Firstly, I'd like to preface that I haven't read your book/story. And I would really advise that for anyone wishing to design the book cover, they need to read it to get a better idea of what they're trying to express with the cover design itself.
Second, this is gonna be a hefty read because there's a lot to say--well, there's a lot to explain, and I want you to understand the HOW and WHY and not just the WHAT so you can know better what you're looking for. I apologize in advance.
So I'm gonna get into the nitty gritty of it:
My biggest issue is Typography. In general it's not effective in being legible. The font isn't easy to read. That's important because you want the person to get a swipe of the book cover and well, be able to read it without putting in effort. The font gets in the way of that.
For those that don't know, fonts can be generally divided into Serif, Sans Serif, Script, and Decorative. There's others but that's the "essentials". What you have here is decorative. It's very stylistic and it's not "standardized" meaning it has elements that aim for it to be unique--different. The problem with decorative fonts is that they can be hard to read at times.
>>> I want to add that I'm proceeding with the assumption that the book will be available online and on screens rather than in publications/print. If so, the title itself can be less important in a way since the site itself will be showing the title. So it's a very real option to just forego it and focus on the visuals.
Another thing with the typography of the title is the color. This will connect to the other points to improvement but for now I'll emphasize the problem with it. And this is really a non-negotiable. DON'T DO A GRADIENT. It fucks up legibility and you just can't read shit with it (excuse my French). It takes a LOT of thought and design savvy (planning & conceptualizing) to come up with a text colored in gradients that work. So the general rule of thumb is to not.
When something you're trying to read changes color from one part to the other, it breaks the rhythm of understanding. It creates "noise" that gets in the way especially if the gradient is applied by letter and not by word or by whole (what I mean by this is that the gradient travels from one part of the letter to the other as opposed to from one part of the word to the other).
Lastly is scaling. There's a better word for it but I can't recall at the top of my head. Check out "Principles of Design", it should help. In terms of "scaling", the text is mostly the same size. That's a problem because you want the reader to see the most important words first. In this case "Ferdie" and "Elementals".
So that's for typography.
My recommendations:
1.) CHANGE THE FONT. Something less showy or less inconsistent shapes. You can still use a decorative font but maybe try a Sans Serif, there'a s lot of great ones out there but I do have doubts whether it'll supply the "vibe" of the story your looking for. Look out for other Decorative Fonts there's thousands and it can take a designer hours to even find the right one even from their own library so take your time and know it's gonna be a long process of looking if that's what you're going to do.
2.) CHANGE THE COLOR. At it's most basic rule, one color for all text is good. But if you want to have multiple colors, make sure it's per word and not per letter. In the case of "and the" make that the same color always. We'll get back to what type of color you should pick later, but just know if it's easier to read then it's better. If you're dead set on gradients, please don't have 3 colors. It's too much for text and it just makes the text & words disjointed. Go from one color to the other--ideally Analogous or Complementary colors (look those up if you don't know them), you can find A LOT of good examples and sites that can provide those colors.
3.) CHANGE THE SIZE. Make sure that the most important parts of the title are the largest and that they don't occupy so much space (like the text touching the left and right of the cover) that it becomes intrusive. Make the "and the" smaller. HIERARCHY! That's the term I'm looking for. Establish hierarchy in the text.
God this is long.
Next I'd like to talk about is the COLORS.
To be more succinct, you need contrast. If you were to pixelate the whole cover into three colors it would be dark orange, bright orange, and black. That makes it very...united. And while you want text to be united/cohesive, you don't want visuals to do the same because it'll look bland. Like a wash of one color. Like you worked with a limited palette which I sure hope you didn't.
So what are the problems?
One, you need to create contrast in HUE. That means don't do a swash of oranges. The one thing to ALWAYS remember is that color is never JUST THE COLOR. Color Theory creates a basic tenet that color is "relative" to another color. How it appears "changes" when it's beside another. Scarlet is not JUST SCARLET beside orange, it's inevitably going to look like another shade of orange despite being red.
I'm pointing this out because the characters are orange. You might say, well they're beige. Their skin toned. And I'm sure they are...but beside orange, it just looks like a lighter shade of orange. So we have to change that. Make sure that the character DOES not relate "color-wise" to the background. They're different and separate so make them appear that way.
Rule of thumb: Squint.
While you can see the man in the center, it's only because his clothing is black and not at all because he's a man. If he was naked, you wouldn't see him if you squinted. Same goes for the other characters.
Second, avoid too much shades of a particular color (oranges, blacks, etc.). This is especially concerning when we're talking in digital media as the thumbnails and images that will be shown of your cover will be small. Details get in the way when it comes to that sizing and you need the reader to know what they're looking at and not "be amazed" at the detail of what they're looking at. Trust me, people are blinder to detail than you think.
Recommendations:
1.) CONTRASTING HUE--COOL COLORS. I'm reminded of a particular Dune cover. It has a lot of oranges but thankfully a contrasting pop of green. This makes sure that you know the different things there rather than a scenery of orange sunsets--and is that a leather jacket? Why is leather jacket floating? My point is, make sure the characters are colored in COOL colors (blues, greens, violets, etc.) and I know it sounds like you're painting an alien. But it just means making sure the white isn't leaning towards yellow. The skin isn't leaning towards beige. It may sound like you're coloring their skin in Baby Blue but trust that when done right, Baby Blue looks like normal skin beside a sunset.
2.) SIMPLIFY. As much as we would like to show off, complexities are just noise to the unsuspecting reader or viewer. Simplify the shapes. Don't add so much shades of a certain color (light orange to reddish orange to dark orange, or black to dark gray to light gray). That Dune cover I mentioned does this in a very great way.
3.) TEXT COLOR. I talked about the color of the typography before. Now I'm going to really drive it home. MAKE THE TEXT COLOR NOT THE COLOR OF YOUR BACKGROUND. I know it looks like you're already doing that. And in a way you are. But it's just orange and orange and orange. Lose the black part where the text is and maybe make the text black. That black part at the top should really go. It's not doing anything (is it relevant to the story? If so then maybe, but you have to remember that you're trying to attract people who don't know anything about the story so it doesn't feel as relevant to them as it is to you, sadly).
Last thing I'll go through is the characters.
We can apply the previous lessons here already: too much of one color and its many many shades, very similar and close (analogous) colors, low hue contrast, etc.
But let's go back to hierarchy. Again, I do not know the story. I'm assuming the guy is the protagonist and the two women are main characters. But it is sadly a LOT.
Prioritize. Leave only one character, make them bigger, maybe even go waist up as opposed to showing up to the knees. And really make them the star of the cover. We are all sadly limited in what we can do to a certain space, so we have to establish what is the most important thing we want the reader to see.
As for the art style, it's good. But as other people have mentioned the style doesn't lend to a wider audience. Something to think about but ultimately not a deal breaker.
I'd also really really add more color to the characters. Black is not as generous as people think and a color (maybe a complimentary cool color) would work better. Like a dark blue for the jacket, maybe.
Recommendations:
1.) PRIORITIZE. The cover doesn't have enough room for all three. Make sure the reader sees whose the most recognizable and significant player of the story. Often this is the protagonist but you can pick someone else if you so desire. Just make sure you're saying "THIS PERSON WILL BE IN THE STORY" and not "This person with this persona and that person". The most important and often hardest work of design is removing the unnecessary.
2.) COLOR THEM DIFFERENTLY. Like for the text, you want the characters to be discernible from the background. The girl on the right for example. That's a really orange skin. And I get that it's darker and tanner skin. But again, beside so much orange, it just looks like another shade of orange. Same goes for the man. And if the left woman was very pale, make sure it's snow pale--tinged with blue and not just stark white. I cannot emphasize enough how colors relative to each other "bleed" into the other, so you want something with a color of its own, hopefully a complimentary color when you're trying to make something or someone pop out.
----
That's pretty much it. I apologize for the long ass reply. I hope you found it helpful. And that you're able to understand if not what you want to change then maybe a better direction of what you want an artist to do for you.
I sadly cannot do the artwork for you. There are great ways to commission for a book cover, I've heard of Fiverr but have no experience or enough info about it. There are many young artists out there willing to "test their mettle" and are providing services for a viable price so you can look out for them.
That's all, and good luck!
Also, for the love of god and all of humanity, DO NOT DO AI anything.
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