a cover story

Marketing is a bitch, I'd like to say that first and foremost.  And not because it's difficult to sometimes execute, and not because the physical act of creating it is necessarily difficult, but the idea itself is.  A movie poster, an ad in a magazine, or let's just say a book cover... you've got to sell something without having the luxury of adding your own words and excitement to it.

Let an image sit on its own and sell a product for you.

I've always had it in my head what I wanted for the cover of my book.  Granted, the very very first version of what was then called "The Originality" was just the word hovering over a cityscape with the "O" as the ring the book is based around.  But soon after that I started putting my three main characters on the cover.  At first they were anime style characters because that was all I could draw at the time, and sadly I cannot find any pictures of what that cover once was.  Trust me, it was something...

In 2006 I started drawing what you see below.  They were originally models from magazines that I traced and then changed the details of (hair, clothes, yadda yadda.)  Banning, the gent in the middle, is wearing an outfit from later in the book but I realize now looking back on it that it looks like a Halloween costume or maybe a sex-slave outfit.  Either, really.

I got the idea one day a few months later while avoiding writing that I should fill in the drawing with black.  I kept thinking that if it were really a book cover, I wouldn't want to see the faces of the people I'd drawn because they weren't amazing in any way and certainly no one would buy a book that looked like that.  Ever.  Now that being said, I've always loved silhouettes.  I find them powerful, mysterious, and in the end, just plain cool.  I couldn't tell you why if I tried, it's just something about them that strikes me.

So I retraced my image, transferred it, and then colored it in with a black marker.  Not really pleased with the marker, I then painted it with black and once it had dried, used my parents scanner to bring it to digital life.  In the middle picture above, the way the paint dried is why there are ripples in the background.  Then I used the junky version of Photoshop I had at the time and filled them in and right away, I was impressed.  With a little dicking around (as I'm so fond of doing with Photoshop) I added some light effects and lens flares and it absolutely blew me away.

No, it wasn't perfect, but to a 21-year-old me at the time it was the best thing I could imagine.  And it became the cover of "The Originality."

Three years later I started the final MAJOR rewrite of the book and with it came a title change that didn't make me cringe every time someone asked me what my book was called.  "The Originality" became "The Onyxus Chronicles."  I decided at that point to move beyond the drawn version of the cover and hunt down pictures of actual people to use instead.  The character of Sydney (on the right) is British and was originally based on Kate Beckinsale, but as time had gone on and I discovered Emily Blunt, she replaced her.  Going into this that was the only person I knew I would be using.  For Bryna, on the left, I just needed to find an actress shorter in stature with blonde hair, and Kristen Bell fit the role perfectly.

Then there's Banning.  He's written as having blond hair, but for the rewrite it ended up being a dirtier blond and I found a picture of a model named Caleb Lane that reminded me of the outfit he wears later in the book (again, the trashy sex-slave outfit.)  So I had my leads.

For a time, this cover served its purpose just as its predecessor had and I was pleased with it.  At this point the reason behind keeping them as silhouettes was so that the reader could imagine any face they wanted on the figures.  Imagine themselves, imagine a friend, whatever they wanted.  That's part of why silhouettes are cool; they can be what you need if you have a little imagination.  And clearly I tamed Emily Blunt's hair, because in silhouette form it looked craaaaazy.

We flash forward a few years later now.  The thing that bugged me about the second incarnation of the book cover was that you could not see any details.  Hair color, skin color, nothing.  I wanted it to be a bit more than that.  At this point I'd also gotten over my fascination with Caleb Lane and wanted to go with super-sexy-stud-muffin Brandon Stoughton instead.  Also, Bryna needed to be replaced by someone who looked a little more exotic and Amanda Seyfried has blossomed into a vixen ready for the role.

So I hunted down hi-def images, found a PERFECT shot of Emily Blunt, and using Photoshop skills that had become much more finely tuned I came up with what you see below.

I was in love with it.  Suddenly they weren't just silhouettes but they were real.  They were tangible.  I could imagine them doing and saying the things they do in the book and it made all the difference to me.

That was 2012 though, and when I decided to get serious about publishing, I knew I had some more work to do.  I spoke with my wonderful big brother at great length about the cover and he said he would design it for me.  I was over the moon because he's good at that "stuff" and I knew my ideas would be in good hands.  In January this year he sent me a page of mockups and I picked and prodded them with what I did and did not like before giving him my thoughts.  There was no huge rush to get the cover done, seeing as I wasn't done with the final edit of my work, so I messed around with some of his ideas on my own work and churned out the cover below in the interim.

I had to get rid of Times New Roman as a font because that was just silly at this point.  Ease back on the multiple lens flares, moved Sydney to the opposite side (because she's his right hand... get it?) and add a little shading to the girls to give better depth.  Again, I loved it, because it was never a question to me of what I wanted this to look like.  Maybe it was not the exact version of what I wanted it to look like, but my idea was solid.

I figured when the time came to make the real cover I would just go to a website like Shutterstock.com and buy a few images to use.  Legally I couldn't use my three celebrities on the cover, due in large part to the fact I had not taken the pictures myself and therefore did not own them.  I am but a humble writer, one without a legal team to fight my battles were someone to get huffy over what I'd done.

But after perusing Shutterstock I admit I was at a loss.  None of the models were posed the way I wanted, there faces (though no, they wouldn't be seen) were nothing at all like those of the characters, and it just bothered me.  It killed me, actually, because I didn't want to "settle" with my book cover.  I've never been the person who says "Yeah... this is good enough, I guess," and anyone who knows me would agree.

My brother suggested I shoot the cover myself and after some deliberation I decided he was right.

I reached out on Facebook for help, something I'm not super prone to doing.  Me being me, I like to do things myself.  This time however, I would not be able to turn myself into a woman to get the silhouettes.  Not good ones, at least.

Obviously.

I know I shouldn't be as surprised as I usually am when people are willing to help me but I genuinely was shocked at the interest people showed in being a part of the cover.  The very first response was from a girl I used to work with at Express and it floored me.  When I met her so long ago, I thought she looked like Bryna.  When I started the re-write of the book, Bryna became her.  Her features changed a little to fit this girl I knew so little about, and in the end, she was who I thought of whenever I read the character.  And she wanted to be her on the cover, not even knowing my thoughts on the matter.  So obviously I was over the moon.

I asked a specific person I had in mind to be my Sydney and she was very enthusiastic to do so.  I told the girls I would keep them anonymous for their sake, and should they decide to reveal the roles they played then that would be up to them.  My plan when I started writing this blog had been to then tell you all that I'd found a guy for my Banning and leave it at that, but me being me (again) and annoyingly honest, I'll just tell the truth.

I filled in for Banning.

I thought it would be too self-serving to do so right off the bat, but the amount of people that told me I should be him just mounted to a point that I thought "Oh who the fuck cares, it's my book and he's my creation."

Banning always was me.  He represented me.  And though he's straight and super fit and yadda yadda yadda, his character will always represent the biggest piece of me (as opposed to the girls which are just fractions of my mind.)  So I filled the shoes of my leading man and that's all there is to it.  Easter egg revealed!

So the girls came over, I turned my apartment into a studio, and we had a blast.  @markstyleme came to help with hair and posing, @klreynol was there because she has been since the inception of the book (and it's dedicated to her, so I felt it was only right to have her present,) and @caitcd was on hand as well with her camera so that the pictures would hit the quality I needed.  We drank champagne and wine and laughed and joked the whole time.  We made each other feel comfortable in what we were doing and that was the best part, because ever so surprisingly, it is not easy at all to mimic the poses of pictures you've been staring at for so many years.

When I took the very first picture and saw how the backlighting worked on my Sydney, I got a little emotional.  Goosebumps, tight throat, the works.  Because it was finally real.  This whole thing was finally real, and I guess in many ways, coming to an end.

That's the final cover.  That's what is wrapped around the 396 page novel currently sitting beside me on my desk as I write this.  I am so stoked for this cover, I'm so over joyed that it hit the marks I wanted it to hit and will do it's job at selling the book the way I intended it to.  Striking, simple, and a little mysterious.  It could serve as a movie poster, it will be the template for each of the three (so far) sequels that branch off from this story, and it just works.  It may not be the best cover ever designed but it's what I wanted and that's all that matters in the end.

I am incredibly appreciative to my brother Josh most of all for his help in designing the final cover(s) and could never thank him enough.  I'm thankful to the insight and input from my three bests that were with me the night I cemented this in history, and above all I'm thankful to all of you and your continued words of support.  One week from tomorrow and this will be published and available for anyone and everyone wants to read it.

The cover story is only the beginning!