Hey guys!
Today I'm presenting to you an awesome blog post by my cover-designer, Rachel Rossano! She was the hands the creation of Fly Away Home's gorgeous cover! After a wee bit of coaxing she agreed to write a post about cover design and what it entails--I figured those of us who are authors could use a reminder of all the work our "makeup artists" do to bring our precious books to life! What she came up with was an entertaining and enlightening tour through the process. May I present to you:
Cover Design: From Concept to Creation
by Rachel Rossano
Rachel Heffington invited me to come
and chat with all of you about a favorite topic of mine, book covers.
Almost everyone knows the old adage
“Never judge a book by its cover.” Everyone just as universally
ignores its wise advice. Because of that many books go unread that
could have been enjoyed and loved. I feel for those poor books and
their authors who labored over each and every word within the cover.
That's why I do what I do, design book covers.
A good book cover must do at least
three things: accurately represent the story within, catch the
reader's eye, and appear professional. There are myriads of other
rules, but these three are right up at the top.
When I approach a new project, my first
request of the author is: Tell me about your book. I want to know
about the genre, characters, setting, and anything else that the
author feels is important about their story.
Genre is important because it defines
the approach I take to the cover. A romance cover usually has a
couple on the front, unless the story is from one character's
perspective or revolves heavily around one of the characters. A
mystery requires tension and a totally different feel and visual goal
than women's fiction or science fiction. The genre defines the
general approach.
Characters are very important to me. As
a writer and as a reader, my first interest is in the characters.
They drive my plots and frequently are integral to my designs. I try
to match the character the author describes to an image that we can
use. Sometimes compromises have to be made, but usually good matches
can be found. Thankfully eye color and hair color are tweak-able.
If there's a setting or scene that's
crucial to the story, I try to get that on the cover. For Rachel
Heffington's book, Fly Away Home,
setting and time period were very important to the design. Set in 50s
New York City, the setting needed to be clear in the images, the
clothing, the coloring, and the font choices.
The process of
creating a cover that catches the eye is a bit hard to explain.
Placement of the elements, coloring, font choices, and other style
choices all factor into the final product. In this day of electronic
devices and purchasing ebooks on Amazon and iTunes, making sure a
cover looks good in color, black and white, thumbnail size, and full
print size becomes part of the job as well.
What makes a cover
appear professional is another tough one to quantify. There are so
many factors. The final cover should look finished, not slapped
together. The individual parts should work together as a whole image,
not jump out to the observer as pieces. Coloring and lighting also
play a big role. Garishly colored typography or oddly stretched
pictures rarely appear professional. Picking out what works and
doesn't sometimes takes an experienced eye. As someone once pointed
out to me about writing, in the end cover designing is very
subjective.
Each designer has a
different process and a different style. My designing projects
usually follow four steps: discussion, designing, finalizing, and
tweaking.
Rachel Heffington
came to me with a clear idea of what she wanted in her cover design.
This cut down on the discussion phase considerably. Based on her
blurb, mock up, and our conversations about the styles of covers she
liked on other books, I went hunting for images that might work for
her main character and a few other elements that we might want to
use. I emailed her links to a selection of possibilities. She chose
the one she thought best captured Callie.
The next step,
designing, is where I put together a mock of how I think the elements
could go together using comp images, which are low quality resolution
watermarked images from the royalty-free website. I don't purchase
the images until the composition of the cover has been finalized.
Creating a mock cover lets the author and I work through the layout
designing aspects of the cover like where the title will go, where
each image will be used. Edges remain raw and watermarks mar the
pictures. Fonts (kind of lettering) are rarely finalized, and small
details like the blurb and tagline will come later. Mocks aren't
particularly pretty but they serve a purpose. Once we have a very
clear overall picture of which images we need and their placement, we
move to the finalizing stage.
Finalizing is when
I purchase the images, put them together, finish edges, and work to
make the cover feel like a single image. The font choices are
selected. The blurb, bio, and tagline add another layer. After
receiving approval from the author comes, I prepare the final cover
files. Payment happens and the author gets the product.
I always hope the
tweaking phase won't be necessary, but even if it is, I try to make
it painless. Not every system is perfect and sometimes images need to
be adjusted a millimeter here or there. With print covers sometimes
colors need to be adjusted so the hard copy looks like it should.
Just small things. We go through the process of proofing and checking
until the the proof copy arrives at the author's door and it is
perfect.
It is done! Finally
ready for sharing with the world.
I know from
publishing my own books, the feeling of holding the finished product
in your hands is worth all the hard work.
(Examples of the many beautiful covers Rachel has created!)
Rachel Rossano is a happily married homeschooling mom of three kids. Mid the chaos, she thinks about characters, plots, and book cover ideas. The ideas percolate in her head until she can give them form during nap times and after the little ones go to bed. Beyond writing and book covers, she enjoys spending time with her husband, watching movies, teaching her kids, and reading good books. Above all, she seeks to glorify her Savior in all she does. You can visit her over on her blog at http://rachel-rossano.blogspot.com/ or check out her design website at http://rossanodesigns.weebly.com/.
As a sort of add-on to Rachel's post, I have the tag questions ready for you! Just go ahead and fill out the questions on your blog and add your link to this post. Also, don't forget that
filling out this tag gives you more entries in the Coziness Package Giveaway! All right:
1.) What is the most important thing about a cover?
2.) Are covers even that important?
3.) If you could choose one actor (living or dead) to play each of your leads, who would that list include?
4.) In what genres do you prefer to work?
5.) Which book on the shelf closest to you has the prettiest cover?
6.) If you could have any famous author judge your work, who would you choose and why?
7.) What is one thing you must have near you in order to write?
8.) If you are independently published, which cover designer did you choose?
9.) What is your worst writing habit?
10.) Do you have a favorite literary-inclined character from a book or movie?
There you go! Remember, the time is short in which to enter for a chance to win the awesome Coziness Package so get your entries in so you'll be in the running. :)
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