Bad Cover Art…Redesigned: The Lake

Welcome to Bad Cover Art…Redesigned! Where I bring you the most horrible of all cover art I can find on the world wide web and try to come up with an alternative (that I hope is better).

This week I bring to you: The Lake by R Karl Largent

According to Amazon, The Lake is about a lake.

Okay but seriously. Definitely a lake involved. However, there is also a horrific product of a technological disaster. A mutant that defies all laws of nature and threatens to destroy all of mankind. (As long as all mankind comes near the Lake of course).

I now bring to you The Lake…redesigned!

Thoughts – 

I didn’t set out with anything particular in mind this week. I just trawled through Amazon again (further killing my recommendations list). When I found the above cover I chuckled to myself at the picture but still kind of liked the concept. I feel like this week is more about updating the original cover rather than being like ‘THE BADNESS…IT PAINS ME.’

I knew I definitely wanted to keep the kind of underwater feel of the original cover by just having the waves lapping at the top and then the font and whatever else under the water as it were. I checked out deviantart and luckily they had a few different backgrounds that used this concept.

Originally I just had the background and the font but then I thought I should at least try and have a little homage to the monster. It’s a monster book so I couldn’t really not involve the monster somehow but I definitely wanted to do it tastefully. So I had a look around for some monster brushes or tentacle brushes and found one I liked. Then I just slotted that in there to give the cover a little something extra and a little more intrigue.

I like the original because it kind of seems nostalgic and fun but I also like the redesign as a more modern interpretation and something you might see on the shelves if this book were to be released now.

Process – 

Step 1 – Adjusted the background to cut off the top and then made it darker and moodier using Colour Balance and Contrast.

Step 2 – Placed the text on and chose the Font. Then I duplicated the title font, made it green, cut the top off of it and placed it over the top of the original text. Then I reduced the opacity and smudged the edges up to make it blend a little better. I also added a drop shadow.

Step 3 – Added the tentacles in black and dropped shadow on it.

Elements – 

Font – Scorched Earth

Background

Monster

Thanks for taking a look! 🙂