background to the story and the covers are on the BVC blog here:
> http://blog.bookviewcafe.com/2009/12/30/book-cover-design-101-unleashing-the-monster/
>
On the whole I like the one at the bottom to the left with the blue
lettering - the black lettering to the right shows up a bit better but
it's sufficiently different from the rest of the cover that it looks
odd. Out of place anyway - with that cover "odd" may not be sufficient
a term. And you may want to hope the cover isn't the only thing you have
to sell the book with since alas it DOES look like you've written a
13,000 word penis joke. :)
--
Kay Shapero
address munged, email kay at following domain
http://www.kayshapero.net