First impressions aren’t always critical, but to a comic book, especially from a creator you don’t have an established fandom for, they kind of are.
Think of the cover as a gatekeeper or even a bouncer. It’s the very first thing anyone encounters about your project. So, if that gatekeeper is less than overly inviting, you’ll never get the opportunity to provide your sales pitch about your story.
In another analogy, you might have this amazing car, and its engine has all the horses in the world and the most comfortable interior you could ever imagine. However, if its bumper is falling off and the outside is puke-green, almost no one is going to want to take a look inside.
While you might not want to judge a book by its cover, there’s almost no getting around it when it comes to comics.
When I was working through a cover for a project I never got to release, artist Plaid Klaus (VOID TRIP, HIVEMIND) explained it this way:
Covers, in general, are extremely important. They carry the weight of a book on their shoulders and act as the first panel of the story to the issue IMO. Especially considering this is issue 01, this is your readers’ introduction to an entire series, so we want to give them the right flavor to properly wet their palette. In general, an issue one covers is not something you want to rush, so let’s look at this thing from every angle and make sure we nail it.
So, how did we tackle the collaboration?
First, I explained the story and the pitch. What were the goals of the story, the style and influences, its elevator pitch, and important key pieces.
Since the project has yet to be released, I won’t reveal what those bullet points were, but here’s how Plaid interpreted our conversations in 3 covers:
For cover A, Plaid said:
The Vagabond covers you mentioned all focused on a moment of stillness. This focus on quiet moments is a practice more commonly seen in comics from the East. It would be very clever to bring that tradition into your books, especially in the covers. Here, we have the character gazing into the water (the symbol for emotion) and literally reflecting internally while gazing on his image in the water. In general, I like that you are going for that juxtaposition between the violence of war and the stillness of ’the way’ chosen by the monks. Which is why I feel, if we go this direction, we could also add the slightest touch of violence to insinuate that this still moment is AFTER the battle. Perhaps an arm detached on the ground or something even more subtle. I chose to hold off on that element so you can get a sense of the sentiment of this direction and not distracted by the “twist” we would insert into the image.
For B:
You mentioned “300” and when I think Frank Miller, I think GRAPHIC, LOUD, and DIRECT. In a way, this direction is the total opposite of A. This seeks to condense the message and focus on the intensity of the violence. If you look at every Frank Miller comic, there is an element that is screaming at you. Dark Knight has the flash of a lightning bolt. 300 has a helmet and a bloody “300,” and SIN CITY, every cover was LOUD BLACK and LOUD WHITE and LOUD RED. So, if we leaned fully into that direction, I think something that just shows a sword helping to form the 13 on red would hit people very strongly on the shelf, but it does set a loud tone for the series, so that is the trade-off. Also, you could thematically use a different weapon as the “1” for variants (but this is me getting ahead of myself).
And finally, C:
This direction I think of as the “Middle Way”. There is the possibility to capture the quiet moments after battle with a loud object or color symbolic of the battle that fell before. Here, we take the imagery of the warrior reflecting into the water, but we focus on the reflection of his face, which shows the calm reflection juxtaposed with the blood stains from battle. This design could swing in a more quiet direction as well (this version is more violent using the bloody sword). While I like the sword looming over the reflection, in a way, it takes power away from the blood on the face. We could use a similar image, but perhaps with a bird lapping at the water. This makes the entirety of the scene more peaceful, and by process, the contrast of the bloody face is more impactful. I’m not tied to the layout, either. I was playing with the logo on the bottom, but this could easily be reconstructed.
Ultimately, we landed on C. And here’s how the rabbit hole further developed.
In image D:
This Image takes all the elements we discussed and assembles them together. The broken wheel, arrows of war, and the red pedals fall into the scene (alluding to blood/death). The cranes are present and calming in the scene, but to readers who are aware of the symbolism, they also represent Vajrapani. This is a moment after war has begun.
Or E:
When revising a design, I always feel it’s best to stretch additional elements and pull back for that “middle way”. Here, the signs of war are MUCH more subtle. The Wheel, not yet broken, because the war is to come. The only signs of war are the arrows in the wheel and a few red pedals bleeding into the scene.
From here, we kept widdling away at the cover. And after a discussion between the two images, we decided on E.
With E as our overall design now established, we focused on the coloring.
Option 1:
And option 2:
Our final decision was drum roll…ratatatatata…was the orange colored imaged, 1. Now, there were reasons we went in that direction, but that’s a conversation for another day.
If it was your choice, which cover would you have picked?