Yet another book cover topic

dragoon_elf said:

. . . that you can make it your cover or suggest it to your agent/publishers?

Click to expand...

Any photograph can be used as long as it is with the written permission of the copyright holder, which in your case, is your father. It will still be just a suggestion to your publisher, though. Almost all publishing contracts stipulate that the publisher has the final say in cover art (and titles). But if it is as appropriate as you say, you just might have a good shot at getting it used in some manner. Your father will still have to sign a "permission for use" release form. Good luck.

I think a lot of it depends on the publisher, too. I have a book coming out next year with a university press, and I got to have a lot of say in the cover art. But no matter who your publisher ends up being...it can't hurt to ask, right?

I think you're way ahead of yourself. Focus on the writing and selling the ms.

Just because a piece of art encapsulates the themes of the book doesn't necessarily make it a good cover art, by the way. Cover art, more often than not, is about marketing and selling. It's a marketing tool. The decision rests in the publisher. Of course, you can suggest once your book is in production. I suggested mine and my publisher liked it. But it's ultimately based on their decision, and the decision has much to do with marketability.

Yes, you do need permission.

Yes, you might have some kind of say, depending on your publisher. If you love the picture, suggest using it. But it's usually up to the publisher, bottom line. And they've probably done marketing for many more books and for longer than the average writer

I'm a writer with 12 years professional experience as a photoshop artist and a 3d artist, and even I get very little sway on the end cover. The marketing dept get to make the call, end of.

What is annoying though is that they often make overly-safe and derivative decisions. For an example of that you only have to look at the swathes of Da Vince styled covers for any book that merely mentions 'grail', 'templar', 'monk' etc etc. And on a few occasions those marketing jonnies have made some damagingly bad cover decisions.

There does tend to be a culture of 'shall we leave it to the experts' within a publishing house...ie: they'll assume the design company they outsource the cover to, are the experts and will come up with the best idea. What they don't see is that within the design company the task of designing that all important cover image for your debut novel falls into the hands of the most junior, recently hired photoshop artist, who hasn't read your book, and to be blunt...might not be that good, and is briefed not to take too long on the task, as time is money etc etc...and anyway, there's a much better paying design task just come in etc etc.