Things I've Learned About Cover Design (And Things I Still Need to Work On)

I've been going through and making final tweaks to my cover design for my next release (Bound's sequel), and I've been thinking a lot about the things I've learned over the years about cover design. I'd like to share them with you today, as well as share the areas I still need to focus on for improvement. 

Professionalism really does matter, and this is something I knew when I started, but I had a hard time getting that concept to translate in my cover designs. This is an area that I will probably always continue to work on, because as the market shifts and my skills are improved, my covers will continue to change. But what makes a book cover look professional?

Color Scheme
Choosing colors that jive well with the theme of the book, that fit well with what the target audience might be interested in, and that catch the eye is an important aspect of cover design. For me, I try to choose colors that are symbolic for what happens within the book. 

Textures
Weird, right? But being intentional with the textures you use for your design can make a world of difference. This is an area that I have recently really started to explore. It's the little details, the smoke in the background, the shadows  and highlights, that can really create a lot of depth to your design - and make it more likely that a reader will pick up the book.

Graphics
I've learned a lot about creating and utilizing graphics in my cover design. When I designed the cover for my debut novel, Azure Light, I really used just one edited photo for the front and called it good. With that books' sequel, I added a dimmed photo of a forest on the back cover, and that made a huge difference with the design. When I did the cover designs for Clairvoyance and my children's books, I drew out the designs for the front and back covers, and I continued doing so for Bound, and now for this upcoming sequel.

The difference for these two newest releases is that I've learned a lot more about incorporating layers, cropping and rotating images, and layering them on top of each other to get the most depth. 

Font
This, I've learned, is one of the most important - and probably most overlooked - aspect of cover design: Creating your cover font. I've always known it's important to choose a font that fits the book and the genre you're writing in, and around the time I released Clairvoyance I heard a lot about how creating a custom font is super important, but I didn't know how to do that. 

For Bound, I really took my time and went through several iterations for my font before I went with the one that's actually on the cover. For this font, I chose an underlying font that had a similar style to what I wanted the cover to have. For this book, I chose Papyrus. Then, I got to work adding little curves, light and shadow surrounding the font, and finally, I went in and colored in the letters to have that reflected effect by hand. I did the same thing for the cover of my next release, as well. 

This is an area that I have plenty of room for growth. I'd love to learn what the best, most time effective way to go through this process would be, because designing my fonts for these books has been a looooooong process. 



Now that we've talked about the aspects of designing the cover aesthetically, we're only about halfway there! Other things I've learned about book cover design include...

Adding Reviews 
Adding reviews to your cover (especially your hardcover) can be a great way to catch a reader's attention, especially if you can get a review blurb from some well-known authors in your genre. This is an area where I have lots of growth to make. I know the best way to get these kinds of reviews is to find those influencers and authors and just ask if they'd be willing to read the book, but I have a tendency to chicken out when it comes to that asking part. This is something I'm definitely working on!

About the Author
You don't need an about the author on the back cover of your book, but it can be really helpful in getting readers to show more of an interest in your book. I can say from experience that readers like to know about the person who wrote the book. So share with them - if that's your style. I would recommend putting in an "about the author" section if you're designing a dust jacket, because it looks great, and it's also a nice way to fill up that space on the inside flaps of the dust jacket. 

Size
Oh, boy. This section could be a whole post in and of itself. But this one is already getting kind of long, so I'll just say this: If you are an indie author and you're designing or prepping your cover on your own, pay attention to the recommended sizes and ratios provided by the platform you're publishing with. And if your platform provides a template to use, I highly recommend sticking with that! Those templates make things so much easier.

Blurb and Hooks
This is an area where, admittedly, I spend a lot of time, and probably where I still need to make the most improvement. I'll have another post soon about writing your hooks and book blurbs, but especially for your back cover, it's important to make it catchy (not just give a summary of the book's content). 

​Consistency Across Your Series
Finally, I'll say this: You can design your new cover for each book. You absolutely should! Make it unique, make it reflective of the story within. But if you're producing a series, you want to have some consistency across all your books. Your fonts should be similar, your book size should be similar (not page length - it's okay to have longer books as you continue your series, but the actual trim size of your book should be the same). The location of the fonts and graphics on your book's spine should be the same across all books. I know we're not talking about interior design in this post, but your interior designs should be similar across all the books in your series, as well. 

All of these are things that I've learned and incorporated piece by piece over the last seven years. What have you learned? Is there anything in your publishing journey that you've learned about cover design that I have not included? Please share! 

That'll do it for today's post. Thanks for reading, everyone, and have a great rest of your weekend.