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Brian J. W. Lee is a writer. When he's not writing, he's plotting to plunge the world in a deep chasm of terror, darkness and screams. Sorry, did I get carried away?

Wednesday 28 September 2016

Book Cover Disaster!

So basically, my book cover artist, who is my mother, released the book cover to me.

At first glance, it looks fine, but when you look closely, such as at 100% zoom, the cracks would start to show. And boy, does it start to show.

The problems that I immediately identified are the following:
- Poor fonts done up on the fly. I admit that I have a part to play in this as I chose the fonts and colour. But I only had so many options, and I hadn't moved on to sourcing for custom fonts at the time.

- Also, the words are a little small. They get smudged up when zoomed out. As thumbnails, it'd be just a puddle of blood.

- The outlines give it a cartoonish look. Not good if I want to be in the military-horror genre. It looks more like a YA or children's book like this.

- It is still too bright, despite the artist's best efforts. Part of this might be due to her hardware problem.

I've posted this up on the Absolute Write Water Cooler forum, and I've received the following feedback:

- Half says that this cover needs a major cosmetic surgery.

- The other half says that this cover needs to be buried alive.

- Only one guy, in PM, says that some minor patch-ups and it'd be good to go.

In general, here's some of what they're saying:

- Perspective issues.

- Lighting issues.

- The room is undefined, and looks like the soldier is peeking at a monster who's taking a dump in the toilet. T_T

- The blood looks poorly done.

- The art style is improper for a horror novel.

- Plus they agree with me on all my personal criticisms of the art piece.

It's time to deliver the bad news to my mother and move on. I will probably get a pre-made, but if I can get some good recommendations from my pals in Absolute Write, then I might get a book cover artist.

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