How a Book Cover Comes Together

Sometimes you don't want to see how the sausage gets made, but when it comes to book covers, I think it's fun to see an idea unfold and then progress toward the finished product.

In this case, the book cover was for a new children's picture book that I'm bringing out shortly. (Shameless plug: It's winter-themed and will make a great Christmas present!) Usually, it's me drawing some sort of terrible sketch that my artist is somehow able to magically interpret into something fantastic. However, this time I didn't have any strong ideas for the cover, so I threw it open to my artist, Hannah Doerksen. She wanted to use the following Robert Munsch cover for inspiration.

I thought this was a great idea seeing as it sells the reaction to something rather than the thing to which the characters are reacting, which is exactly what I wanted for my book. So, rather than me creating the rough sketch, this time Hannah drew up something that I had to interpret. She mainly wanted to know which character to feature as the primary focus, so this is what she texted me prior to embarking on the actual drawing. 

For reasons that will become obvious shortly, I went with the image on the right. Over the weekend, Hannah continued to refine the cover. Here's her second draft.

I gave her a bit of feedback, and then she proceeded to a full ink drawing.

It was at this point I realized there were no women on the cover, so she made a small revision and then began coloring.

From there it was just a matter of some texturing and details. Then it was up to me to figure out what the title and credits would look like. This is what I came up with.

I'm very pleased with the result. All the files have been submitted, and I'm now awaiting a proof. I can't wait to unleash this book on the world!