Cover Art? Where to find AFFORDABLE artists or the best tools to do it yourself??

[Crystal Lea]

Hi everyone.

 

I have been on the hunt for some great cover art for my ebooks and

seem to keep getting looped back to artists who charge in the

hundreds of dollars for their work.  While I'm not disputing that

they are indeed fantastic artists, I was wondering if there are

not artists out there who do cover work that is great for a

paranormal romance writer but that will not cost the proverbial

arm and leg.

Does anyone out there happen to know of any cover artists

that would fit the bill?  And if any of you do your own cover art,

what programs are the most suited for doing so?  Best places

for stock art, that kind of thing?  I appreciate all the help anyone

can give me!  :-)

 

Thanks all!!

Crystal

[Christy Pinheiro]

I use an incredible illustrator for some of my cover art and I've been very happy with the price and also the quality of the art. You can see their samples here: http://www.darkgeometry.ca/

 

the artist is located in Canada and accepts Paypal. But if you need full cover design (not just the artwork) you can try Carl Graves, (that's Joe Konrath's cover artist) but it's going to be at least $350. The other option is to buy cover software and do it yourself. I've used BookCover Pro with good results.

 

Christy

[Crystal Lea]

Thank you Christy!! 

I'll take a look at both! 

I appreciate the help.

Crystal

[Michelle Isenhoff]

Crystal, I had the same problem.  While I'd love to have some great art on my covers, I have to justify such an expense against the realistic profit from self-published work.  So I did some experimenting on my own.  I've created all my covers using creative commons photographs and paint.net (it's free).  You can see them at http://www.michelleisenhoff.wordpress.com.  As flashy as some?  As inviting?  Perhaps not.  But not bad.  And they were all free.

[TannisSkye]

I ended up doing my cover art myself because sometimes the model/photographer/graphics want credit for their work, which is fine, but then sometimes contracts get entered into the occasion. Much less drama  this way.

 

[Crystal Lea]

Thank you all so much for your advice! 

I'm beginning to lean more and more towards doing the covers myself...seems 

like probably the best thing for me to learn to do. 

I appreciate you all taking the time to help me out!

[Larissa Hinton]

I absolutely agree! Photoshopping your own cover is just plain ol' fun. At first I was intimidated, but then I just did it and got GREAT results. 

 

Here are both of my book covers:

 

 

 

All I did was go on www.shuttershock.com and photo shopped it then tada! Done. Total cost: 10 bucks!

[AK Dawson]

Hi guys. Michelle above hits the nail on the head when she says that she can't justify the expense of professional design compared to the potential profit of a self-published book, and I also agree about doing your cover yourself. It's fun! I've done my own covers before for a couple of things. For the book I've just put up on Kindle, I did the typography then had a friend help me polish (or rather roughen) it up a bit. Here it is: 

AK Dawson

 

 

[Michelle Isenhoff]

Sweet cover, AK!

[AK Dawson]

Thanks! I spent ages agonising over it. I've just been to your site and am impressed with the creative commons pic you found for the quill pen - I didn't know there was much free photography out there (I think you just have to credit the owner). Your story looks great too! 

 

[Michelle Isenhoff]

I've gotten all my pics from Flikr.com's creative commons.  I only used pics with the attribution license.  Then you can do whatever with it and use it for anything, as long as you credit the owner.  I just put their name on the copyright page, or at the top of ebook versions.

[Crystal Lea]

Great cover AK!!

Hopefully by the time I'm done learning I'll be able to come up with

that caliber of work too!

 

[Crystal Lea]

Those are both FANTASTIC Larissa!!