Morgan Mandel's Basic Guide to Self-Publishing - Day Five - Setting Up Cover Art and Logo

The great thing about self-publishing is you get to choose your own book cover. The not-so-great thing about self-publishing is you get to choose your own book cover. It’s wonderful to get a choice. It’s scary to get a choice.

From blogging, I’d met many capable artists, and had seen the beautiful covers they’d created. I could have approached one of them to do a cover for Killer Career. I may even have done so, if not by chance. By a stroke of luck, I found just what I wanted online at http://www.istockphoto.com/. Once I saw it, I knew that was the one – kind of like my wedding dress.

I had more decisions to make. I wanted the back of my book to be striking so it would get noticed. When I’d first spoken with a rep. from Lightning Source, I’d learned that color on the back cover would not cost any more than on the front, because actually they were considered part of the same thing. If you’ve ever seen a cover flat, you know what I mean. It’s all spread out – back to spine to front.

Anyway, to gain attention, I decided to show readers what my main characters might look like. I already had the woman’s image from the front of the cover, but what about the villain and the good guy? I rifled through the male shots at Istock and found one I really liked for the villain. The problem was he didn’t look like the bad guy described in my manuscript. For some reason his image still stuck in my mind and would not dislodge.

I searched for another photo to portray the villain, but none matched up. Somehow in my mind the villain’s features had changed from a guy with clipped, salt and pepper hair and gray eyes to a guy with hazel eyes, shoulder length chestnut hair pushed back, and sexy sideburns. I had no recourse but to carefully go back into my manuscript and make the changes.

For the good guy, he had to look sweet, have kind of messy dark hair which stuck out a bit. It took a while, but I finally found one that fit the description.

Next, I needed to figure out a logo for Choice One Publishing Co. I had to be careful not to pick one too similar to someone else’s or I could get into trouble. The possibility of that happening made me nervous. Then, a crazy, fun thought hit me. Why not try it? After all, I could do what I wanted. It was my book. Using photo editing software, I made a cameo close-up of my dog, Rascal’s face and resized it. The logo was unique. No one else could possibly have it. It symbolized the fact that Choice One Publishing Co. was mine down to the tiniest detail.

With my choices made, I loaded everything onto the template. It sounds easy for me to say it now, but it took me days to get everything on there just so. I had to stay inside the lines so words or appendages wouldn’t get chopped off, I had to add a background, and do all sorts of finagling to get everything according to specifications.

First, I inserted the words Fiction/Romantic Suspense, so booksellers, librarians and/or readers could readily know the book’s genre.

Next, I placed the blurbs I was fortunate to receive from Robert W. Walker and Austin S. Camacho. After that, I placed a thumbnail of each major character, next to which I added a comment from that character’s point of view.

I added the publishing house name, website and logo. Lastly, I inserted the barcode which I’d found on the template from Lightning Source.

With the back cover figured out, next came the spine. I had to pick out fonts, figure out the order of the title, author and publishing company, as well as where to place the logo. The lettering had to stay inside those dreaded lines.

With the spine in place, I could load the front cover. That’s when I made a horrible discovery. My heroine wore an engagement ring. It had to go. Although I don’t have the steadiest of hands for tiny editing, I managed to clone her skin over the area of the ring, so it would look as if the ring had never been there. I tried to fit the image onto the template, but it didn’t look right. As a last resort, I inserted a frame. That worked and the picture looked right. Also, the black tied in with the same color background of the spine and back cover.

Those are the basics of what I did. I mentioned some of my problems, but lots of trial and error went into producing the finished product. Without my Adobe Pro 9, Adobe Acrobat Elements an old version of Roxio photo editing software, and Word 2007, I couldn’t have done it. Of course, I could have skipped all that and gone with a cover artist, which many self-pubs do, but I had my mind set on that special cover art. Once I want something, if it’s within my power to get it, I will.

Was it worth the aggravation? Well, I’m planning on doing another book, this time with a photo of Rascal on the front cover. I guess that tells you something.

What about you? Would you consider tackling cover art yourself, or would you prefer to hire a cover artist? Or, maybe you’re a cover artist and would like to share something about what you do. Please join in.
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Morgan Mandel

http://www.morganmandel.com/
http://choiceonepublishing.com/