How do you make your eBook cover? This is the topic of third part of my #SteemitEducation tutorial, written in a personal #uLog style.
In my process to release my first book on steemit which included my #fiftywords stories. I'm sharing what I learned in this Three-Parter semi-educational post. Here are the links of [Part 1] & [Part 2.]
Here's "Fifty Words Collection" Announcement
In the first part I went the idea of turning posts into books, as well as how I collected the articles & came with content. The second part was about Formatting both the pages & paragraphs. This final part is about the Cover of the book.
The Process Of Making The Cover
I could have easily designed the cover in GIMP or Photoshop, and add it as an image to the book in google document. But I decided to make the cover using the dedicated service Canva.
Their " beautiful book cover in under 5 minutes" is debatable but I choose them a for two reasons only:
- I wanted the cover in PDF format instead of picture file format. That way I can combine it with the book using any PDF combine program.
- They offer many appealing templates that I could use to make my own.
- By then, I didn't know how to make the cover design in the size of pages. (sorry, make them three.)
Templates... Templates everywhere.
Using Canva Cover Maker
The online tool is powerful and easy. You can easily access many catchy fonts for titles, you can change the layout and add as many elements (text, images) to the cover. Some templates & items need premium paid account, but the amount of options available is amazing even in the Free plan. I love how easily I can access everything, the search feature alone deserves respect as it saves a lot of time navigating all the options.
The page size, while it can't be changed after choosing the template (in the Free plan,) you choose the size you want if you create a new cover without a specific template.
Though while all the pre-made covers are great. Being freely available to everyone is a huge disadvantage, so I wanted to add my own background.
Canva's Designer Interface.
I looked for some B5 cover and learned the size in pixels so I can design the cover GIMP, I looked for something that's related to my stories somehow... I thought for a long while but couldn't think of an idea that suits all the stories.
In the end I decided to use a picture of one of my #fiftwords as a base image... The only one that clicked all the buttons in my mind was the mountain image I used in my story "Broken by Avalanche." A Public Domain photo I could use.
After finishing photo-shopping the image all that was left was to import it in Canva, and add the rest of design on top of it. Great!!
I'm pretty sure you saw the end result by now,
The cover for the current, ALPHA Edition of my book.
I downloaded the cover as a PDF file, and after I combined it with the PDF from google using some random online tool. (though I have an alternative if the file size was too big.) Aaaand, I was good to go.
The Promo Images
I wanted my advertisement Announcement post to be eye catchy... What I imagined was a picture of the book in real life printed edition, held by real person hand. I knew that wasn't possible.
After some researching (have you noticed the pattern yet?) I found this person who teaches people how to make promotional covers of books, including 3D promo images. His website The 3D Book Cover Creator is a great tool that offers something close to what I had imagined.
So I began working on my promotional image,
using the 3D cover created in that link, and my Photo-shopping knowledge.
Once again I'm pretty sure you already saw the result.
While it didn't receive the number of clicks I expected, much less hoped and that left me a bit saddened. I'm still glad for the experience. I'm happy to learn new things.
Final Thoughts
So this is the third and last part of my process of creating "Fifty Words Collection" eBook, thanks for sticking with me until now. Next, I want to work on creating a landing page, I'll be glad if you can offer some ideas for that too.
If you haven't yet, you might want to check fifty word stories listed here. Or my longer ones like A Fascinating Legacy, A Murky liquid or Your Heart Would Remember.
