How to make a book cover?

SummerSurf57

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I want to make a book cover for my story. How can I make the actual cover, back cover and spine illustrations (eg. Photoshop?) I'd prefer if it wasn't on Photoshop, however, since I can't really afford to buy it. Also, I am happy to draw it, if that's a good idea?
 

benbradley

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Use Photoshop.
Use Gimp. It's free, runs on Linux and Mac as well as MS Windows, and is roughly the equivalent of Photoshop:
http://www.gimp.org/
Both Gimp and Photoshop have a steeper learning curve than, say the Paint program that comes with MS Windows, so you'll need to spend some time acquainting yourself with it.

If you want to do this yourself and have it look professional, you might also want to get a graphic arts degree learn some other types of drawing programs as well such as the vector-based Adobe Illustrator. There's likely a few "FOSS" vector-based drawing programs as well.
 

Alessandra Kelley

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I can't answer if drawing is a good idea because I don't know your level of experience. I personally would sooner draw or paint something than use Photoshop (although I'm willing to use Photoshop to manipulate already drawn or painted images). I think handpainted images are more personal and distinctive, particularly when so many covers are simply Photoshopped photos.

If one's drawing skills are not very strong, it could be more trouble than it's worth to try to make something work. On the other hand, Photoshop is not a magical substitute for drawing skills.

I'm sorry, I don't know if I'm being helpful here.
 

Elvirnith

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I want to make a book cover for my story. How can I make the actual cover, back cover and spine illustrations (eg. Photoshop?) I'd prefer if it wasn't on Photoshop, however, since I can't really afford to buy it. Also, I am happy to draw it, if that's a good idea?

Sounds like you need to take some art lessons, use a pre-made cover (not recommended), or hire an artist to do the cover for you.

Also, make sure it's a high resolution. The original of my book cover is a .tiff file that's 362 MB in size and is 4125 pixels wide and 5625 pixels tall with 500 DPI (a bit excessive, but it's high quality and an be scaled to any size).

There's plenty of tutorials online, so I recommend you do some creative google kung-fu.
 

thorjansen

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There's a fairly decent FOSS alternative to AI called Inkscape, available for Linux, Windows and Mac.

http://inkscape.org/

But yeah, OP, don't spend a lot of time worrying about a cover. Finish the book first. And let your publisher do the cover. The only reason you might need to do a cover yourself (or pay someone to do it for you) is if you do a self-pub POD or ebook.

Disclaimer: I've designed a few sample covers for my own WIP, but I'm a graphic designer too, with book design experience. I don't expect to use my comps, I just like making them up to be creative in another way when I get temporarily blocked writing.
 
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