I am working on this one right now. The book deals with the fact that Freud didn't have the benefit of the all the advances that have been made in neuroscience than can now be used to complement analysis. I liked the fact that the brain scanning table resembled an analysts couch. It makes a nice contrast it with a victorian armchair.
Amnesty International
This is a t-shirt design I am working on. The only stipulation is that I have to use the barb wire element from their logo.
Sins of the Flesh
Rod Preece
This cover was one of several that won in the AAUP (Association of American University Presses) book and jacket show. The version on the bottom is the way the cover looked at the final stage of mechanical production. I spent about a day drawing the pig but it just wasn't working. At the eleventh hour I looked for an image in one of my royalty free books of line art and found a new pig. Thankfully the client agreed that it was an improvement. There was a time when those trusted line art books were put to good use as university presses don't usually have budgets for images. I think I will do a future post that just features those covers.
This cover was one of several that won in the AAUP (Association of American University Presses) book and jacket show. The version on the bottom is the way the cover looked at the final stage of mechanical production. I spent about a day drawing the pig but it just wasn't working. At the eleventh hour I looked for an image in one of my royalty free books of line art and found a new pig. Thankfully the client agreed that it was an improvement. There was a time when those trusted line art books were put to good use as university presses don't usually have budgets for images. I think I will do a future post that just features those covers.
Montreal's Best BYOB Restaurants
Joanna Fox
Without trying to over think this one too much, I went for a light hearted, fun approach.
Without trying to over think this one too much, I went for a light hearted, fun approach.
Amassing Power
David Massell
From the back cover: At the turn of the century American industrialist J.B. Duke set his sights on one of North America's greatest and most spectacular rivers - the Saguenay ... to develop, and sell its tremendous hydroelectric potential. I was given a stack of photos to work with and this one of Duke in a bowler hat jumped out at me. The curve of his hat and a curve in the famous river.
From the back cover: At the turn of the century American industrialist J.B. Duke set his sights on one of North America's greatest and most spectacular rivers - the Saguenay ... to develop, and sell its tremendous hydroelectric potential. I was given a stack of photos to work with and this one of Duke in a bowler hat jumped out at me. The curve of his hat and a curve in the famous river.
Another one in this ongoing series. Because showing a specific national currency wouldn't work, the problem became how do you show money without showing it?
Chess Pieces
David Solway
This is one from the vault. It was my first poetry cover. I had to scan all the actual chess pieces because I didn't have a camera yet.
This is one from the vault. It was my first poetry cover. I had to scan all the actual chess pieces because I didn't have a camera yet.
The Lost Franklin Expedition
I guess if you stick around long enough you not only do multiple covers for the same author but also on the same subject matter. The first is a poetry cover about the lost Franklin expedition. It is a three part fold that reveals the graves of the Franklin party on Beechey Island in the Canadian arctic on the last fold. The second book is about to be published and is a collection of letters from Lady Franklin in her quest to find out the fate of her husband.
Opening Doors Wider
Edited by Sylvia Bashevkin
This is another one of those covers where the title drives the design.
This is another one of those covers where the title drives the design.
Maisonneuve magazine
The Alcoholhic Monkeys of St. Kitts
I found this in my files when I was cleaning out my office. Maisonneuve is a Montreal based magazine - New Yorker with edge. It was kind of a dream job for a designer. I redesigned the entire magazine from front cover to back including the masthead. It is still going strong today. Check it out.
I found this in my files when I was cleaning out my office. Maisonneuve is a Montreal based magazine - New Yorker with edge. It was kind of a dream job for a designer. I redesigned the entire magazine from front cover to back including the masthead. It is still going strong today. Check it out.
A Fragile Social Fabric?
Raymond Breton et al.
This cover must have taken an entire day to produce. I literally had to thread each of those needles in photoshop.
This cover must have taken an entire day to produce. I literally had to thread each of those needles in photoshop.
Interview with Christopher Tobias
I just did an interview with Christopher Tobias that you can check out here. He is a very talented cover designer and you can check out his own covers here
Technonatures
White and Wilbert, editors
This cover plays off another cover I did recently. I find this happens quite frequently where cover solutions build and play off each other.
This cover plays off another cover I did recently. I find this happens quite frequently where cover solutions build and play off each other.
Gay Male Pornography
Christopher N. Kendall
I would put this cover into the "type only with a twist" category.
I would put this cover into the "type only with a twist" category.
From the brief: "The mother, Isabel, pays the rent with an all-night job delivering newspapers out of her van. And the climactic section involves a kind of quest road trip in which Isabel, now 20, and her grandmother set out in a Volvo on a quest to find Isabel’s mother. Eventually they do find her and her van alongside a prairie road. She’s burning papers from her life alongside the road."
My first idea which really intrigued me was to use the open doors of the black van referred to in the novel as symbolic open arms. I spent a lot of time trying to find an image of a van shot from above with the doors open to no avail. I finally found a site that had diecast models of cars for sale with doors that opened and I ordered a Ford Econoline black van. I had to pick it up from my U.S. postal box and when declaring it on the way back over the border, I got involved in a conversation with the custom guy who was really into cars. For about 30 seconds there I actually felt like I was one of the guys, talking about cars. In the end he had a hard time understanding what the hell it was, that I was planning to do with it. I think he is still trying to figure it out.
The publisher in the end wanted this novel to tie into another novel by the same author that had just been shortlisted for a literary prize so we went in another direction, still using the van though. Prairie landscapes with blue skies always seem kind of corny to me. The final version has a blackened sky which works.
Final cover
Suburban Legends
Joan Crate
From the brief: "the book makes an analogy between a suburban wife who is dealing with loneliness, divorce, aging, and copious amounts of winter (tons of winter imagery in this book, which I'd love for the cover to pick up on), and the character of Snow White, who sacrificed everything for the dwarves and was replaced by newer, flashier, fantasy figures.
This is the first sketch I presented.
In the end we opted for a more simplified approach with a more modern feel.
From the brief: "the book makes an analogy between a suburban wife who is dealing with loneliness, divorce, aging, and copious amounts of winter (tons of winter imagery in this book, which I'd love for the cover to pick up on), and the character of Snow White, who sacrificed everything for the dwarves and was replaced by newer, flashier, fantasy figures.
This is the first sketch I presented.
In the end we opted for a more simplified approach with a more modern feel.
An Irish History of Civilization
Don Akenson
This is a two volume series. There is nothing that original about having an image go over two covers in a series but in this case it seemed a nice way of using the image of the man in a boat on an Irish river. The boat in this case is called a 'coracle' and is specific to Ireland and Wales.
This is a two volume series. There is nothing that original about having an image go over two covers in a series but in this case it seemed a nice way of using the image of the man in a boat on an Irish river. The boat in this case is called a 'coracle' and is specific to Ireland and Wales.
I just got asked to submit cover designs to a design competition where the entries only use classic fonts and I was reminded of this quote by Vignelli. I only use about 4 or 5 different fonts on most of my cover designs. They are, in no particular order:
New Baskerville (will go with me to the grave)
Helvetica
Futura
Trade Gothic
New Century School Book
Sundre
Christopher Willard
From the brief:
Sundre is a town in Alberta. The cover for this novel is challenging because we don’t want Prairies and grain elevators, the big sky, etc, even though they figure in the story, because the book is really about a husband and wife talking about the past—but they are both dead.
In a nutshell the concept is headboard as tombstone.
From the brief:
Sundre is a town in Alberta. The cover for this novel is challenging because we don’t want Prairies and grain elevators, the big sky, etc, even though they figure in the story, because the book is really about a husband and wife talking about the past—but they are both dead.
In a nutshell the concept is headboard as tombstone.
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