have u ever made a book cover that looked good at first but then realize it's actually shit? because i feel that too! And for my almost 3 years in making graphics here are some life changing tips i learned along the way!!

these tips aren't professional they're just purely out of my experience and yours could be different!

(applicable for both mobile and desktop designers)

-you see, textures are AMAZING but i have realized that having ONE background and adding other elements to it is better than just putting together a texture background

-you can add the texture to it but using textures plainly as your background isn't really good (imo)

-it also depends on the genre of the book cover you are gonna make

bad ex:

-this one's a fantasy cover and i made this long ago. I just made layers of textures in the background and that's it!

-this book cover is very bad (imo) because you don't get a perspertive of where he is, is he in a forest? in a castle? in a what?? you don't get to feel that it's a fantasy book!

good example:

[credits to the owner]

-this is very good! u know it's gonna be sci-fi/futuristic because of the building behind the character! And the designer of this graphic didn't just put the background and then the characters but! she/he used textures too!

-it depends on how u use your resources!!

-looking for resources that fits your needs are very very hard!

-i find it easy that if you are looking for backgrounds, do not directly for search it on google because most of the time, it has bad quality

try to search from these sites:

pixabay.com

pexels.com

unsplash.com

(the photo quality is amazing!)

and when searching try to use these words:

"streets"

"city at night"

"castles"

"forest"

"fantasy backgrounds"

"dark backgrounds"

etc.

-here are the things i always keep in mind when looking for characters/faceclaims

for fantasy/sci-fi - i always use pngs of the faceclaim

for humor/romance - i use photopacks or photos of the person from photoshoots

for horror/thriller - i use png packs and photopacks

i don't always use pngs because some pngs don't fit the book cover. just try what works for you~

-i used to just download bgs and pngs and forget the color scheme but COLOR SCHEMES are life savers! U have to have them!

examples:

black,red,white,gray

white,black,violet

white,black,gray+(one light color)

see? color scheme bring out the beat of your graphics! so choose wisely!!

I wish to share more tips with you but that's all i've got for today!! I hope this will help u in your graphics designing journey! If you want to hear or read more tips, just comment down below!!! or ask some questions and i will answer them on the next tips update!

adios!

lexa xoxo