Cover art – single character or multiple?

PlixTrixaplik

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Which cover do you think is more effective?

I drew two versions of my book cover. One is the MC by herself, and the other is the MC with her three adventuring companions.

I like the first one because the MC’s face is easier to see in a thumbnail. In the second cover, everyone is so tiny that it’s difficult to determine anything about them.

However, I like the second one because I think there’s something inherently more interesting about seeing a group of characters together. It conveys to the reader that this story is not just about the MC, but also about their relationships with other characters.

I did the drawings in Clip Studio. If you have any constructive criticisms of my art style or typography you want to share, that would be fine, too.

amberly cover2b.jpg
amberly cover2a.jpg


The book (such as it is)
 

TheKillingAlice

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I did the drawings in Clip Studio. If you have any constructive criticisms of my art style or typography you want to share, that would be fine, too.
I'm not very fond of either. :blob_cookie:
I mean, it's cool to be able to draw consistently, but I just don't personally dig the art style, and I wouldn't click on it.
I have my own hypothesis on topics like this. People nowadays are going crazy because of "AI Art on Covers", not realizing that there are really great artists who draw similarly to your average AI cover Art. Why do I mention this? Because I believe the actual oversaturation happened on the Webnovel market due to the growing popularity of Webtoons YEARS ago, before AI Art was even a thing.
While Lightnovels always did something similar, they were always niche, and nobody cared that much, whereas Webnovels from the Korean market were far more accessible and popular. Still, Webtoons have a huge audience, while Webnovels remain niche in comparison, even to this very day. Since Webnovels that spawned Webtoon adaptations are more likely to be read, a lot of other Webnovels went ahead and used "Webtoon-esque" Art on their covers, which implied more than they actually were, to draw in readers (that's as much as I could gauge; in other words, it's a theory).
I do understand putting people on book covers, I use them too, but I don't often show people's faces (I do make exceptions, obviously, but compared to how many covers I have made in my lifetime - which is a lot - it's very few with full-on faces on them and people being clearly recognizable). Because you want to imagine the characters yourself, if it's not a medium that shows you the characters in the first place.
Outside of that, it doesn't tell you anything anyway; you could put a bunch of squares on your cover, and it would give me the same amount of input on the story as your quartet of characters does. It's just padding, nothing more. If it's padding, it needs to appeal to as many eyes as possible, whereas a specific drawing style that doesn't necessarily cater to the general mass will not be appealing to the average potential audience.
I'm sure there will be people fast at telling me that I'm wrong, because it's up to taste, but I'm basing this on estimations and observations I have made over the years. Every site has its audience pool, and you might go well with just putting a woman with cleavage on the cover. Sometimes, there doesn't even have to be a cover to draw in an audience. But those aren't the ones you are targeting with your cover anyway. You are targeting those who go by first glance appeal without looking solely for boobage.
I never understood why a Webnovel, that isn't a Webtoon, would desperately need a Character drawn on the cover. If your art style is very cool and very likely to appeal to many people, AND you drew something that carries weight, something that carries a bit of personality with it, I would totally say go for it. But in this case, the drawing doesn't even properly blend in with the background, and then the font just hovers above their heads like the Sword of Damocles. It's all very messy, yet boring, since it tells me nothing the Title didn't already hint at.
The text is also stuck to the ceiling (where typography on any sort of poster or cover should never stick, because it leaves the field of vision to the viewer - though that rule ESPECIALLY goes for the bottom).
Aaaanyway, that's my five cents.
 
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Ararara

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I like the left one better yea

Maybe the face is a bit too round / mouth too small, looks a tiny bit off. Like Thomas the tank engine. But it's pretty good
 

Bimbanana

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I'm not very fond of either. :blob_cookie:
I mean, it's cool to be able to draw consistently, but I just don't personally dig the art style, and I wouldn't click on it.
I have my own hypothesis on topics like this. People nowadays are going crazy because of "AI Art on Covers", not realizing that there are really great artists who draw similarly to your average AI cover Art. Why do I mention this? Because I believe the actual oversaturation happened on the Webnovel market due to the growing popularity of Webtoons YEARS ago, before AI Art was even a thing.
While Lightnovels always did something similar, they were always niche, and nobody cared that much, whereas Webnovels from the Korean market were far more accessible and popular. Still, Webtoons have a huge audience, while Webnovels remain niche in comparison, even to this very day. Since Webnovels that spawned Webtoon adaptations are more likely to be read, a lot of other Webnovels went ahead and used "Webtoon-esque" Art on their covers, which implied more than they actually were, to draw in readers (that's as much as I could gauge; in other words, it's a theory).
I do understand putting people on book covers, I use them too, but I don't often show people's faces (I do make exceptions, obviously, but compared to how many covers I have made in my lifetime - which is a lot - it's very few with full-on faces on them and people being clearly recognizable). Because you want to imagine the characters yourself, if it's not a medium that shows you the characters in the first place.
Outside of that, it doesn't tell you anything anyway; you could put a bunch of squares on your cover, and it would give me the same amount of input on the story as your quartet of characters does. It's just padding, nothing more. If it's padding, it needs to appeal to as many eyes as possible, whereas a specific drawing style that doesn't necessarily cater to the general mass will not be appealing to the average potential audience.
I'm sure there will be people fast at telling me that I'm wrong, because it's up to taste, but I'm basing this on estimations and observations I have made over the years. Every site has its audience pool, and you might go well with just putting a woman with cleavage on the cover. Sometimes, there doesn't even have to be a cover to draw in an audience. But those aren't the ones you are targeting with your cover anyway. You are targeting those who go by first glance appeal without looking solely for boobage.
I never understood why a Webnovel, that isn't a Webtoon, would desperately need a Character drawn on the cover. If your art style is very cool and very likely to appeal to many people, AND you drew something that carries weight, something that carries a bit of personality with it, I would totally say go for it. But in this case, the drawing doesn't even properly blend in with the background, and then the font just hovers above their heads like the Sword of Damocles. It's all very messy, yet boring, since it tells me nothing the Title didn't already hint at.
The text is also stuck to the ceiling (where typography on any sort of poster or cover should never stick, because it leaves the field of vision to the viewer - though that rule ESPECIALLY goes for the bottom).
Aaaanyway, that's my five cents.
I actually been thinking should I comment or not.
Well since the nice Alice here already comment from the technical side, might as well jumped in. But maybe only from the general market side.

My question is what are you aiming with your novel? If you aiming to compete in the market, I'm sorry to say its gonna be super-duper difficult with this title and cover.

However, if you write for yourself. To express your idea on writing, to satisfied your artistic side by drawing the cover yourself, and realize that this is but a practice to get better later, then: VERY COOL! Many didnt even start making anything other than keeping it on their mind.

I am very intrigued with your choice to not make the main character look slender like other artwork. Is there a message behind it? (See, this thing actually piqued some interest) but then again not many will think like this since they all too used with cute sexy anime girls.

But then again, if you wish to compete in the market. Yeah, plenty of things need to be reworked here.
Please note that on today's age, readers judge a book from its cover. Like, very literally.
 

TheKillingAlice

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My question is what are you aiming with your novel? If you aiming to compete in the market, I'm sorry to say its gonna be super-duper difficult with this title and cover.
Since the question explicitly asked about what's more effective, I'd assume it is meant to appeal to an audience. :blob_hmm:
I am very intrigued with your choice to not make the main character look slender like other artwork. Is there a message behind it? (See, this thing actually piqued some interest) but then again not many will think like this since they all too used with cute sexy anime girls.
Isn't that just OPs drawing style, without much to it? :blob_cookie:
 

PlixTrixaplik

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Aaaanyway, that's my five cents.
I guess I should have explained myself more clearly in the initial post. My goal is not to make money, or break into an already saturated market, or attracts tons of readers, or anything like that. I do this as a hobby, nothing more. I came into this with the expectation that maybe three people in the entire galaxy will ever read any of my stuff.

Don't get me wrong; I do appreciate your brutally honest feedback. I did ask for it, and I'll certainly consider some of your points, especially regarding cover design, about which I am woefully ignorant. I'm also in complete agreement that the background sucks, partly because I only spent like two minutes drawing it, so it's partly a skill issue and partly a lack of effort issue.

I'm just saying that knowing where I'm coming from might have helped explain some of my creative choices. Such as the choice to draw my own book cover when I know my artwork sucks. (Also, I happen to really like my own artwork, even knowing that it objectively sucks. I'm using it because my only goal in this endeavor is to express myself creatively, for good or ill.)

So why did I request feedback at all? I really just wanted to generate conversation, and I was curious about others' opinions.

I am very intrigued with your choice to not make the main character look slender like other artwork. Is there a message behind it? (See, this thing actually piqued some interest) but then again not many will think like this since they all too used with cute sexy anime girls.
I'm glad you noticed. I'm fully aware that I could attract more readers by putting a conventionally cute, skinny anime waifu with gigantic boobs on my cover. As noted in my previous reply, I'm not particularly interested in chasing trends. That was how I imagined my MC, so that's how I drew her. It wasn't particularly intended to be a political statement, but I guess it could be one, in the hands of a more competent artist.

My question is what are you aiming with your novel?
I write only as a personal hobby, as you probably guessed. I know I'll never achieve any kind of mass appeal. My only aspiration is to create works of fiction that a handful of readers out there might possibly enjoy.
 

worldismyne

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The one on the left. For a larger image, a group is fine, but your cover is going to be shrunk down the size of your thumb. Clarity is your main goal for the cover.

I'd strongly recommend going to the library and looking at the cover of books for the genre you're writing in to get an idea of what to do with the typography. In most cases, you don't want to have your title overlapping the head of your main character. So you could lift and center your gal, and then have the title at the bottom of the image. Or you could center and scooch her down at bit, and edit the title so it fits more into the top 1/3 of your cover.

(some programs will have 'justify' as an alignment option for text, that will pull everything to fit more evenly throughout the textbox)

Whichever direction you go, it would be a good idea to amp up the magical star she's making in front of her. (A great opportunity to show what makes the magic in your book unique) and have that effect the background (if it's ice, add frost on the parts of the trees facing her. if water, add rain. if light, make it the main light source. etc)

I also Art by Fugitive Rabbit has a bunch of resources to connect artists with models/refs for people with different body types. They released a bunch of mermaid photoshoots this May. There are models that take requests as well as tons of dynamic poses available for free.
 

TheKillingAlice

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So why did I request feedback at all? I really just wanted to generate conversation, and I was curious about others' opinions.
I'm more of a pragmatic person, so when someone asks for "effective", I read it as that, but if you say you just asked in general, I don't really know how that goes, but I guess it means you will just go with the flow on your character art, then. :blob_cookie:
In that case, I'd still somewhat change the background. It seems as if they are supposed to be standing in the woods, but the shading doesn't add up, so it won't blend in with the rest. It feels like a random background either way, but at the same time, ill-fitting. So I would maybe make it white or black, or just use an actual "random background" and see if it comes together that way.
As for the typography, it's always more complicated with something big on the cover front and center, when you can't overlap it. Characters are hazardous because you don't want to overlap them, but they take up so much space that you often don't know where to put your title, author, and genre - and without those, it's not a cover. It will just be a random image with a caption. :blob_hmm:
A title looks best on a cover when it becomes part of it. That's the goal you will want to achieve.
 

DarkCrinkle

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Hmmm... I think you should try adding mood Lighting to your cover... Since they are in a dark swampy looking forest... You could overlay them with maybe a darker tinged of green or blue so that the characters blend in with the background better.

Personally, I prefer the one with multiple characters in the cover, but just maybe zoomed them in like around the upper torso so you can see the details more.

Also, since you're using CSP don't be afraid to abuse the Asset store. You can improve backgrounds and proportions just by using them.
 

PlixTrixaplik

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Whichever direction you go, it would be a good idea to amp up the magical star she's making in front of her. (A great opportunity to show what makes the magic in your book unique) and have that effect the background (if it's ice, add frost on the parts of the trees facing her. if water, add rain. if light, make it the main light source. etc)
Thanks for all the suggestions. I especially like the idea about the magic; it's forcing me to realize that I should really put some more work into my magic worldbuilding.
 
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