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Ok slight changes on the font to increase readablity. I won't post it into the window big because I'm really looking for the thumbnail readability which I think is better having split up the title. Also I borrowed a technique from FirstBastion with my font (thanks).
I'm also working on the adjustment suggested by cherpenbeck which involves just repositioning the gate to properly provide contrast with her right side, but that's going to require more photoshopping than I can face tonight.
Ah - okay - no worries! And you like the second render of Talon and Ebon the best. Cool!
Well, my atmospheres are going to take a little more tweaking to get right - namely where to put the volumetric sphere in relation to the characters and camera. So I'm going to try it in its own scene with my castle stuff on its own and once I get that where I like it I can figure out if I want to place the characters or if I want to do the atmosphere as postwork in photoshop. But as soon as I get something decent I'll post it.
Yeah I was reading up on some of that, and the camera has to be outside the sphere right? I have not had opportunity to practice, BUT there's a guy over on DA http://chemicq.deviantart.com/ doing quite a bit with the Iray atmospheres. You should take a look at his environmental stuff.
Yeah the camera has to stay outside. For the most part the camera seems to move with the sphere and I just adjusted the focal length to zoom in - so that isn't a big deal. But the problem is you can't see the sphere unless you have hidden lines turned on and in certain situations I can't see my subject throught the camera. Add to that, there are lights but also an HDR environment and you can adjust the size of hte sphere, along with the scale for adjustments to fog density. There are a lot of variables it just comes down to tweaking the right setting at the right time. lol!
Thanks for the link - I'll check it out!
It is a DAZ Studio Ambient Occlusion UberEnv2 3Delight render, Distant Army uses DAZ instances which are recognized in the 3Delight renderer, but neither iRay nor Reality/Luxrender have the code to display those same instances, unfortunately. The other thing Distant Army has is a series of built in Fog cameras for DAZ, which is what I used to generate the atmospheric muddling in the distance with a small amount of post to help with the wispiness.
Agreed, The compositional balance of the second Talon and Ebon render angle is more dynamic, but the Depth of Field blur of the horse's head and negatively impacts the image, I get the sense they're a team, but by blurring the horse, he loses focus and importance. I don't know if that's what you're going for. Looking forward to see them in some cool setting.
Manne, the new font actually looks readable. So yes, it has improved!
Thanks Cherpenbeck, I also did some checking on Amazon to see the size at which ebook icons display. Next time I post up, I'll format the image attachment in the body of the message to be standard ebook display size (if possible), so that it's a good comparison.
When it comes to the size of title or font, I would suggest erring on the side of "too big" rather than too small. We have to remember an ebook cover is selling the written word, and though the image is solidifying the idea of the book in a potential buyer's mind, its the title that is the brand. (the title is what they will remember and mention to their friends or search for.) All three together along with the written description/synopsis compell the customer to consider or reject purchasing. Now if the author is well known, on some covers half the realestate is plastering the famous author's name. Title or image may not be as important there, because its the authors themselves that have the following.
Almost missed this! The font is good. I see you have the decorative swirls. That gave me the idea - why don't you try something similiar to the original Heart's Ransom and Heart's War titles with the semie translucent color behind the letters. That will take the title "off the same layer" as the character because I can see her legs behind the letters an it was distracting. Does that make sense? Then that back ground color can be a bit darker and make the text pop.
WHOA! So . . . how 'bout them Yankees? lol! Kidding - I usually say that when I'm pretty much clueless but I'll take your world for it, First. lol! I've got a good grasp on a lot of things but Ambient Occulsion and Instancing I always get confused one even though I've gone over more than one tut on 'em.
I'm of two minds on the second pose. On one hand, Ebon is Talon's trusty steed, on the other, Talon should be the focus being the hero. What I might do is ease up on that blur a little if possible. But I check out this render that I'm attaching first and see which one shows the most promise.
You're pretty much dead on, First. There's been an one going debate on if authors should bother making titles and names readable on the thumbnails. The biggest thing that catches the attention is the color on the thumbnail. I read a study where cool colors get clicked on more than warm - but I don't know how much weight to put into stuff like that. However because my author name is my brand, I have made it a part of my branding to put my name in a certain font on my books. Cinzel is one I found on Google Web Fonts and it's a nice block with small caps. Not too weighty tho. So I always try to use that font on my name - It doesn't always work, but I try to be consistent with that.
Then there's also the premise of contrasting fonts. If you want your fonts to stand out, contrast them with a different style. For example, with my name being in Cinzel, a block style font, the title should be in a lighter script or serif type font to contrast the two.
If you have to go one way or an other, I would lean to making the author's name the most readable out of the two. The title is in big letters right next to the thumbnail, the authors name is smaller underneath that title. Amazon already accented the title for me so I'm going to accent what they didn't - my name.
Now here comes the really fun part. I'm really liking this render!
But first a disclaimer - I know it's too dark.
But remember I said I was gong to try the atmospherics in a different scene. Well the package comes with an HDR environment and a preset distant light as well as render settings. I left those in place while I was working on textures for Night Guard. I know I had Talon running around shirtless, but I wanted to try both to see which one looked best. I really like the armor - but I'm biased too! lol!
But the Night Gaurd outfit now sports a completely different studded leather armor vest. I added celtic knotwork trim too. I think the color really turned out nicely.
Unfortunately the "tunic" which I made into a nicer chainmail hauberk is not cooperating at all. It can't cope with his exaggerated pose. I even tried changing the mesh but unless I learn how to create a tunic from the ground up (which I'm starting on but still have a long ways to go before I can swing that). But if anyone knows how to fix the disaster please let me know. The shaders turned the metal black, but since I'm not sure if I'll use it, I didn't mess with them. The problem is he looks totally stupid without the tunic - so I gotta figure out how to get something to work if I'm going to go with him wearing clothing. lol!
Something went wonky on the texture for the belt but that should be an easy fix. You can't see his boots or his gloves but I've got a suede leather texture with a tooled leather texture accent.
The cape is another thing that has to go since it's shape refuses to cooperate and you can't even see all the hard work I put into it. I should render a shot of just that because I hand painted the fur on the collar and it turned out really cool too.
Now, with the dark background and the black horse, it's going to be tricky, but I'm seeing serious lighting potential here - are you guys seeing the same thing or am I just deluding myself? lol!
I too have just finished an e-book cover though I didn't necessarily use any DAZ models. I did use DAZ Carrara 8.5 to build, render and output all the 3D assets which were then brought into Photoshop for final compositing. The client wanted something chaotic. I would have preferred to do something a little more restrained but I'm still happy with the final result.
Pierre
That's done in web design a lot too. I think it's a pretty standard graphics art technique with fonts.
Ok but you're a pretty well known author. Would you say the same for an author who was just getting started?
I can never get those longer tunic's to work properly with anything other than a fairly bland standing pose.
Earlier that's why we were discussing the dynamic cloth for the cape, so you could make drape in a more life-like fashion. Nice thing about that is I am pretty sure the collar and the cape are two different pieces, so perhaps that's a possibility. I agree, you're going to have the potential for very dramatic lighting with a dark background: torchlight, moonlight, nice backlight and possibly even some lighting from below. Is this a scene from your book? At what time of the day/night does it take place? You're other scene was going for sunset.
Alrighty then, let's discuss genre expectations.
Apparently in the romance genre, guys don't get cold. Nor, apparently, do they require any protective gear when working in any number of potentially dangerous environments as many romance covers show them completely devoid of clothing from the waist up. Not pointing fingers, apparently the sci-fi ladies also never get cold or have need of protective gear other than a metal bikini. You've said that the book cover with the more SF/Fantasy feel didn't do well as well as your other covers specifically because it did meet up with genre expectations. Possibly because the hero was fully clothed and was wearing protective gear...just sayin' 
Jump forward to this render, which I like because it has a more realistic feel (having had the skin ripped off my hands by the reigns being ripped out of them, I applaud the gloves); my question is, will your readers identify with it? Also, as an aside in a dark picture like this, your shirtless hero is going to stand out more against the dark horse and background simply because he'd be in contrast with the horse.
Congratulations on your cover. I have never worked in Carrara. Was it difficult or easy?
That's a good idea. Because I'd already done the semi-transparent bar on the last mock-up I didn't want to use the same technique again; but maybe I'll try a different kind of shape or a more pronounced drop shadow. If nothing else, there's always mist.
Hi Mannie. I've been working in Carrara for so long that it's second nature to me. So the answer to your question regarding whether it was difficult or easy is that it was easy! The ships were really basic vertex objects that were extruded them modified. The texture mapping was really just projection mapping along the vertical plane. All the other elements like laser blasts, explosions and missiles were created in Photoshop where the entire image was composited and worked over until I was happy with it.
On a related note, I've tried plenty of 3D programs over the years going all the way back to my Amiga days and Carrara is the only one that ever "spoke" to me creatively. There's certainly more powerful 3D software out there but I always liked Carrara's interface and ease of use. It still took years of use to get totally familiar with it (not to mention years of subscribing to VTC.com's tutorials...thank you Marc Bremmer...) but I can now build nearly anything I imagine without too much effort. It certainly took a long time to get proficient but I definitely enjoy the program alot.
Pierre
Hi pfontaine2_6fda6a5e0e !
Your cover is looking really nice and genre-typical. Well, the scientist in me is asking if this fight is taking place in the atmosphere of a planet- othervice the emitting light from the back of the futuric vessel would show no beams, and the sun would show no halo of light.
And yes, I do know that these covers usually are about as realistic as space battles in films, with sounding crashes and sizzling laser beams where there is no atmosphere at all which could transport sound ...
But I'm just nitpicking ...
In truth, yes, because there's brand, and then there's image. When a complete and total newbie author hits the stage, they don't need to convey a newbie image, they need to convey an image that's equal to the top professionals. Just like landing that big job, you don't go to interviews wearing jeans and a t-shirt. You go wearing the business suit or whatever even if you have to borrow it from a friend or family member. They need to convey the image that says - what do you mean you've never heard of me? I'm the greatest thing next to sliced bread. lol! Because we're always running into "new to me" authors - for example I was on Twitch watching a stream and participating in chat. It was a D&D stream and the audience in chat was about 60-40% guys to girls, most in their late 20's or older.
No matter where I'm at on the www, my screen name is always as close to Kathryn Loch as I can get it because that's my brand. Well, when the members in chat found out that it wasn't someone using the same name and I was indeed Kathryn Loch, I discovered I already had a following within that community even though I was visiting for the first time. The many of the ladies had read my books. Some of the guys who were familiar with the books their wives and gf's read knew my name. But the rest of the folks didn't know me from Adam. So I was a new author to them, but they hit Amazon to check out my books that's for sure because I saw an uptick in my author ranking in SF/Fantasy immediately after (Amazon has great reports and charts for that sort of thing). The funny thing was, my ranking as a romance author stayed he same. It was a D&D stream and my SF/Fantasy numbers saw a double-digit percentage increase. lol!
So my advice on that one - do nothing to advertise the author is a newb - that comes across on its own because nobody's perfect. Do everything to make people think they just haven't been in the loop if they don't recognize the author's name . . . but they are now, and this author's cool factor is off the charts.
Had to laugh about the gloves. In that pic of me when I was a kid - notice no gloves. But as an adult - wore them all the time and my trainer would give me shit if I forgot them.
Well the chainmail tunic and the cape with the fur piece are two different things. But I can't help but notice it's no wonder the garments don't want to fit - they're absolutely tiny when it comes to the meshes! Wow! I've tried reading articles on transferring morphs from G1 clothing to G2 but the mesh is so tiny I don't know if it will work or if I'm just wasting time. To be honest - this has been in my wish list for awhile now and is even more tempting now. http://www.daz3d.com/knight-guard-for-genesis-2-male-s Of course OptiTex has the dynamic medieval bundle but that's for M4 and I've got a couple of things for M4 that aren't translating to G2 or Gianni. I think the only reason Night Guard does as well as it does with my stuff is because DAZ did a G2 upgrade on it. Because the original files for NG are for Genesis - DAZ has a newer file setup for G2 (that's what happens when you have to start rooting around in files for all the texture stuff. lol!) In fact, I see a ton of medieval stuff that's very nice in the marketplace, but 98% is for M4 or earlier. I've been using Gianni as a basis for all my stuff - looking at the size comparison of the characters - no wonder it doesn't fit even with the "fitting morphs".
As to your question "is this a scene from your book" yeah - kinda. There are a couple of scenes it could apply to but nothing specific unless I put Gwen on the horse. In the story, I set the entire thing up nicely so it makes sense that she's on the horse and he's not and it's definitely an action scene (they're being attacked by brigands, the guards that accompanied them are nowhere to be found, and Talon is trying to get Gwen out of there). But I fear that if I tried to convey that scene literally without the set up, it wouldn't make sense. I was going to go with the pre-rafaelite image idea but I'd have to tone down Ebon's pose big time. The funny thing is - if I did convey the scene accurately then he really wouldn't have a shirt on but he'd also be barefoot too. Tough to explain without going into details of the entire scene but they were on a medieval version of a picnic when they're attacked. During that time part, of the armor a knight wore was mail hosen that protected the legs but also covered the feet - no boots. There are also other scenes where this could apply quite easily since Talon is involved in a number of historical battles when the story takes place.
That being said - while most of the heroes and heroines on romance covers usually lack clothing - one must remember the basic reason for historical romance is the premise of "knight in shining armor." There are plenty of covers out there with the hero in armor or period clothing. Of course many times it also has this strange super-hero spandex look to it even though it's metal armor. But an interesting side note is that historians have studied plenty of skeletons and have determined a majority of those who were involved in fighting and knightly combat were big dudes - not tall but definitely brawny - in fact most of the time the right side was overdeveloped when compared to the left.
It's also funny that you're exactly right - if I removed the armor he would stand out better. lol! Well, might as well try with and without the armor and see how it goes with that. In the meantime, I'm still eyeballing that Knight Guard pack. lol!
Very nice! And if the client is happy with it - there ya go. If he doesn't have to worry about the appearance of the thumbnail then it definitely stands out. Shrink it down and it's hard to see. But not everyone focuses on the thumbnail issue either. Nicely done!
Yes, I understand the criticism. I asked the client what he wanted; an image that was scientifically accurate or something more dramatic or both. He wanted something dramatic with all the bells and whistles. Thanks for the kind thoughts!
Well figured out a solution for the lighting and was able to believably brighten up the hero. Letting something sit for a few days, always triggers new ideas and solutions.
Sweet when will you post it?
hehe - I was going to ask the same thing, Manne.
I at least have something to post finally! Yay!
I was tearing my hair out trying to get this stuff to fit. I read a bunch of Sickle Yield's tutorials and I htink my brain almost exploded. But I finally got it together and got one of the tunics to work properly. While it's split down the middle like a typical riding surcoat, I found out that it's not really split the mesh still wants to stay together despite the gap. But I was able to get it shaped decently and I can take care of the rest using a layer mask in photoshop.
This render is with "moderate" lighting, I'm experimenting with more dramatic lighting, but I'm not sure if it might be too garish. So I thought I'd post this one and see what y'all thought.
It depends.
For an illustration, this looks very good. For a book cover, it might be too dark. Can't see what it is in the thumbnail. His face togester with the saddle is just an unrecognizable blot of color in a dark field.
I originally had the highlander hero holding the longsword, but once I realized he should be holding a torch the lighting sort of resolved itself and the pose had a better balance. Added a moonlit sky to justify the highlights and shadows.
Lokks better with the torch. I would use the Title in white, blue is hard to read.
Hey FirstBastion, thanks for posting that up. Nice job. I agree with Cherpenbeck the blue is harder to read, but I like the tighter shot in the first rendition better. However, I think it might look better if you killed the bottom torch.
The blue title was really only a test, I sort of broke my own high contrast rule on purpose just to see how it would look. The placement color and font are only placeholders for now. I do think its always good to try a few different possibilities of framing to see which one feels more compelling. I agree the closeup make the hero a better focus, and the wider shot offers a better sense of the siege world, both valid ways to go.
Good Morning all. WIP. I like the thumbnail as I think I got the font to be pretty legible, but let me know. Comments and crits always welcome.
Manne, Hive Queen is a seriously cool scifi image and even at thumbnail it draws the curiousity. But when you look at it full size it gets better. Female hero in a cool scifi outfit with an ancient weapon suggesting some sort of time travel element, and the graffitti on the wall. Well well, they're supposed to be transmission line towers, but at first or second glance, they almost look like a pictograph image hand drawn, of a woman in futuristic attire a preistess maybe, sort of like someone scrawl a prophesy on the wall, and here now we have the embodiement of that prophesy, bringing light into the fogged darkness. The flourescent blue works really well too. I also like the strength of the fonts for both title and author. You might want to consider a different font, same size just different. The image deserves it.
A more sci-fi font? For the title or the Author or both? Is the current font choice just too plain for the image? I uploaded a 2nd thumbnail. Let me know, and thank you for the AWESOME comments.