Boring cover art

[Roberto Romani]

Sometimes they do. Here is the cover of the italian edition of N.Fields' "Roman republican legionary 298-105 B.C." drawn by L. Tarlazzi. It's a good cover but, unfortunately, as you can see, portraying soldiers of a different period. Pity.

[attachment=6789]Legionarirepubblicani.jpg[/attachment]

[Flavivs Aetivs]

It's also directly ripped off the movie gladiator.

[Virilis]

I think I have three books on late roman army where there is the same picture of the Deurne helmet on a black background.

[Robert Vermaat]

I think I have three books on late roman army where there is the same picture of the Deurne helmet on a black background.

One of them about infantry. ;-)

[Flavivs Aetivs]

I wouldn't put it past an infantryman of high grade buying such a helmet.

[Paul Elliott]

I'm glad I stumbled on this thread again. My contract for the next book involves me providing art, which is fine (photos, maps, line art and such), but they also want a few images to use for the cover .... pictures of me in kit are no good (I don't look particularly aggressive or butch in most of my photos!), I have pictures of sculpture, a couple of relevant triumphal arches, and such, but the quality is not up to scratch.

I mocked up a cover using the period-correct Ludovisi Battle sarcophagus, but my wife immediately declared that it looked like a university text book.

I have a couple of photos of a colleague in period kit in a more energetic pose that is quite menacing... with some colour change, like the cover History Press did for The Last Legionary, I think it might work. I'll keep an eye on the thread ....

[mcbishop]

I'm glad I stumbled on this thread again. My contract for the next book involves me providing art, which is fine (photos, maps, line art and such), but they also want a few images to use for the cover ....

Time was when publishers would give you a small budget for illustrations (B&C1!), but that seldom happens these days since they have gotten tighter as they burnish their prophet margins, flutter their eyelids, and pout at potential multinational partners.

You can always hunt for public domain images (anything out of copyright plus some oddities in strange places: Cichorius plates, though hackneyed, can be manipulated in interesting ways) or Creative Commons images that allow commercial reproduction. Failing that, ask someone who is sympathetic to your lot and has a lot of images you could use in exchange for a free copy of the book.

I trust the publisher is giving you a better-than-average royalty for getting you to do all the work. There are compensations, though: at least you get some control and won't get some of the oddities I've been threatened with over the years.

Mike Bishop

[Alanus]

Hey, Paul!

You can always take more "macho-er" photos of your legio comrades and then choose the best one. Try Photoshopping it to death-- high contrast, even sepia.

I had the same problem with my new one on the first Gothic persecution of Christians. This is what I came up with. Kind of 4th century mosaic-ish, and like an icon. I'm not satisfied with the title font, but I can't find anything appropriate; too many look medieval or Celtic. I posted the novel on another thread, but RAT interest is underwhelming. :errr:

The person in the painting looks non-macho, almost feminine with sloping shoulders. There's a reason for that. I just don't want to give away the plot. :|

It's not great, but it's not boring.


[attachment=6881]FtB_Cover3_copy_2013-03-31.jpg[/attachment]

[AMELIANVS]

Although,I believe this is not boring Book cover at all-because it generates too many negative feelings, like anger of that kind which lead one to the darks side of the force.So this is how Czech edition for the LAST LEGION looks like.

Please do not declare war on my country !

[Michael Kerr]

Hi Alanus, did you design and photoshop your cover yourself? It seems to have a couple of texture filters through it. Good use of filters and layering in photoshop can really spruce up artwork and covers. My second question is did you pick the colours for the cover or was it your publisher? It seems that a lot of authors seem to have to supply their own artwork. I only ask as I am a bit of an avid photoshopper having used it for 18 years at work in newspaper industry.

Regards
Michael Kerr

[Alanus]

Michael,

I produced the original painting on old-fashioned vellum using caligrapher's ink, so it was opaque. Then placed it on a mottled sheet of gold paper and took a photo of it. Not easy because I had parallelism problems. My son Jason photoshopped it to add the mosaic effect, plus adding the title and author fonts. (He photoshopped the DDB cover also, heightening a flashlight beam that shined from inside the 3rd century Roman helmet.) I don't like the fonts on either cover, preferring something that that might pass for Roman-era.

Covers for both novels were my design and color scheme. It was important to have the cover person appearing as bright with a halo, yet looking evil. (The dualistic root of human nature.) The odd thing about this cover: it's bright but the novel is dark.
Just the opposite, The Demon's Door Bolt has a dark cover, but the story is light and quite humorous. Weird. :dizzy:

[Alanus]

Although,I believe this is not boring Book cover at all-because it generates too many negative feelings, like anger of that kind which lead one to the darks side of the force.So this is how Czech edition for the LAST LEGION looks like.

Please do not declare war on my country !

It reminds me of 1930s comic book covers. Back then, comic books were small by width and height, but they were thick with lots of pages. Flash Gordon. Tim Tyler. The covers were "faded" looking, just like this one. mile:

[Michael Kerr]

Alanus wrote:

The odd thing about this cover: it's bright but the novel is dark.

Was that a deliberate decision by you? I am curious about the choice of colours that publishers and authors choose for different genres like ancient history or medieval works. I like the colours in the Pen and Sword book covers about ancient Rome and Greece.

Regards
Michael Kerr

[Alanus]

In a novel about Armageddon and fighting the Devil, the cover "wanted" to be dark. I don't know if that was my decision... or it just generated itself. The cover illustration depicts one "individual" of an entire group of characters, which (in truth) could be good or evil by "programming." I just thought it would bring attention to the novel, something out of the ordinary. Here it is in a larger jpeg:


[attachment=6904]3658685_2013-04-03.jpg[/attachment]


On the other hand, the Forging the Blade cover needed to give readers an idea of conflict in a manner forcasting human nature, the good and bad in all of us. It's not even historically accurate, the sword being late cruxiform, not something from the 4th century.

[Diocle]

I love this book for various reasosns: The Strategikon is like the Temple of Hera at Paestum, it's a classic. The Helmet in the pic is also a super classic. It's the first translation in Italian that you can find in any bookshop. I like very much the gold on black background.I worship the work of the Author to spread to the general Italian public the Roman Military History, because in Italy the Military history lives an ancillary life compared to the serious history, and this is deeply wrong in my opinion, even in a country in which the Roman Military History was used by the Fascism for its idiotic rethoric. So this is one of my preferred covers about Roman Military matter.