CHANGING COVERS
One of the reasons I like being self-published is the ability to look at things I’ve put out there and say “well, that didn’t work. The foundation of the story is good, but it’s not resonating with readers…let’s try something different!”
(note: this is often after sending this out to betas and having editing done. I don’t want lectures about the joys of critique groups, traditional publishing, etc etc ad nauseum.)
Sometimes that means ripping apart a story and rewriting it (which is happening right now with Klone’s Stronghold: Reeni) for various reasons.
More often it’s quick fixes of typos, updating the back matter and…creating a new cover. I started learning how to make semi-decent covers early on in my self-publishing days, when I got ripped off by a cover artist working through someone trying to set up their own hybrid publishing company. Not only did the artist not come anywhere near the concept, but the pricing was way out of line for the times (and given what the quality was, would still be way out of line. Though I suspect the current equivalent would be someone dashing it off using AI).
I started doing my own covers instead of working with a designer regularly because I was also putting out short stories and the cost was just too high. I didn’t like the results working with cover creation programs offered by several distributors, either. Plus I also tend to take pretty decent photographs. Making covers using my own pictures for background images seemed to be a pretty sweet notion.
As a result, I downloaded GIMP and started wrestling with it. GIMP is a perfectly good enough program, but…I started looking elsewhere after a while because it was always a fight to get everything done correctly. One friend does her covers in PowerPoint. I tried it and, well, it was still a wrestling job. Then I ended up with BookBrush and, for me, it’s well worth the expense. I don’t just do covers in it, I do promotional material.
Keep in mind that I’ve been told I have a decent eye for colorways, based on my quilting and my past history making beaded jewelry. Not everyone can do that. I also dedicate some amount of time looking at current covers, taking a few courses here and there, and studying what may or may not work.
The biggest challenge, however, is finding background images that work. I’ve learned the hard way that I have to modify my picture taking in order to create useable cover pictures (though I will use them in promo stuff). Then there’s the challenge of AI-generated images. I won’t use AI, so for a while last year I thought that meant no images on my covers unless they were pictures I’ve taken myself. I couldn’t find anything in my various photo sources that both fit and were uploaded before AI became a thing.
Then…something changed, as evidenced by those two covers above. The original Becoming Solo cover was kinda okay, but it was quickly outdated color-wise and font-wise. I stumbled across that image a week ago while doing something else in BookBrush, and looked up the licensing source data. Imagine my happy surprise when I discovered that this image was created in the twenty-teens, pre-AI. I added an updated font and…I like this cover so much better. To me, it hints of the darkness within that story, not just the choices that the main character Yesenia has to face but a secondary character with darkness within her, Shadow the Question, who has seen the destruction of a Magic Fair first-hand.
(yes, there will be a sequel, no, I don’t know when or what it will be about. Might be Shadow’s story. Might not be. Still brewing in the backbrain.)
The Crucible cover came about from the same sort of poking around—in fact, I discovered both images at the same time. When I was putting together the covers for The Cost of Power trilogy last year, I just couldn’t find anything that worked. I was fiddling with a promotional trailer for the trilogy’s omnibus edition and…this image came up. I took one look at it and realized that this picture of a man with a gun was Gabriel Martiniere throughout this series, but even more so for the second book, Crucible, where Gabe struggles with a LOT of issues and bad choices, in the face of increasing desperation because he can’t admit that he still wants a way out from the Martiniere Family. Which leads to…problems.
I looked up the upload date and, again…a twenty-teen upload. Perfect! The same held true for the other two books of the trilogy as well as the omnibus. Why I couldn’t find them a year ago I don’t know, but I was more than happy to replace the plain brown and gold covers in Cinzel Decorative font (which is in EVERYTHING right now, especially romantasy—I fear it is going to be the next Papyrus as far as people not wanting to see it). Add in the Black Ops One font and the tone…fit.
(the other two covers involve lightning striking two hills…which fits the ending of book one, and a cutout of two lovers looking at each other against a background of a heart made up of sparks, which fits what happens in book three. The omnibus cover is flame against darkness. All twenty-teen uploads, again.)
Sometimes my cover fiddling works and makes me happy, like these covers. Or the covers for my Netwalk Sequence series. Others…well, I’m still struggling with some of the main Martiniere Family Legacy covers. That may be an issue of the fonts. Same for the Goddess’s Honor fantasy series because I haven’t been happy with any of the covers. The original ones by a designer are outdated, alas. Fantasy covers are a big challenge because there is so much AI out there.
But…I’ll keep looking around. Sooner or later I’ll find what I need…as I just discovered.
When the time is right….
