How to Make a Book Cover for Dummies

What’s woody, grasshoppers?

Play the video above to get your groove on while you read the breakdown of Thick 3
 
This week I unveiled the book cover for In the Thick of Things aka Thick 3…the story itself is only 5 percent done…I’m taking my time with the story because I want THIS one to be special….
 
…kinda like how you continue to sleep and hoe around until you find the RIGHT person to settle down with
 
Anyway…I purposely posted the book cover a year before the novel’s release date to motivate me to finish the project
 
The visual helps out the king with the content of the story…besides the provocative nature of the book covers in the Thick series (half nakedness DOES help), they give me an idea of how I should approach the story…the better the book cover looks to the public, the better I write the story to MATCH the intense beauty of the visual before you pick up a copy
 
And for the record, I’m NOT the illustrator of the book covers…the artwork is done by Joshua Calloway, straight from the mean "skreets" of cornfields and cheese factories of Wisconsin USA, baby
 
Check out his work @ www.jacart.org
 
I hand picked Joshua to work on the book covers of Thick 2 and 3…I fell out with the illustrator of Thick 1…I was an asshole to Zach, but shit, I play hardball when it comes to projects that need to be done
 
I can be VERY anal about how I want the book covers to be executed...real rap
 
Shout out to Zachary Schoenbaum…check out his work @ www.umbralust.com
 
I emailed Joshua about a one-week book cover project for Thick 3…he agreed, and worked from the material I’d given him…I specifically told him I wanted yellow to dominate the illustration, just like how red dominated Thick 1 and orange dominated Thick 2
 
Thick 3 is also known as the "yellow book"
 
Joshua went to work with the first draft of the cover…the watershed style is used right 'chea on some Leonardo da Vinci type shit…I switched things up so the book covers won’t look the same from the other Thick novels as well as other books in today’s market
 
A week after our initial emails, Joshua hit me off with…

I wasn’t feeling it…the drawing wasn’t wack…it was just…
 
…eh!
 
The illustration didn’t make my dick hard…I told money (Joshua) to make her face smaller, sharpen the nose, make the lips fuller, fix the index finger, and put some red in the illustration to contrast with the yellow
 
Money headed back to the drawing board with this…

We were right on track, baby!

The wrinkles from the brush strokes of the painting didn’t sit too well with the king…they made shorty look old in the face...like "Jesus is my homeboy" old...I told money to smooth out the lines in the painting and add the background I gave him
 
He hit me off with…

Nice…nice…niiiiiiiiiice
 
Actually, Joshua had sent me two versions of the book cover: one with a sun, and one without…I wanted the sun to have an “Oh shit!” facial expression as he’s lookin’ at shorty…Joshua thought that shit was weird…I didn’t give a fuck, I wanted that joint in the painting
 
I told him to make the size of the sun smaller, add a red strand in the middle of shorty’s hair, and add the book title in the painting for this…

The cover was dope, but I wasn’t wholeheartedly satisfied…I didn’t bust a nut from the illustration
 
I suggested that money make the woman a little bit smaller, make “In The” that rides the T in THICK look much bigger, and put his own swag to the finished product since we had an extra day until the deadline
 
I hate using the word “swag,” but I’ll let it ride for once this time
 
He cooked up the final project in the kitchen and hooked me up with what you now see

I wish I knew how to draw as great as I can write…that'll save me some dough...LOL...straight up...drawing cartoons were my first passion as a shorty standing knee high…I couldn’t draw a lick, so I wrote episodes instead
 
Every cover of my books are conceived by me…I hire artists to carry out the images I possess in my mind…I’m the conductor in the orchestra of art
 
Simple as that
 
There’s actually more to the creative process of this illustration than I’m giving away…the process is tedious; it takes longer than expected…but hey, it’s worth it
 
I treat book covers like album covers…even if you think the story suck, at least you can’t front on the cover…I want people to buy the book based on the cover ALONE
 
And also for the cover to become timeless while the clock runs laps around this small, cold world like it’s on crack

Aight, ya’ll…I’m out
 
Peace

Nah’Sun the Great @ www.nahsunblaze.com

The Making of Thick 2 Book Cover

Uh oh…it’s that time again

It’s that time to break down the book cover process…I’m gonna make this brief…Arm wrestling with the hands of time is draining …heck, I’m surprised I have time to draw up this blog

The show MUST go on

Aight…so I wanted a frontal image of a plus size woman…the illustrator for the original Thick book was missing in action for whatever reason

Shout out to Zach…where ever you are…hope all is well with you

Not getting a response from Zach through email had led me to hit up another secret weapon…Joshua…

I was kinda hard on Zach during the process of my Nah’Sun logo and the book cover to the original Thick…but hey…I want my shit done right and exact on the strength of how I see things

Make a long explanation short, I told my new illustrator, Joshua, what I envisioned for the one week assignment…he drew up a quick skeleton before going all the way in

  

That’s the skeleton of the original figure…Joshua felt that the woman needed more attitude…I’m not the type to put a lid on my illustrator's creative juices…so I let him do his thing

I fell back and wondered what he’d cooked up

He came up with…

The drawing was dope…I told him to take out the purple in the hair and parts of the body because this is the ORANGE BOOK of the series…Thick When the Chances are Slim is known as the RED BOOK

I’m tailoring my book covers of the Thick series to the Chakra…I might talk about the Chakra in a later blog when I have more time on my hands

Anyway…I told Joshua to take out the purple, and take out the black lines that separate the body parts…WIDER HIPS was also needed

Yep…I love wide hips…POW!

The changes were on point…I wanted a spaced out background…since the woman is the Queen of the Universe, I thought an orange spaced out background was fitting for her existence on earth (the black grass in the bottom of the book represents the earth)

I wanted the book to have an orange theme for the background…he went back to the drawing board and came up with…

Too red

Aight, chill…no worry

I told money about the red background…stubborn minds led to this…

Leave it to me to help out the sport...this version kinda reminds me of Storm from the X-Men

I didn’t wanna stress my guy over a minor (but major) part of the illustration…it’s not about getting angry or panicking over the small stuff…it’s about helping those who are helping you

The old saying of “one hand washes the other” when you’re on a team is perfect for a great outcome instead of acting like a dick at the first sign of trouble

I searched around for some orange coloring I wanted for the background…I found a few and sent the 3 bottom photos for him to work with

Color for the author header block

Shading of the background

main color

He thanked me for the alley oop and slam dunked my vision for the background

Heads kept asking me “what’s her race?” because of the heavy facial features on the drawing…Joshua faded out the facial features to leave her vague…He also used blends and shadings to separate the body parts instead of black lines to make the drawing appear more artsy

The black lines would’ve restricted the flow of the illustration…he obliged and cooked up…

The Finish Product

That’s what I’m talkin’ 'bout

As you can see, coming up with a book cover that reflects my original intent is a process itself…I’m not a believer of slapping anything on the cover just for the hell of it

I treat my book covers like artists back in the day treated their albums

And guess what???

The book cover ACTUALLY has something to do with the story...SHOTS FIRED!!!

Aight, ya’ll…I’m Audi 9G

Peace

Nah’Sun

The World Premier of "Thick in the Nick of Time"

Abracadabra, grasshoppers

Ya guy is still grusslin in the book game…I don’t grind hard…I grind SMART

Feast your eyes on the unveiling of my upcoming novel Thick in the Nick of Time aka Thick 2

The book is the SEQUEL to Thick When the Chances are Slim

I'll break down the illustration process tomorrow

 

The tentative date for Thick 2 is late 2012-early 2013

#TeamThick

If you haven’t copped your copy of the original THICK, hit up the link below to purchase

www.nahsunblaze.com

The joint is only 15 bucks…each page is cheaper than gas prices

Aight, ya’ll

Peace

Nah'Sun

No Strings Attached Sex

Before I start, I wanna say Heaven is between a woman’s legs

As your resident perfectionist, sometimes picking the RIGHT book cover design is a pain in the brain. Patience is a bitter plant, but it fruits are sweet.

This is the first draft of the “Thick When the Chances are Slim" book cover





My heart almost jumped out my mouth when I saw this draft. Then again, it’s called a ROUGH draft for a reason,

I gave the illustrator a picture and told him what I wanted. He took it from there…Shout out to Zachary Schoenbaum @ www.umbralust.com

After a few days he drew up this joint





I almost threw up my sandwich…I kept my cool and told him to go back to the drawing board…I needed something to give me a stiffy...whatever this was wouldn’t give a male nympho a hard on

He came back with this…




 
Not bad…I told him I wanted the swirly things…I also gave him some font styles and color designs for the cover

Due to peer pressure, I told homie to change it…so he did (he didn’t have a choice since I was paying him)

I wanted him to further draw out the woman’s tig ol biddies

 

I loved it, but I thought the highlighting of the reds were uneven. The reds should draw out a 2D figure of the woman

The women needed more curves and evenness

He drew…





The author title block at the top of the book is on point. So was the font and coloring of the title at the bottom

I showed the drawing to my peeps…they thought the woman looked “too manly”

Oh well 

I told him to play around with the cover…shit got worse 

After getting more negative views than a little bit, I suggested a more curvy woman

I actually thought about going with this one…heads STILL weren’t feeling it

Damn!!!…coming up with an eye catchy book cover drained the life outta me…well...almost 

So far, so good…I loved this one

But sometimes you gotta let go what you love for the greater good

My advisor told me I can do better…so I contacted Zach and tossed him so extra money to start the project over again

I really wasn’t feeling the blue background behind the red…something had to give





Red is the color of sex…I ditched the red and blue idea and went with the combination of red, orange and yellow

I also tossed him some ideas about the shape of the woman

The sketches you see above is based on a famous video vixen/magazine model…you’ll have to figure out the rest





A few modifications and touch ups later, we finally agreed on the cover what you see now

The WE included me, Zach, my advisors, and random people

They don’t call me the people’s champ for nothing

As you can see, writing a book is not just one aspect of publishing. At least when it comes to myself. I’m very precise about how I want things done

The steps of the book is just half of the process…I’m sure you got the gist of everything

Aight, ya’ll…I’m out

Peace

Nah'Sun