[Radthorne]

Thank you for your kind words. :)

Do you have some links where one can see all three of your covers (well, at least the other two, since as you say the third one is on my other thread around the corner...). I'd be curious too to see how the different intrepretations are. Did you get any input into any of them?

And on the question of this thread - as both a reader and as as writer, I agree with you 100%. As a person trying to sell books, it's a little trickier.

In the former case, I'd prefer to not see representations of the characters (either how they look or their cloting). In many cases it seems that the cover artist has a very different image than I do of what the author wrote. And for my own writing, even though I can make the cover images reflect exactly what I'm envisioning, to me much of the power of writing fiction is the ability of the reader to extend the writer's imagination. What people see in their own heads is much more vivid, I feel, than what I can describe. That is why I tend to be fairly spare in my descriptions, giving readers a descriptive skeleton and allowing their own imaginations to run with it. I've had readers come back and tell me how wonderfully detailed my descriptions were, and I know it was all just in their own minds.

But on the marketing front... In the U.S. market, at least, "populated" covers seem to be the norm. My own publisher says that, when they've reprinted some of their titles and changed the covers to have images of people instead of abstracts, their sales on those books shot up. And various marketing things I've read over the years always point to the fact that people (at least American people) seem to buy things with people on 'em... So there's this conflict between the desires of the writer and the marketer here...

I think what I will probably do is continue with the same style I have for my future Tonogato books, but if I write something different (and Windstorm elects to pick it up) I might try it with characters and see what happens.

One thing I'm doing is working on a sample book cover image, kind of another proof-of-concept to show that I think this program (and the other tools I'm using) can be used to come up with a workable cover. If it looks good enough when I'm done I'll stick it up here in this thread.

[alison]

Just for you, Rad, I put all the covers up in my forum (under the heading Book Covers, so you can't miss it).

Interesting what you say about the marketing attraction of human figures. I haven't really thought about it, but for me, the publishers all make clear that they are designing to attract what they perceive to be their market. Which I don't have an argument with. And they're polite about soliciting feedback and suggestions from me, and have sometimes even used them; but in the end we both know it's up to them. This doesn't bother me. (See my earlier remark about having no visual imagination...)

Thinking about it, the human figure thing must be an Australian/American thing. The UK has human figure covers of course, but they do go for the more abstract cover in a big way - offhand, there's Phillip Pulman's His Dark Materials, especially the hardbacks, which were gorgeously designed covers featuring objects from the books (they even had woodcuts for the beginning of each chapter). For the final book in the series, they didn't even put the name of the book on the cover! But I guess he was pretty famous by then.

[Radthorne]

Ok, so it's been more than a week, but I had other things going on... like The Sands of Sabakushi coming out, and a convention!

Anyway, this wasn't the image I started with - that one still needs work. But I thought I'd toss this one up, since it only took a couple of hours to do. It's a faux cover, for a book that I have not written; but I wanted to experiment with things that might work on a cover. This, I think, is reasonably typical of the sort of thing found on American-market book covers. In this case the figure is reasonably small, compared to the rest of the image. Anyway, the other picture I'm working on is rather more elaborate, so we'll see what it looks like when I'm done.


http://www.sff.net/people/radthorne/Cloud Mage 01.jpg

[Radthorne]

So here's another fake book cover, this one with a sci-fi theme. Still experimenting, just to see what can be done.


http://www.sff.net/people/radthorne/Last Moon 01.jpg

[alison]

Hey Kevin - you know those books (didn't Stanislaw Lem do one? and Borges?) which are just collections of forwards or commentaries on imaginary books? You should do a picture book of covers of fictional books!

I rather like this one. All very Star Wars space opera, I thought. There's still that sense though of a video game feel with the figure; maybe it's something to do with the shading on the skin? A graphics expert would know more than me. Any chance of roughing it up somehow?

[KatG]

Kevin, seriously, have you thought about turning this into a business?

The sf one has a gamers sort of look, but for certain kind of stories, that would have strong appeal. The fantasy one is not a typical fantasy image, but is extremely eye-catching in part because of that. Either of these covers would work terrifically for novels, I think.

Now, do one that's a little more abstract, for a horror novel. :)

[northerain]

Nevermind :)

[Radthorne]

I rather like this one. All very Star Wars space opera, I thought. There's still that sense though of a video game feel with the figure; maybe it's something to do with the shading on the skin? A graphics expert would know more than me. Any chance of roughing it up somehow?
Thanks! And yes, you're right about the skin tone. It's very hard to get that to come up right - it's mostly a matter of the lighting, as some of the folks commented earlier in the thread. I'm still trying to nail that part down. As an example of how it can affect things, here's the same character before I started building the scene, but closer up. Although her skin is still pretty smooth looking, the effect with the lighting is rather different...

http://www.sff.net/people/radthorne/Test 03.jpg

[Radthorne]

Kevin, seriously, have you thought about turning this into a business?
You are very kind; thank you! (It's an idea, though; I might make more money at it than I have at writing books! :rolleyes: )

The sf one has a gamers sort of look, but for certain kind of stories, that would have strong appeal.
Yes, the military sci-fi types might also find it an acceptable image type too.

Now, do one that's a little more abstract, for a horror novel. :)
You mean something like this? :D

http://www.sff.net/people/radthorne/Dark Angel 01.jpg

[KatG]

Yes, exactly, but lose the little green and pink flecks, they don't go. Now, let's see, give me an older guy with long white hair, peasant clothes and a pack on his back, background up to you. :) This is fun.

It's the three-dimensionalism actually, I think, that gives the sf cover the gamers feel, and a slight angularity blockiness to the figure. A painting would be softer, flatter, less sharp edged. In the fantasy one, the figure is farther away, less distinct and central, so you don't get that impression. But the closer shot of the woman with lighting effects -- very cool.

Maybe it's super easy to do this stuff with the software you have, but you definitely have an eye for it, and graphics arts are in demand. Talk to Abbey -- she does work in the video game world. Not that I don't like art -- the artist that did Gary's cover, for instance, is very interesting, but you're coming up with some nice designs.

Interesting stuff, northerain. I was a little unclear as to what was who's art. Was the demon in the refrigerator one yours? That was cute. But the more abstract stuff was interesting too. Good for horror or dark fantasy or thrillers.