Salvaging Scottwell cover?

[abracanabra]

Planning on entering "Salvaging Scottwell" into a contest that requires cover art. What do you think? Yes, the original picture's mine--one I shot last weekend.

ETA: Title bar needs work. Hrmph.

Comments

[alisgray.livejournal.com]

very bold colors, eye-grabbing. without more context it looks like a novel about cyber-crime in Arizona. (had this not cross-posted to facebook I'm afraid I wouldn't have seen it.)

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

Arizona...? Scottwell, is that why? Or the blue door?

Thanks for the feedback.

Yeah. The facebook thing...I link on Fb to some of my LJ posts, but not all by a long shot. Debating making it all, but...I dunno. Wascally Wabbits!

[alisgray.livejournal.com]

yes, both "Scottsdale" and the color palette. Actually the texture looks kinda adobe-like too.

[grntserendipity.livejournal.com]

I'd pick up the book with that cover. I really like it!

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the feedback. Glad you like it!

[malcubed.livejournal.com]

Esthetically pleasing and eye-grabbing, I will leave it to you to determine if it is appropriately thematic or representative of the work since I have no clue.

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the feedback. Glad you liked it.

[wiredferret.livejournal.com]

I like it, and the binary at the bottom points to the theme.

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

Great--thanks for the feedback.

[guppiecat]

Did you mean to have the text align so closely with the top of the coloured bars? It's a bit jarring visually.

As an alternative (and one that I have no idea would fit the story (and isn't practical (but is neat))), what if you printed up binary code on your own yellow plastic banner and hung it on a door in a similar arrangement. Then, spray-painted "Saving Scottwell" on the door?

That would be visually powerful and the text wouldn't distract from the image so much.

Just a thought, of course.

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I was noticing the alignment.

I kind of like the spraypaint idea--maybe there's a font/photoshop effect that could duplicate that.

Thanks!

[alisgray.livejournal.com]

fine-tuning, but yes, I agree. (are you in graphic design, guppiecat?)

[guppiecat]

alisgray, well, I think it would be most fair to say "not anymore". I took a lot of art classes as a kid, came close to an art double major in college, worked as a web designer and form designer for a print-to-mail company. However, these days I mostly do security consulting and business development, with a bit of photography on the side.

[dmbaird.livejournal.com]

Sweet - having heard much of the story, I think this fits nicely.

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

I like it!

[ladylaurel.livejournal.com]

BUT I would make the font size of the binary at the bottom a little smaller and I would play around with having your title and name be a bit disjointed rather than so...orderly in the middle. Like maybe have the title in the upper left corner and your name in the lower right corner, esp. if you can do the font of the title and your name in a more skewed way. If you were to look at the cover of "mystic river" I'm thinking something a little like that.

OR even better perhaps, would be to have the binary code go vertically down one side of the cover, and have the title and name at the bottom.

I think what it is really, for me, is that I like the photo so much, I feel like you're covering it with the title in an inconvient place to take in the art of the cover. That can be considered a good thing I suppose though...

Re: I like it!

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

A friend of mine did a graffiti-style title on the door and it looks pretty awesome now.

[tesla-aldrich.livejournal.com]

I love the photo and I think it's great for the story, not to mention being striking and making me want to pick up whatever it might be attached to.

I do agree with the above comments that the text could benefit from some tuning, but I'm not good at graphic design, so no specific suggestions here.

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

[fayde.livejournal.com]

I would run the 1, 0, numbers off the sides of the page - unless there is a meaningful reason not to. I can guess that the binary code is supposed to be degrading, but if that is the case, you can still have it run off one side. I think that would imply that there is a greater amount of code that can't be read that the numbers are coming from.

[alisgray.livejournal.com]

an interesting point. does the binary say anything as is, I suddenly wonder?

cloudscudding, as it is you have three type faces (the police tape and the binary as well as title & author.) Is there a reason to have three? The title looks a bit news-type like, perhaps that is intentional. News bylines probably would have the author's name smaller. I feel this is a minor point however.

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

The binary actually spells "POLICE LINE." The title font is now graffiti, so it's still three fonts, but I like how it looks. Yay, birdfigment!

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

The binary actually spells "POLICE LINE," so I kept it as it was.