Rough cover mockup, opinions needed

[tneva82]

http://www.tneva.net/pics/covermockup.jpg

Working on sword&sorcery rules for Traveler with intention of using them to play in realm of Conan with Traveler rules. Now I'm wondering whether it's worth doing any fancier cover than flat background with text. Picture I linked is pretty much extension of my artistic "skills" so anything fancier than that is pretty much beyond me.

Swords + skull are from free cover art from Lulu from where I plan to order myself nice shiny book for myself once I get them done(lot easier to play from that than bunch of printed paper!). Turned swords to black&grey from original light green&brown(I think it was those colour), slapped it there and added Traveler logo+required text. Text seems kinda small though. Have to check on that cover sizes again. Probably need to scale them up.

So. Worth keeping something like this or should I just say skip it and go for flat colour + text(and figure something to make it non-official book looking which is kinda hard since they have the darn flat colour reserved! You should leave that for artistically incapable folks like myself :wink: ).

 

[rust]

It is of course a matter of taste, but I would delete the crossed swords,
in my view their graphic style does not fit in well with the photographic
style of the skull and the glossy cover background.

 

[tneva82]

It is of course a matter of taste, but I would delete the crossed swords,
in my view their graphic style does not fit in well with the photographic
style of the skull and the glossy cover background.

True. That's what I'm mostly worrying about(though not sure whether background WILL be glossy). Wish I could find free-to-use image of swords that would look apropriate. Swords would be rather suitable image for sword&sorcery book.

Too bad no-one I know has replica sword. Father has cavalry sword but that's "bit" wrong looking for the sword&sorcery theme :wink:

 

[dmccoy1693]

I'd agree with rust. The swords don't really seem to fit.

Have you considered printing it out at Kinkos or Staples? You can do it for about the same price and have it the next day. And they'll have as many binding options as Lulu.

 

[Da Boss]

The black and Skull is actually very effective and nicely done which the swords (as noted) tends to spoil.

Not being artistic I tend to rely on others - and I find that artists are very generous in allowing (non profit) usage.

Recomend checking out sites like Renderosity

 

[tneva82]

The black and Skull is actually very effective and nicely done which the swords (as noted) tends to spoil.

Too bad can't take credit for the skull since it's stock art from Lulu. So all *I* did was spoil it :lol:

Okay swords out. I'll see if I can figure out something that DOES fit. Maybe I can find artist that would allow use of nice art for non-profit(I figure nobody is going to pay a dime for my ruleset anyway so hardly a loss for me to not try to make profit from it ;-) publish. Maybe somebody with black&white if they would allow use of that in interior art(sure would be sweet) though that might be pushing it.

Anyway thanks for confirmation about swords. I had feeling they didn't work so good to know everyone is on same page on that.

 

[BP]

The skull is nice - and the 'concept of the swords - if you were doing pirate rules...

As for swords and sorcery - you should be able to find some really cool free (for non-profit) art online which is more in tune with your theme...

For instance check out:



(That first one would look really sweet with a starship coming up to the left...)

Most artists would be more than happy if you showcased their work on non-profit material (or profit material for a cut) as long as they are given credit. Do contact them if you can and give credit!

 

[Da Boss]

The black and Skull is actually very effective and nicely done which the swords (as noted) tends to spoil.

Too bad can't take credit for the skull since it's stock art from Lulu. So all *I* did was spoil it :lol:

Okay swords out. I'll see if I can figure out something that DOES fit. Maybe I can find artist that would allow use of nice art for non-profit(I figure nobody is going to pay a dime for my ruleset anyway so hardly a loss for me to not try to make profit from it ;-) publish. Maybe somebody with black&white if they would allow use of that in interior art(sure would be sweet) though that might be pushing it..

Its suprising how generous people can be - I have used about 12 artists so far from Renderosity (see my projects) and all have been very co-operative and only asked for a suitable credit (the least I can do)

 

[Klaus Kipling]

Agree with the rest. Ditch the swords. Sometimes less is more! (+ the images pixelate close up - will be very obvious when printed).

The rest works quite well, but if you'll accept a tip from a former graphic designer, raise the skull up a smidge so that the bottom of the teeth line up with the bottom of the Traveller 'go-faster' stripe.

Oh, and bring the logo in from the right edge a touch - you should leave a bit of a safe area as printing and guillotining don't always match up.

 

[kafka]

Loose the swords as they seem to have referent to what you are trying to do. It makes one think that it is going to be about pirates.

The skull is also bad in the sense that one thinks of horror when they see it.

I agree with others that there are plenty of pictures of heroic fantasy in the public domain or creative commons that you could use. Check out flickr for them as well. Heck you might even find some people who model these in cosplay.

 

[Paladin]

Any progress with this?

 

[tneva82]

Any progress with this?

Lol. Didn't know someone actually cares

Anyway bit further: http://www.tneva.net/steelandwill/steelandwillcover.pdf

Don't mind the sword&sorcery on the middle. Current working file has that replaced as steel & will as well. Lulu slapped that one automatically from initial working title.