Tag Archives: book cover design

April 9, 2014 · 9:00 am

Behind the Scenes – Roberto’s Return

This is a cover for Melange Books, the next in the T.J. Jackson Mysteries.

For this cover, the author already had a pretty good idea of what he wanted, and he even had images of the park he wanted used for the background. However, since it was a recognizable building, I did have the author check on the need for a property release. (Just like models, many buildings and areas require property releases. It’s a good idea to check before shooting in an area to see if you’ll need one). The author was able to get permission, and so we were able to proceed with that image.

I also ended up doing a bit of digital illustration (Photoshop CS6) to piece everything together. Since we wanted a very specific pose, and the author had the outfit necessary, he had a friend model for him and shoot the image, and then I picked out the stock images of the man’s head to best fit the character. I added in a different sky, since we wanted sunset, and we tried to mimic the baseball text for the title itself.

Side note: Since most of these covers have been revealed by the time I post them, and since I usually try to post behind the scenes information when I reveal the covers on my blog, I’m going to start calling these posts “Behind the Scenes” instead of “Cover Reveal.” Sorry for any confusion. 🙂

Stock Photos from Dreamstime:

http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-photo-afroammerican-businessman-points-finger-up-image29241340
http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-photo-sunset-sky-image24432770

All other images provided by author. Photograph of Doubleday Field used with permission.

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Filed under Book Covers, Client Work, Photo Illustration

Tagged as A T.J. Jackson Mystery, baseball player, book cover design, cover art, Paul Ferrante, photographic illustration, photoshop CS6, Roberto's Return, SBibb, Stephanie Bibb, Stephanie Flint

April 2, 2014 · 8:00 am

Cover Reveal – The Last Conception

This is a cover for Melange Books.

In this case, the author had a stock image in mind, and it worked out quite well for the cover. I had my own textures that I used to create the overall, papery text. Otherwise, I just played with color tonality, blending modes, and text placement. I gave the bottom of the cover a darker brown color to represent dirt, and the author asked that the main image be green to symbolize life. This was the end result. Simple, but elegant. 🙂

Stock photo from: Dreamstime.

http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-image-woman-tree-image18317296

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Filed under Book Covers, Client Work, Photo Illustration

Tagged as book cover art, book cover design, ebook covers, Gabriel Constans, Melange Books, photographic illustration, SBibb, SBibb's Photographic Illustration, Stephanie Bibb, Stephanie Flint, The Last Conception

March 26, 2014 · 8:00 am

Dangerous Denial – Cover Reveal

This is a cover I edited for Barking Rain Press. In this case, they already had the main image they wanted, and they had the cool text placement in the cross hairs. However, they wanted me to do the final touches and adjust the sizing and such. So, after a bit of playing around with effects, I ended up playing the the motion blur and radial blur filters to add a sense of movement and disorientation. I also played with blurring and retouching the background so our main focus would be on the woman, and I played with the overall lighting. This is the end result. 🙂

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Filed under Book Covers, Client Work, Photo Illustration

Tagged as Amy Ray, Barking Rain Press, book cover art, book cover design, book covers, Dangerous Denial, ebooks, motion blur, photographic illustration, photoshop CS6, radial blur, SBibb, Stephanie Bibb, Stephanie Flint, thriller

March 12, 2014 · 7:00 am

A Burning Hope – Book Cover Reveal

This is another cover for Melange Books, for a fantasy short story.

The author and I went through a few slight variations, debating how to get the swamp to look right and where the best place to put the fire was. I also tinkered with lighting to create the mood we wanted. One thing to keep in mind when doing covers is that lighting, and using strong color contrast, can help attract the eye to the image. Another trick to keep in mind when looking for stock photos is that you might look for something that already has some photoshop done to it, then tweak it further to suit your purposes. In this case, I found the ‘monster’s’ eyes already partially edited. But, because the monsters are supposed to be blind, I did additional photoshop to create the final look.

Stock photos from: Dreamstime.

http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-images-floating-fishing-village-image26604324
http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-photography-boat-fog-image12261557
http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-photo-fire-image16068630
http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-images-horror-blindness-image20380689

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Filed under Book Covers, Photo Illustration

Tagged as A Burning Hope, book cover art, book cover design, book covers, cover design, ebooks, Mathias G.B. Colwell, Melange Book, photographic illustration, photomanipulation, SBibb, short stories, Stephanie Bibb, Stephanie Flint

February 26, 2014 · 2:36 pm

Cover Reveal – A Thousand Sunsets

A cover for Melange Books.

This is another example where I changed the hairstyle of the person in the stock photo. The image I used had long hair, but we needed short, curly hair to better fit the main character. In this case, I started by using the Patch tool and Clone brush tool in Photoshop CS6 to fill in the background where the hair had been previously, then tweaked it using layers to smooth out where her shoulders where. Then, on a new layer, I used the smudge tool. First a softer, but larger size for the over all shape of the hair, and then a smaller, harder brush to give it the little details in the hair. Then I created another layer to sharpen it and lowered the opacity to make it look a little more natural. Viola. New hairstyle.

This is also a case where I ended up using a discarded cover proof from another project. A while back I’d tested this image and text placement (different font, though) for a different romance cover, but the author and I ultimately chose something different. However, when I read the art form for A Thousand Sunsets, this proof came back to mind. So I asked the publisher if they’d mind me recycling the proof (since we hadn’t used it), and I did check with the author, but it turned out to be what they were looking for. So… without further ado, the cover for A Thousand Sunsets:

Stock Image from Dreamstime:

http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-image-couple-love-silhouette-lake-sunset-image21896121

Little side note; I had fun highlighting the faces with a very faint heart-shaped overlay. It’s not super-visible, but it’s there. 🙂

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Filed under Book Covers, Client Work, Photo Illustration

Tagged as A Thousand Sunsets, book cover art, book cover design, book cover illustration, cover design, cover reveal, custom book covers, Jannie Lund, Melange Books, patch tool, photographic illustration, photomanipulation, photoshop CS6, romance novel, SBibb, Stephanie Flint

February 19, 2014 · 7:00 am

Cover Reveal – Elmo’s Sojourn

This is a cover for Melange Books.

Initially I thought this cover was going to be a bit more difficult to reconstruct from the proof image (since I start with a proof before creating the final), but again, the align layers function came in super handy, and all I had to do was some finishing tweaks to bring everything together. Once the basic pieces were in place, I went in and tweaked the lighting further, added in shadows and played with blending, and removed some of the distracting pieces from around the edges of the cover. Blades of grass and little star specks can distract from the center image if they stand out too much. Since we wanted a wormhole effect, this is also a case where I ended up using illustrations as well as photography in order to add to the science fiction look of the piece. Sometimes its helpful to look in the illustrated sections of the stock sites, and not just the photos. You never know what you might find that could be useful. 🙂

Stock Photos from: Dreamstime.

http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-images-tornado-green-field-image18897874
http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-photography-back-view-senior-man-white-background-image35078222
http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-photo-old-trees-mist-laurel-forest-madeira-portugal-image35702305
http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-images-banyan-trees-hilo-image18648599
http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-image-tornado-city-image21115451
http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-images-tornado-image3181364
http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-photos-traveling-wormhole-image21501588

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Filed under Book Covers, Client Work, Photo Illustration

Tagged as book cover art, book cover design, book cover illustration, cover design, cover reveal, custom book covers, Elmo's Sojourn, Melange Books, photographic illustration, photomanipulation, SBibb, Stephanie Flint, stock photography, Walt Trizna

December 4, 2013 · 6:36 pm

Second Best – Cover Reveal

Another cover for Melange Books.

This one was actually one of the easier covers for me, largely because we were working directly from a stock subscription, so I was able to work with the full-size images right from the get-go. For this, I played around with overall mood, trying to get a sense of the setting per the art request sheet, and I also asked about extra details regarding the character (which age to go with and so forth) from the author. We later added the faint scar on her cheek, which is more visible at larger resolutions, but wasn’t meant to be the point of focus. Overall, I’m really pleased with how this came out. 🙂

Stock Photography from Dreamstime:

http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-photography-portrait-girl-image15706682
http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-images-old-abandoned-factory-image18763339
http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-images-chain-link-fence-image7247619
http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-image-abstract-chain-link-fence-image7536291

The Feast of Yule – Cover Reveal

This was a cover that managed to come together really easily. In this case, the author requested that there be a gnome on the cover if possible, and if we could get an autumn background, that’d be good, too. Mentioned that the gnomes were mischievous and at one point had axes in the story. So I went browsing through Dreamstime looking for images of gnomes. I didn’t find a gnome, per say… but three images later, I’d say that gnome looks mischevious, don’t you?

Sometimes a cover can be amazingly simple to put together. This was one of them. Also, I kept the same sort of title treatment to help it tie into her other story, Forgetting Fallenwood. 🙂

Stock Photography from Dreamstime:

http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-image-little-boy-suit-pumpkin-gnome-autumn-park-image29692401

http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-photography-vintage-axe-isolated-image24376757
http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-photography-christmas-old-man-beard-red-hat-carrying-santa-claus-bag-over-white-background-image33924152

Santa’s Special Girl – Book Cover Reveal

Another cover for Melange Books. Today I talk about how photomanipulation is like a puzzle. 🙂

This was a case where character creation was useful. The author requested that we have the little girl sitting on the other character’s lap, who is dressed as Santa. In this case, I didn’t have much luck finding the perfect picture from the main stock site I used, so I wound up putting a few photos together to create the resulting image. Found a guy dressed in a Santa suit who matched the description– changed his hair color. Gave him a slight smile. Found a Santa hat. Found a little girl sitting cross-legged in pajamas– helpful. Found a sitting Santa to use for the lap… and used puppet warp on the arm. Found a background. Put everything together, and voila! Photomanipulation is a bit like putting together puzzle pieces, but it helps to have an idea of what the pieces look like before starting the search to find the right one. Kind of like finding the corner pieces first and working your way into the puzzle from there.

Stock Photos from Dreamstime:

http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-images-teen-punk-santa-image5438109
http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-image-portrait-handsome-guy-image3590996
http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-photo-girl-sitting-santas-lap-getting-hug-image27538055
http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-photos-beautiful-six-year-old-girl-sitting-pajamas-over-white-image125808
http://www.dreamstime.com/royalty-free-stock-photography-doctor-s-office-image480487#_

Cover Reveal – The Revolving Year

Forgot to post yesterday. Today we have a cover reveal. 🙂

Full size version: http://sbibb.deviantart.com/art/The-Revolving-Year-Cover-405328502

This is a wrap-around cover for Barking Rain Press. (Find the book here: http://www.barkingrainpress.org/dd-product/revolving-year/ )

Photoshop CS6. For this cover, the publisher already had a few images picked out they were interested in. I chose to play with this one, under the idea that the man in the picture needed to be removed, and the season changed to Fall. (See the original Shutterstock image: http://www.shutterstock.com/pic.mhtml?id=99948338&src=id ) This was actually quite a bit of fun, and the content aware fill tool proofed to be quite useful, as did the clone tool when I cropped the woman’s hair shorter. The additional fall trees photos are my own. Overall, I quite enjoyed creating this one, especially trying to set the tone. I did the basic title treatment, and the publisher adjusted it to fit their needs.

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Filed under Book Covers, Photo Illustration

Tagged as book cover, book cover design, content aware fill, photographic illustration, romance novel, SBibb, shutterstock. Barking Rain Press, Stephanie Bibb, Stephanie Flint, The Revolving Year, Vanessa Furse Jackson, wrap-around book cover