Like everything, it's been a process for me. Until now, I've been letting my artwork drive the project. I've taken a step back, a new look. I began this project with the creation of a template (One story, two titles). I've kept notes on the second cover, so we'll talk about this one:
Unnatural Girl : 2
I started with the creation of this:
Rear cover is on our left, front on the right, binding in the middle.
The dark blue line is the cut line. The color will go out to the light blue line, but the cut will be made on the dark blue line. It's good to keep text and important elements a 1/2" in from the dark blue line.
I already have the image for the back cover and the blurb. I now move on to create the artwork for the front cover. We need two things: a portrait for the narrow box and a graphic design for the horizontal rectangle.
We'll create the portrait first. I open Adobe Illustrator and make a sketch:
I don't worry about detail and shadowing at this point, just a sketch. Now, I lay in some color, again, just generally.
In Adobe Illustration, I work with the sketch on the top level, laying in color behind the sketch. When I get done with the color, I'll delete the sketch.
Finished color:
I could stop here if I wanted. I save the file, then open in Adobe Photoshop. Using a 40% airbrush tool, I work the colors. I also make the final adjustments, her right eye, for example and I changed the shadowing on her right leg.
Now all we have to do is work out our graphic for the box and lay the artwork in.
I kept the graphics simple, blue on blue with a cut-off yellow circle. The yellow circle acts as a light source of the artwork.
The blurb:
Clandestinity, happenstance or just children playing.
“OK, now you’re the mom. OK?”
I nodded.
Holding my hands, she leaned back. “That makes you me. So you’re Suzie now.”
“You’re Suzie so I can’t be.”
“I’m Michael now and you’re Suzie.” She scrunched her face. “Wait, Michael and Suzie already are –”
“Huh?”
“That’s us, I mean, us before we changed clothes.”
I nodded.
“Michelle.” She tasted the name, then nodded hard. “Michelle. You’re Michelle now. Your turn. You give me a name.”
I bit my lip. “Sam? How’s Sam?”
Which ever, the map was set that day, sending me on a long, strange odyssey.
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Comments: 18
Road kills and phoenix flies*:
thanks ! ! !
I enjoyed learning a little of the process of Photoshop...I've Got to open that photoshop box!..
I love the "look" of the clean and simple layout.
I love the blurb too!
The heck with the formal education stuff - you KNOW what you are doing.
You ARE formally educated. You just followed your own curriculum.
I want to say, I love your portraits and how you really seem to catch the essence of your subjects. People's faces were always the hardest thing for me to draw and paint.
I fully understand what you say.
You may enjoy my essay on art:
http://www.spiritualvision.org/ArtHistory/Index.html
I love the human body. I love it's unforgiving. If we draw a tree, we can screw up as we will and it's still a tree. The human body is varied but as I say, unforgiving.
I've put much effort into faces.
I agree, the human body is the hardest to capture, I think because it's vibrant, full of life and movement, even when reclined. Trees do have their own "rules" maybe, such as the size a branch or trunk needs to be to support it's branches, but nothing is as hard to capture as the human form and face. You do an admiral job of doing so :)
Indeed, trees have their own rules, but are more forgiving.
Back then, Heinlein was modern scifi.
I've written a series, eight books. I call it "The Makaila Series." Classic scifi, without the old struggle between good and evil. I'm taking the entire series to print early next year, I think. So much to write, so little time.
The set up is: What if God were a being who created the temporal by pushing her light into the darkness? (Primitive dualism). It's not a theological study -- it's classic adventure scifi. That's just the backdrop in which I work.
It's a fun story.
At this point, I think I'm going to steal the layout from the Adobe software books, all covers with the same feel, numbered on the spine 1 through 8, basically not unlike the above design.
Once I get the layout, merely create the artwork and drop it in.
I make it sound easy, huh?