Tagged: cover

Stereos in the Snow

When we designed the covers for the Divided Man series, we worked on the three of them simultaneously. It was a good way to produce a unified result, with the content, colors, layout, and typography working together so the books really looked like a set.

We liked how that went, so we’re following the same methodology for the Science Novels. For books one and three, the main images were downloaded and then manipulated in Photoshop, much as with the earlier cover designs. But we just couldn’t find a stock image anywhere that really worked for book two.

So, we took our own, snapping extreme closeups of an old amplifier from our music room. The initial candidate gave us very encouraging results, but we felt dissatisfied that there wasn’t any ice in the image (probably because we took the pic on our dining table). Pervasive cold is an important thematic element in the story that should be reflected on the cover, plus it would help connect the imagery for the other two books. Kent tinkered with adding ice and snow textures sampled from many of the same images that we’d already auditioned and rejected, but it wasn’t coming together. The effects he was getting didn’t match what Jen saw in her mind’s eye.

A confluence of propitious events followed. Jen tracked down a source for salvaged electronics, where she purchased another techie gizmo for us to photograph. This also prompted us to scavenge our to-recycle pile. That turned out to be a been-recycled pile, and therefore it didn’t exist. Rats. But, Jen’s mom was looking to clear out some old stereo equipment that no one had used in years, so we grabbed it.

And then, best of all, it snowed. We took all our delightfully obsolete treasures out on the deck and let nature heap them with eleven inches of snow. We also spritzed them with a squirt bottle to help things along. The neighbors, if they noticed, didn’t say anything.

The final cover image will be an amalgam created from portions of several of the pictures Jen took. It’s not done yet, but already it looks awesome.

Good Things Come In Threes

Cover designs for trilogies, for instance.

As much as with the interior content of the books, we feel it’s important that the covers work both individually and as a set. Our goal is that you know they belong together even before you open one up. Of course, we also want them to be gorgeous and pique your interest.

A book’s cover has a big job. Not that anyone we know would ever go against the venerable clichéd wisdom and dare to judge a book by its cover, but c’mon. It’s a lot like what they say about a meal: you taste it first with your eyes. So, the cover has to convey a sense of quality and professionalism, signal the genre and the tone, and also usually depict some aspect of the subject matter. Bottom line is, you want to let your target readers know that this is a book that they’ll be interested in.

And as of this week, the Science Trilogy now has prototype covers! They’re not completely polished yet, and we’re following our practice of laying something aside for a bit so we can take a fresh look and spot ways to strengthen it later, but we’re really excited about how they’re shaping up. On top of all the criteria already listed, this trio actually tells a story of its own, which resonates with the novels themselves. (Can you tell we’re proud of the design?)

It’ll be time for a reveal before we know it. So, watch this space!

Cover Me!

If all goes according to plan, we will have another novel in the hands of our adoring public by the end of this year. Science Novel is the working title for this, the first book in the working titled Science Trilogy. Both do have actual names, and we’ll be excited to reveal them soon. Watch this space!

In preparation for upcoming edits, we recently spent a few evenings (and one rainy weekend) reading through the manuscript in its current form. Diving deep into this story world inspired Kent. He cracked his knuckles flamboyantly, like Bugs Bunny at the piano, and fired up his various Adobe art programs. After the requisite swearing and incredulous frustration about where they could have possibly hidden the good tools this time, he’s spent many an hour working up mock covers.

There are several different directions we’ve discussed for the cover art and it’s finally time to narrow it down and make a decision. The problem is that we like so many of them and we can only have one. Well, since it’s a trilogy we can actually have three, but they all have to coordinate and cohere, so we have to pick a single direction.

We think we’ve done that. It’s up to Kent to whip up a trio of “proof of concept” covers. At that point we’ll either get all swoony, which means we’re on the right track, or we’ll both go “hmm” which means we need to start over.

And if we don’t agree? One word: thumb-wrestling.

We Got Ya Covered (Well…)

The Writing Cave has lately also been a Design Cavern, as we try to get a jump on cover ideas for our next series. It’s as important not to rush the creative process for a visual product as it is for prose, and you deserve beautiful covers to look at. We won’t let you down.

Our preliminary brainstorming has given us several intriguing concepts, plus several lightboxes and pinboards full of images. It’s really, unbelievably easy to burn whole afternoons on image research.

We’ve thrown together a few mockups, nothing too fancy at this stage. Jen has collaged some rough comps in Photoshop, while Kent fills pages with hand-lettered variations of the titles like he’s daydreaming about marrying them.

The biggest challenge is coming up with unifying imagery for all three books. That’s not quite the whole problem, though. The three books form one large story, and there are ideas at both a micro and macro level that tie everything together. We easily made a short list of relevant symbols. What we want is for each book to have a distinctive main image, and all three of those images to work as a set that exemplifies the theme. (And expresses the appropriate mood, and conveys an accurate impression of the genre, all while looking awesome.)

It’s a tall order. But we didn’t let you down last time.

Cover Reveal: Tenpenny Zen

Mark your calendars! Tenpenny Zen, the second book in our Divided Man series, will be available on Monday, March 20.

Our books tend to defy categorization. We’re labeling this one as Cyberpunk although it might more accurately be called Shroompunk. For some reason Amazon doesn’t consider our newly invented genre legit. Yet.

And now, may we present to you the gorgeousness that is the cover of Tenpenny Zen:

Tenpenny Zen: a novel of sex, cults, and an interdimensional henge contraption.

Check back next week for a sneak peek at chapter 1!

Cover Reveal: Miss Brandymoon’s Device

r-avatarIt’s one week until launch day for Miss Brandymoon’s Device, the first volume of our Divided Man trilogy! We’re very excited and proud to reveal the cover design Kent created.

Feast your eyes!

mbd-cover-crop

Miss BrandyMoon’s Device: A novel of sex, nanotech, and a sentient lava lamp.

As soon as it launches we’ll provide info on all the ways to get your hands on it. Stay tuned!

We’re Covered!

r-avatarLast night, Kent completed the cover designs for all three volumes of the trilogy. We’re very proud of them (they’re gorgeous, in our unimpeachably unbiased opinion) and they bring us one very important step nearer to publishing the books.

We can’t wait to unveil these to the world. Stay tuned for the releases very soon!

The cover design project required about 60 hours, and produced a set of three coordinated designs. But it wasn’t anywhere close to an equal distribution of 20 hours per cover. The early stages of the process took up a disproportionate amount, and most of that went into searching stock photo libraries for the right base images to work from. Sites like Shutterstock have a seemingly infinite inventory, but we found it difficult to narrow things down to the right images. Eventually we decided to stop burning time on image searches and instead burn it on photo manipulation. Kent’s Photoshop kung-fu, accumulated over years of professional design experience, was up to the challenge.

Most authors don’t design their own covers. The publisher typically handles that, but if you’re self publishing then that puts it right back on your plate and you need to budget for art and graphic design services.  A strong cover is essential, so this is not a place to wing it. In our case, design skills came along as part of the partnership package so it made sense to capitalize on them and get the covers we really wanted.

Every partnership is unique, and the background of each partner confers knowledge that can be leveraged — whether that’s in the form of subject matter, story structure, process, mechanics, or production.

Time Flies Like An Arrow

r-avatarWoof.

Everything. Takes. Forever.

Maybe we have unrealistic expectations. Okay, that’s probably it. After all, we’ve done this several times, so of course it’ll just go faster and smoother each time from now on, right?

Jen continues to hammer away at the outlining for Son of Science Novel. It’s taking (spoiler alert!) longer than she budgeted. But it really is coming together, and now she’s nearly done incorporating all the mysterious scratches left by mysterious chickens in our various steno pads, from back when we were brainstorming the story. The process might be going faster, except she finds herself distracted by the art project happening on Kent’s side of the writing cave.

Kent continues to refine the illustration for the cover of our trilogy’s first book. It’s getting very close too, in fact, but there’s always one more tweak, one more font to try, one more configuration of the title and other text in relation to the artwork… Kent claims that he’d be making better time if not for the constant distraction of the outline being crafted on the other side of the writing cave. (Jen rolls her eyes.)

It’s worth giving your projects the time they need in order to create work that you’re proud of. With a partner sharing the load, you’ll get through the slow patches in half the time and have energy left for the fun stuff.