Evolution of a Cover

Covers are hard.

The first book I published was Bloodhunters v1: Bad Blood. At the time, I couldn't afford to pay anyone, so I used my own artwork (below, left). But it was too rough, so I asked my brother for help. He's a very nice artist, but he's too busy these days with his 3D printing business, so he's not doing much traditional artwork. Still, he cleaned up my image, and I published it with his version of the cover (below, middle). But one of the first reviews I received criticized the cover for being too bland. So I decided to work an actual artist into my budget. Since the book has transgender themes, I decided to look for a trans artist. I went with an artist by the name of Cyanimations, who provided the cover I finally used (below, right).

I really like how the art style has a "comic book" feel that compliments the story quite nicely. I also hired him for the other two books in the series:

 

Next I wrote a collection of prequel stories, which I called "Blood Samples." Since it was free, I didn't worry too much about the cover. I went with a crude cityscape based on a pour painting (below, left). But later I discovered "GetCovers," a site which designs book covers for $35. So I reposted the book with a new cover (below, right.)

For the "Random Xinery" series of short stories, I made all the covers myself. I used model train miniatures, resin dice my wife created for me, and battle grids that I made myself.

For my upcoming "Itropa" novel, I initially thought I'd use a drawing I made back in college (below, left), but I finally got GetCovers to make a better version (below, right).

But none of my covers have gone through more revisions than my most recent release, Nomads of Zyden. My first attempt at a cover depicted a nude woman engulfed in flames. I purchased some pictures of a model from Grafit Studio, and I really like how it turned out (below, left). But I thought it might be a little too male-gazey for a novel about a lesbian, so I censored it a little bit (below, right).

But it still didn't sit well with me. Next I tried taking a couple of pictures of a sword I own. First I tried it in front of some greenery (below, left), but it seemed a little bland. Part of the novel takes place in the frozen mountains, and I was fortunate enough to get some snow this year, so I tried the same concept with the sword in the snow (below, right). 

But in the end, I still thought that was a little bland. So finally I broke down and went with GetCovers (below), and I'm more than happy with the result.