Cover Art

Wow, I hadn't thought about that. Interesting. I can see where they're coming from though, nowadays. Hope you're right about bows and arrows being okay. The girl is Sulon the Hunter, by the way, and she'd put that arrow between a pair of eyes from a thousand yards away ;-)

 

I think it will be okay for another reason on top of it being a bow - it isn't pointing at the reader directly.

But regardless, I agree with the others - it's a great cover. Does what it says on the tin and done with a bit of panache as well

 

I actually really like it; it doesn't look amateurish like so many DIY covers tend to do.

 

The cover does make a person wonder what the book is about, which is one of the goals of an effective cover.

 

You're lucky, being able to design your own covers. I had a go once, and the result was.....urghh! and yes, its a great colour combo.

 

The key is practice. I'm sure you had to practice walking for some time before you mastered it. It's the same with cover design.

 

Thanks for the comments on my cover for The Inward Gate. Good to hear it makes people intrigued. I'm not a designer by trade, by the way, but I have drawn and sculpted most of my life and am a regular viewer of art channels on Youtube. I think the key is simplicity and a melding of all the different elements. My brother is a designer and concept artist, however, and he made this for me in 2016. This cover was for a novel. He had to create it with only a few hints because I wanted him to read it without spoilers. He became so invested in the story and in the art that eventually we started working on a project together that's lasted up to this day. You'll notice an element I took from this cover. I think it captures the downfall of Man quite well, the birds scattering in flight in the aftermath.



Edit: My brother makes fantasy maps, too. He's known for 'Clichea' especially.

 

Apart from the fact that this book cover looks great, it also has
has a simple three-element configuration. The Girl, background and typography. I think you have judged this perfectly, it would have been oh so easy to use conflicting fonts and unneeded information - to over-engineer it in other words. As it is, the image and title speak for themselves. Great job.

 

thank you I should mention though, that I had nothing to do with the design. I just paid for it but yeah, its my favourite cover. The designer "knew their shit". To be honest, it makes me a little self conscious, because I fear the story that it covers, doesn't match its quality!

 

Because I don't mind being laughed at -here's a useful example of why I reckon its best left to the experts. My effort is on the left, a proper designer made the right hand one (as if you couldn't tell).

 

Your version of the cover looks good. The only problem I see with it is the dimensions. Too wide, and not tall enough for a book-style format.

 

Here's my amateur attempt.
I bought the artwork which is a woman pilot in a cockpit, then cut and pasted images of monitors and displays around her, using GIMP to warp them to fit. The background image of the exploding ship was altered and color shifted.

The story is not done yet, still in rewrite, and I need to refine the titles.



This is actually intended as the first in a series, so I may encounter trouble getting artwork that is similar.

Two others I have out (self-published) are these.




When you realize they are part of the same series, you see the problem. Both are premade but altered by the artist, but only the second looks anything close to the main character. Plus the styles are entirely different.

They are in rewrite now and I'm looking to get some matching covers to go with them.

 

Bored, so I felt like changing the cover I designed for my novella/short novel. It's amazing what some distance and a few adjustments can do. The rightmost one should be darker, richer and fuller. There's a little ethereal bloom on the title, too. I'm surprised I kept the left version for so long. Far too hazy and undefined.

 

Not bad by any stretch. Very nice.