Book Cover Illustrations

Part of yesterday’s work: A Character Concept Drawing for R.S. Guthrie’s upcoming novel Black Beast. It is still a tad cartoonish so it doesn’t blend into the realism of the rest of the cover illustration. Of course hopefully there will never be/never has been a creature like this. So making it “real” gets a little tricky, though shadowing and reducing the symmetry of the original drawing helps.

Onward. Hopefully this book cover illustration and the lettering will get finished today and Guthrie’s book will be on its way to Kindle as well as a print edition.

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Duncan Long is a book cover artist and illustrator for PS Publishing, Pocket Books, Solomon Press, Fort Ross, HarperCollins, and many self-published authors. See more of his book cover artwork and illustrations at: Book Cover Artwork and Illustrations
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The Kindle version of Hunt of the Sea Wolves is now available at: Amazon.com.

Interestingly, the original color version becomes grayscale — because the Kindle is currently color blind. I expect that to change in the near future, but for now, a book illustrator must take a little care to keep the cover illustration contrasts in the light/dark end of things rather than only contrasts of colors that will all become black when converted to grayscale (resulting in the old black cat in a dark room effect).

Here’s a blurb about the book:

Special Agent James Parris, of Homeland Security, heads up a team of professional terrorist hunter-killers that is called on when not one or two, but three liquefied natural gas ships are hijacked by ruthless members of the Abu Sayyaf Group, one of several military Islamist separatist organizations in the Philippines.

Parris and his team must stop the ships before the vessels reach their intended targets or hundreds of thousands of citizens of three countries will die in horrific explosions that can vaporize entire cities.

This is a political-thriller/modern-day pirate tale about terrorists and a SpecOps team of hunter-killers who must stop the ships before they reach large city ports and blow them up (with each ship having the destruction potential of several nuclear bombs).

If you enjoy a good adventure story, check out Hunt of the Sea Wolves.

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Duncan Long is a freelance magazine and book illustrator for HarperCollins, PS Publishing, Pocket Books, Solomon Press, Fort Ross, ISFiC Press, and many other publishers and self-publishing authors. See his book illustrations at: Duncan’s Book Cover Portfolio
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Today’s project was finalizing the artwork for John Chadwell’s Hunt of the Sea Wolves which will go into print first as a Kindle title and from there… Well, the sky’s the limit because Diverse Talent Group is currently soliciting producers.

John Chadwell has written hundreds of articles for magazines and newspapers, is a successful script doctor, and has penned over 20 theatrical scripts. Readers may recall that he wrote the story for Werewolves of New Idria (which I illustrated in its graphic novel form for Moonstone Books).

John also works from time to time with Ron Shusett (who wrote Alien and Total Recall). The team is back together with the script for Hunt of the Sea Wolves which Shusett co-wrote with John.

And, yes, it gets exciting to be involved with these projects, even if only on the edge of things.

(You can visit John’s Hunt of the Sea Wolves site for more info about the story.)

As is often the case, I created two rough versions of the cover. John went with the one shown above (which I agree is the better of the two). The runner up is shown below.

And here’s the picture before I added the cover lettering:

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Duncan Long is a book cover artist for John Chadwell as well as ILEX, PS Publishing, Pocket Books, HarperCollins, and many other publishers and self-publishing authors. See his book cover artwork at: Duncan’s Book Cover Artwork Portfolio
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Several months ago I had the privilege of creating the cover for A. J. Vega’s Majesty’s Offspring. I’m happy to announce that the book has a home page now. The site is nicely done and the Prologue to the book is also available online for those wanting a sneak peek at what’s inside the covers.

If you like science fiction, check this book out.

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Duncan Long creates cover illustrations for science fiction novels and other genres of books. His book cover illustrations have appeared on titles from HarperCollins, Pocket Books, ISFiC Press, ILEX, and many other publishers and self-publishing authors. He has also created several cover illustrations for Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine. See more of his illustrations for books and magazines at: Duncan Long’s Illustration Portfolio
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Got an interesting email from self-publishing author John Backus about his new novel. The book has been meeting with amazing success. I find John’s experience interesting because it paints a picture of what I think the future of publishing is soon likely to be: Authors putting their own stories into print, then shepherding them to success while pocketing most of the earnings.

John gave me permission to publish parts of his message on my blog, so here goes…

I thought you might be interested to know that Hunter-After The Fall, Book One, has been steadily climbing the Amazon.com bestseller ranks since its publication in August, 2010. Every day, scores of people are ordering it all over the world! From humble beginnings we have risen to the #1 bestselling “post apocalyptic” title on Amazon out of 400+ titles as a paperback, and #1 bestselling ebook out of 140+ titles in the Kindle store, and have broken into three different top 100 bestseller categories.

Not too bad for a no-name writer’s first novel, eh? I am convinced that your brilliantly executed cover art has been instrumental in catching the shopper’s eye, when looking for that next great read. Thanks again for your superlative artistic efforts and well-grounded technical advice which you offered so generously. You are, without question, a world-class talent with tremendous imaginative and mechanical skills expressed so evocatively in your art.

I wish you good health, an extra helping of grace, and a fat wallet — because God knows you deserve them all.

I’d encourage science fiction fans to check out John’s book Hunter-After The Fall, Book One — and buy a copy if you’re interested in a good read.

I’ve already created the cover for John’s second book in the series, and it was just as amazing a concept as his first cover. Now I’m looking forward to seeing what the third will be like.

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Duncan Long is a freelance magazine and book illustrator who did the book cover illustration for John Backus’ science fiction novel Hunter-After The Fall, Book One. See more of Long’s book illustrations at: http://DuncanLong.com/art.html
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I thought I’d show the progression of the covers created for the upcoming graphic novel Werewolves of New Idria (available from Moonstone Books).

Up front: NORMALLY I don’t go through this many ideas to get to the final book cover illustration. This project proved a challenge and generated bunches of different versions for the cover artwork. While I’ve got eight here, I’m only showing some of the major modifications and proposals. Imagine about ten variations for each of the ones shown and you’ll get an idea of the work involved to finally get to the final version.

The most ironical part to this story is that the final cover came from a poster I created for the book.

We should have started with the poster.

I’ll start with the FINAL version of the Cover for Werewolves of New Idria:

Now we’ll travel back in time to the first version of the cover:

This proved too static and there was some disagreement as to whether the werewolf should be wearing combat boots (there’s a joke here somewhere, I know). And the wolf head seemed too warm and fuzzy. (Note to illustrators: Wolves have a natural grin, so it’s hard to make them look like real wolves while still having an ominous disposition).

The next version:

Still too static. And still the combat boots. But better with a pretty gal. Onward:

Uhhhmmmm… No. I’m not sure I ever even submitted the above cover for the author or publisher to inspect, but include it to show how wrong an illustrator can go when left to his own devices.

But the motorcycles (taken from a concept illustration I did for the book version the graphic novel is based on) did seem to be working so they got boosted a bit for the next version:

Closer. Notice how the wolf shown above is almost smiling again. Oh, no… Next:

Something from the reach-out-and-grab-you school of illustration. Obviously this isn’t working too well; time to lose this version of the werewolf.

The eyes and sword in the above version were looking good. Finally something that would work – though not everyone was happy with it so I decided to add some fangs….

…and seemed to loose some ground. I retained the eyes and sword and returned to the bikers in the dark which everyone who saw the previous versions seemed to like.

For a time the illustration above was the “final” cover with a few variations in color including green, red, and a combo with a gradient of red to blue. This one would have worked and perhaps is a toss up with the final cover that was generated from the poster. Here it is again:

My question: Which one would you have picked? Input appreciated via the “comments” section below.

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In addition to producing a gazillion variations of illustrations for this graphic novel, Duncan Long often creates book cover illustrations for publishers including HarperCollins, Pocket Books, Solomon Press, ILEX, Fort Ross, PS Publishing, ISFiC Press, and many self-publishing authors. He’s hoping to get started on the artwork for another graphic novel in a few months — possibly with fewer stabs at creating the final graphic novel cover illustration. See more pictures from Werewolves of New Idria at Duncan Long’s Werewolves of New Idria Gallery
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This is another book illustration I had the opportunity to have showcased in the upcoming May issue of Horror Bound Magazine. In this case, science fiction book cover artwork I created for my own novel Wrong Side In.

This picture has had it’s own tale of woe. Several years ago, I wrote a science fiction novel which I self published. The book cover proved harder to execute than I had expected, with about five or six different illustrations being created, none to my liking until about a year ago. This sis one of the elements from the reject pile.

As for the novel, I decided to move from self-publishing to getting a small press to handle the book. And I may have a publisher lined up. Tune in tomorrow – or perhaps a bit later.

And the book cover artwork shown above is still looking for a home.

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Duncan Long creates science fiction, fantasy, and horror book cover artwork. His book and magazine cover artwork has appeared in publications from HarperCollins, Moonstone Books, Pocket Books, PS Publishing, Asimov Science Fiction Magazine, ILEX, ISFiC Press, and other presses as well as self-publishing writers. You can view Long’s book cover artwork at: Duncan Long’s Book Cover Illustration Portfolio.
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John Chadwell (who wrote Werewolves of New Idria — which I illustrated in its graphic novel variation) reports that our new graphic novel is gaining some serious traction.

John was interviewed by the Hollister Free Lance today about the graphic novel. He notes that The Bull Pen (a local game and comic book store) as well as the publisher Moonstone Books) are already taking orders.

That said, orders for the graphic novel can be placed through Moonstone Books. Werewolves of New Idria is due out August 11.

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Duncan Long illustrated the graphic novel Werewolves of New Idria. He has also created illustrations for HarperCollins, ILEX, PS Publishing, ISFiC Press, Pocket Books, Fort Ross, and many self-publishing authors. See more of his graphic novel illustrations at his Graphic Novel Illustrations: Werewolves of New Idria
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I had the opportunity to have some of my artwork showcased in the upcoming May issue of Horror Bound Magazine. While searching for suitable illustrations for the magazine, I discovered a few “Golden Oldies” that I thought I’d post over the next few days.

Most of these (including this one) have never been used as book or magazine illustrations. However it’s been my experience that eventually most pictures find a home on a book cover or as a magazine illustration if I wait long enough.

So I’m crossing my fingers and hoping on this one.

This illustration has perhaps not got much traction as of yet because I made the horns a bit too realistic; those who have not been around rams and similar critters may not recognize the two spiral objects as horns on Ms. Pan’s head. I suppose the runner up is that they are squid tentacles or such. Perhaps even more horrifying. (Perhaps I’m in need of an art director who grew up on a farm.)

And, yes, the title of the illustration is “Ms. Pan.” She’s looking for a book cover to call home.

In the meantime, I’m hoping she’ll provide a little enjoyment for my blog readers.

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When not ogling mythological women, Duncan Long creates fantasy book artwork and magazine illustrations for Pocket Books, HarperCollins, Moonstone Books, PS Publishing, Asimov Science Fiction Magazine, ISFiC Press, and other presses and self-publishing authors. See his book cover illustrations at: http://DuncanLong.com/art.html
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Another updated picture to help peddle the movie script for Werewolves of New Idria by John Chadwell and Ron Shusett (writer/creator of the Alien franchise and Total Recall). This was one of the early concept paintings created as a banner for the online site of the original novel. The picture has been revived to accompany the script (such pictures help potential buyers, clients, and actors, the concept art and illustrations visualize what a scene from the movie might look like). My modifications of the original concept art consisted of adding some glowing eyes to the central character, reworking a few of the details, and adjusting the contrast of the picture.

For those who might be curious, the buildings are based on those down the “main drag” of Manhattan, KS.

The first chapter of the novel can be read online at the Werewolves of New Idria web site.

Pictures for the upcoming graphic novel from Moonstone Books as well as concept illustrations for the novel and script can be viewed at my Werewolves of New Idria gallery.

And the graphic novel can also be pre-ordered from Moonstone Books’ website.

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When not creating concept artwork of werewolves and things that go bump in a movie script night, Duncan Long creates magazine and book illustrations for HarperCollins, Asimov Science Fiction Magazine, Pocket Books, ISFiC Press, ILEX, and many other publishers and self-publishing authors. Long also creates concept art for movie scripts and movie productions as well as graphic novels. See more of his illustrations at: http://DuncanLong.com/art.html
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