It all begins with an idea...or, in my case, a total lack thereof!
As a final treat in the Serving Time discovery blog tour, I have the pleasure of having Keith Draws (the awesome artist who did my cover) show you the steps involved in creating a professional book cover.
With just a short list of my likes and dislikes, accompanied by a grueling summary of Serving Time (sorry about that, Keith!) and even a PDF copy of the manuscript, Keith was able to combine the major ideas of the novel into this fabulous piece of art.
But how did Keith go from the gibberish in my emails, to the artwork you see above?
In many complicated steps, I can assure you! How about having Keith himself tell us all about it?
Over to you, Keith!
First of all, I read the brief sent by Nadine, then
went on to read the book. As I read the book I made notes with consideration to
the information already supplied by Nadine. From there I went on to write down
ideas. Basically, this was a lot of notes about the key elements, what I
thought the story was about, and plot, and underlying themes.
I sat down and started connecting ideas and
eliminating others. Eventually, I felt I had all the information I could work
with, and so opened Manga Studio to begin sketching.
The first thing I did was apply a template of Golden
Sections in order to help me create a balanced layout. I feel that since
this worked so well for Leonardo DaVinci and many other wonderful artists it's
probably the best way to work. After sketching for a while, I had eliminated
even more elements and had selected what I felt were the core images I could
use and laid them out in a relevant composition.
I ended up taking an image of Time, the starship the
main character is travelling in, the Earth, and of course, the universe. Since Time
is said to be watching over the characters and influencing their actions
throughout the book, I decided to make her a part of the surrounding universe
so that it would appear that wherever the characters travel they cannot avoid
her influence, hence her hand caressing the starship.
Once I had a pleasing layout (this was just for
the front at this point), I decided to add the title and the author's name and
sent this initial idea over to Nadine for discussion. Now it was quite possible
I was going in completely the wrong direction so I needed to be sure. This is the layout that I sent.
Overall, Nadine was pleased with the layout and made a
few suggestions, including “Time's
eyes... They're literally ALL black with stars,” as well as a few pointers on
how Time should look, the view of the Earth: “A space ship can approach a
planet from any angle. Since the main characters are from western Europe, maybe
the Earth could be shown from that angle, and maybe a little tilted”, and the
design of the starship, which I hadn't really thought about at that point and
had just scribbled something quickly for the layout. The text needed re
thinking but right now I felt that wasn't too important, since the core of this
cover is the image.
Now I had confirmation that my layout was
working I moved on to the next stage. The first thing I did was design the starship
Pascagoula. I made a few quick sketches
based on the description on the novel and then used these as a basis to create
a 3D model. I do create 3D for a lot of my work because I can use the models as
reference for the final paintings, adjusting lighting, angles, etc. much faster
than just sketching. Here is the model:
I then went on to make models of Time and the Earth
and put a layout together in 3D:
Here I started to
think about the back and spine so I made a quick render and began painting a
more revised layout including those elements. Nadine had also asked if I could
include the demon Nybbas from on the back and
so I made a quick sketch, unfortunately I failed to check his description and
so it didn't really look like him. Here
I also spent a little time on the revised typography, keeping it simple as
Nadine had requested.
At that point I also had the idea of creating Time's
hair out of a nebula and so I did that too.
Nadine really liked this but was unhappy with the
demon, so she pointed me to the description and I tried again.
You probably noticed by now that with each change I
have also worked up the image a little more and more.
Anyway, at this point we decided to leave the demon
off since he was just overcomplicating the cover and I worked up the image to
the final piece you see today:
Thank you for walking us through the creation of that cover, Keith! I am impressed with all the thought and work you put into your projects. Guys, isn't he amazing?
Now I have some questions for you.
How long have you been a cover artist?
Apart from book covers, what other artwork have you done?
These are interesting questions and I'll
answer them as one with a quick bio since they are connected.
I was born in Manchester UK in 1962. After
leaving school in 1978 I attended Rochdale College of Art and from there went
on to work for “Creative Artists”, an advertising agency based in Manchester,
as a Junior visualizer. Soon I moved on to various advertising agencies
primarily as a Graphic Designer, Illustrator, and Photo Editor. I worked
through the ranks, eventually becoming Production Director of “Promedia”, one
of the leading advertising agencies in Manchester at the time. This first part
of my career spanned about 25 years. I learned a great deal about all areas of
the business and had the opportunity to successfully work on many
groundbreaking projects with many well-known brands.
After working in upper-management for some
years, I began to sorely miss the hands-on side of the business and so decided
to try my hand at the relatively new field of 3D and animation; I found this
much more satisfying.
About 6 years ago I relocated to Mexico
and set up a small studio to cater for a very diverse range of clients,
including “McGee” (a broad based construction company and multi-disciplined
specialist based in London), and “Catalyst Pictures” (based in Manchester, they
produce animation, web sites, e-learning, games and widgets for agencies and
direct clients including the BBC). I also supplied 3D and graphics for many
design studios and advertising agencies as well as an alternative rock band
“Twelve Foot Ninja” from Australia who later hired me on to create a 72 page
graphic novel. Working on that graphic novel shifted my focus to illustration
and especially cover artwork, so I began to offer reduced rates to independent
authors. I have enjoyed creating these covers since October 2012 when I began,
and have netted just over 50 covers for very satisfied authors in a very wide
variety of genres and styles since. Recently I relocated to Texas.
How many hours
does an ebook cover generally take you?
It varies but on average I'd say about 24
working hours (3 Days). But that doesn't include the reading and notes.
Do you keep
count of how many ebook covers you've done so far?
Every cover I've done since October can be
seen on my Wordpress site and right now it’s just over 50 covers, though
I have done other illustration projects as well.
What do you
enjoy drawing most?
I like to create things that we don't see
in our everyday life, so it’s unlikely you will ever see me produce a still
life unless it’s part of something else. I suppose I began drawing because of
exactly this. It was my way to pretend. I remember my mother used to get really
upset with me as a child because I always destroyed my drawings. It wasn't
deliberate, though. I remember I used to draw a lot of World War 2 fighter
planes, and as I drew I'd have this whole story going on, I'd be voicing the
pilots, navigators and the enemies too.
Suddenly, my plane would arrive over the
attack zone and at this point I would draw in the landscape below (with gun
emplacements etc.) and enemy planes. My plane would shoot down a few of the
enemy planes and to indicate this I drew explosions over them and then smoke
trails snaking down to earth. Eventually my own plane got shot down so I'd draw
where the bullets hit the fuselage and then the engine and then the ensuing
explosion and smoke. This of course meant that the page ended up completely
destroyed, covered in a mass of scribbles. My mother never had anything but
scribbles to put on the fridge.
Fortunately, these days I stop before I
get to that point.
Do you have a
favorite genre or motif?
While I enjoy working on science fiction, fantasy,
and horror I am not exclusively in love with those genres. In fact more than I
enjoy any particular genre, I love the challenge of creating a cover that works
kind of like a movie trailer. It captures the viewers’ interest and generates
the desire to see more. So that is pretty much genre independent, and I have to
say that one of my favorite cover creations is actually for a cook book and was
primarily an exercise in typography (another love of mine):
Is there
anything you hate having to draw (or something you enjoy less or find
particularly difficult)?
I don't find drawing one thing any more
difficult than another, but some things can be more time consuming, such as
drawing mounds of long hair, which if I'm honest can be a bit annoying for me,
but being something of a perfectionist I still keep on drawing away at it until
it looks something like how I imagine it should.
As far as I am concerned, though, there is
nothing I am afraid to draw. It’s just a matter of looking at the world around
me; if I can draw one thing I can draw another.
And finally, where
can we contact you?
