I wanted to talk about cover design for the grydscaen series today. As a writer mainly I went to art school to study animation and game design which allowed me to focus directly on character designs and animation for grydscaen. There were a few character sketches, storyboards, animations and backgrounds, as well as 3D art done for grydscaen. This was why I went to get a better grasp on my art work. I do all the cover art and interior illustrations for grydscaen like those in grydscaen: tribute. And yes there is a map available, two actually and they could be better but they do what I need them to do.
The artwork below is the cover for grydscaen: alliance, the third volume in the grydscaen series. It showcases a picture of Faid. I have talked about my cover process before but wanted to get into it more with this book.
Each of the book covers feature a character (with Utopia featuring 2 characters). I make a conscious effort to have each book feature the main character for that arc of the story. Alliance featured Faid as the leader of the Packrat hackers since the book is primarily about Packrat culture. In the cover image we see Faid with his signature red hair, a Packrat Runner’s shirt and a Packrat knife called an Ang.
The highlight colour in this book is yellow which was the colour of the binder the manuscript for this book was put in. Each book has a highlight colour which resounds for the art highlight, the author name and the subtitle. We have had green, red, pink, orange, peach, grey and yellow to date. There are more colours coming. The plan was to highlight all the colours of the LGBT flag in the grydscaen books. The pink was the colour from the trans flag.
Once I figure out who will be on the cover I think about what props I want in the drawing. In beginnings it was Naito with fire. In war it was Lino on the throne. In retribution it was Blue with his blue hair with the aegis sparking. With utopia it was Lino and Berlin his boyfriend, and in Tribute it was Acolyte with a Nek hardline terminal. In Alliance it was Faid with the Ang knife.
Sometimes there were multiple drawings done for a cover before we settled on the final line art. For beginnings there were about 8 drawings done until we settled on Naito with fire. I knew what I wanted, a close up of Naito with his hand up and fire but I just had trouble rendering it.
Once the line art is done, the colouring of the illustration starts and the assemblage with the words occurs. The word “grydscaen” is in a certain font that is pervasive for all the books. The book covers are black with the highlight. There was a change in the back design with Alliance which will carry to all the next books but mostly the brand design is set for this series. The drawing is coloured and layed out with the design. There is the “grydscaen” title, the subtitle, author name and volume number against the fade to black. The back cover includes white text against the black with book summary, author photo and bio. The spine includes the author name, the grydscaen name and the subtitle.
The cover galley is provided in PDF format and the editing process occurs. In this cover we had to go back and forth with the yellow used for the highlight it needed to be lighter and less gold. Once the cover, front and back was available and looked right it was approved and endorsed to print along with the internal galley.
All the books in the grydscaen series align with the brand that was established with the publishing of grydscaen: retribution, the first book available in the grydscaen series, even though there were short stories in the grydscaen series available before that.
I do the covers of the grydscaen series so that I have total control over the process of getting a book done. I am a self published author so I have to control everything. I work with my publisher to get the final book done and formatted including the cover.
Working on the cover art is a rewarding thing. I am a writer first so the art is hard. I painstakingly deliberate before I turn in a cover illustration for final consideration. The war book had two covers before we settled on the final for publication. The Utopia book had a cover when it first got published and then a second release was done. I like working on the covers and it is rewarding. I hope you stick around to see the next cover of the grydscaen books scheduled for 2017 grydscaen: desecration and grydscaen: metropolis.