On the book cover front: I have decided to do my own book covers. I simply cannot afford the $500+ for a mainstream cover designer to do each book and the freelancers I've experienced are sub-par at best. The first one [I really liked her portfolio] simply vanished one day. Luckily I did not pay her anything up front. The next contractor took it upon himself to just start working on the project without me actually hiring him, or telling him he got the job. He was mildly difficult to work with, but if he was going to work on the project without being hired, so be it. If I liked what he did - I would hire him and pay him. If I didn't like what he did - I was not obligated to anything. So we get half way through, and I really liked what he had done so far, but he kept arguing with me about removing a house in the picture. He finally did it, and it looked great. I didn't like the font he used for the title or the way he presented the author name, so I asked him to change it. He starts to get impatient or irritated. He was quoting me $20+ and I told him from the very beginning I could pay $50. So he finally makes the changes I asked for and the type for the author name was WAY too small!
I just tell myself - pay him and get the art work and you can hopefully fix it in Photoshop yourself. Then the guy emails me and wants not only the $50 I quoted as my top budget price, but also the $20+! At that point I had had enough.
So, needless to say, I have downloaded some Photoshop tutorials and will be making a stab at my own covers for the foreseeable future. I've done two mock up so far:
These are not real books I'm working on [though a future book will be set in Astoria, Oregon], but I just wanted to see what I could do in Photoshop. Unfortunately, my graphics card is not powerful enough to run the 3D engine in PS. But, I don't think I will need it - at least, not right now. I downloaded one tutorial video, but it requires INDESIGN and ILLUSTRATOR. So I will just be trying to glean from it the info on PS. It is definitely a step up from my previous two covers for IN THE MEADOW and THE PREPARATION, both of which were done in MSPaint. I really like the blending capabilities in PS.
Anyway, at some point, I would like to write a book about my friend, Mason, and I robbing banks together. No, we've never actually robbed banks before, but it was a fantasy/dream we had when we were kids - what better way to live it than write a story about it. I think one of the characters will be mentally ill - not realizing it of course - and will start seeing demons and crazy things all around while they are robbing the bank. We will see. I would like to get OUR DAUGHTER written first - needless to say my slate is pretty full at this point. The stories just keep coming out of the woodwork.
At any rate, I have to do my editing on THE PREPARATION if I'm going to have any chance of releasing it on Kindle in December. Until next time.
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